- News
Featured 
Recent
craftsvilla-co-founded-by-one-year-mba-iim-a-pgpx-alum-manoj-gupta-raises-19-million-in-series-b-funding
Craftsvilla, Co-Founded by PGPX Alum Manoj Gupta Raises $19 Million in Series B Funding
0Craftsvilla has announced a $ 19 Million (Rs 110 Cr) round led by Sequoia Capital and supported by existing investors Lightspeed and Nexus and new investor Global Founders Capital. This comes as a shot in the arm for the company that is building India’s largest marketplace for ethnic apparel and products.
The company plans to use the funds to expand its team in India, and to invest in scaling its technology platform as it embarks on its next phase of growth.
Craftsvilla.com offers close to 2 million unique products from more than 12,000 artisans and designers across the country.
The Mumbai-based company was founded in 2011 by CEO Manoj Gupta, an MBA (PGPX) from IIM Ahmedabad. Manoj, who was earlier with venture capital firm Nexus, which invested in retail powerhouse Snapdeal — saw the rise of online commerce and decided to jump into the space himself as an entrepreneur.
Speaking to Business Standard about the funds raised, Manoj Gupta said, “We started Craftsvilla with the objective of providing people across the globe a way to reconnect with their roots. Today, we are one of the fastest growing e-commerce companies in India with a profitable business model. We are excited to partner with Sequoia and get the benefit of their company building experience in taking Craftsvilla to new heights.”
“We are now facilitating over 100,000 transactions per month, and growing rapidly. This Series B funding will help us in building a brand, and in investing in technology to serve our merchants and customers better. We are aspiring to be 10x our current size by the end of this year, with 20 million products on our platform”, said COO & Co-founder of Craftsvilla.com, Monica Gupta.
“Craftsvilla.com has brought the traditionally disorganised ethnic craft industry on to a structured platform and has enabled micro-entrepreneurship at a scale here so far not seen in this sector,” said Sandeep Singhal, Managing Director, Nexus India Capital Advisors.
As per analysts the company’s core metrics point towards a bright future. The company has achieved 4x growth in revenue over the past six months that too organically – marketing costs accounts for less than 10% of the company’s sales revenue and organic traffic contributes two-thirds of the total traffic to the website.