Mumbai: Premji Invest is leading a ₹270 crore ($35 million) Series B funding round in Giva, a new-age omnichannel jewellery company. Existing investors A91 Partners and Aditya Birla PE will also participate in the round, a senior company executive said.
“While ₹200 crore are coming as primary funding into the company, around ₹70 crore of secondary stake sale has also happened where some of our existing angel and early-stage investors have partly exited,” said Ishendra Agarwal, founder, Giva.
According to him, the company’s valuation has doubled since it last raised Series A funding of $10 million in 2022. “We will use the capital to expand our physical footprint across cities,” said Agarwal adding that currently, about 85% of the sales comes from our online channels. “Offline has been expanding very fast. Over the next three years, we see it becoming a 50-50 split between online and offline,” he added.
Its Series A funding round was led by Sixth Sense Ventures, A91 Partners and other investors like India Quotient, Grand Anicut Angel Fund, and Founder’s Bank Capital.
Founded in 2019 by Ishendra Agarwal, Nikita Prasad and Sachin Shetty, Giva is an omnichannel jewellery brand that sells across third party platforms, its app and offline stores. The company wants to take its store count to around 300 stores by end of the current financial year from 50 presently.
Currently, the company is clocking an annualised revenue run rate of around ₹220 crore, up from ₹170 crore it earned in FY 23. “We are contributory margin positive and are targeting (earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation), ebitda profitability in the next nine to 12 months,” Agarwal said.
The company is planning to enter newer segments in search of further growth. “Right now, we have minimal fine silver jewelry, but then we will also be exploring other areas of silver jewelry which is colored stones, which is going into regional elements of jewelry among other things to build Giva as the one stop shop for silver jewellery buying,” Agarwal said.
“Silver jewellery is a $4 billion opportunity in India with the organized market share at less than 7%. Silver jewellery offers an attractive alternative to other fine jewellery options such as gold, platinum, etc. at an affordable price point for casual and everyday usage. GIVA has emerged as a category leader with its focus on fine silver jewellery, design offerings and customer-centricity,” said Varun Khandelwal, principal – Investments, Premji Invest said in a company release.
Omnichannel jewellery players are seeing a surge in business. Mint reported earlier this month that Global hedge fund Steadview Capital has entered the race to acquire significant minority stake in omnichannel Indian jeweller Bluestone for $100 million. Other players in the market are also seeing heightened investor interest.
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Updated: 05 Jul 2023, 05:00 AM IST