Walmart’s Flipkart has backed Shadowfax, a logistics startup, in a new $60M financing round since the retail company functions to reinforce its logistics system in the state.
Flipkart directed the Series D investing round for a four-year-old startup, Shadowfax co-founder & chief executive Abhishek Bansal, informed TechCrunch in a conference.
All the current sponsors, Nokia Growth Partners, Mirae Asset-Naver Fund, Qualcomm Ventures, World Bank-backed IFC, and Eight Roads Ventures also took part in the round that brings the total raise of startups till now to $100 million.
The fresh round valued Shadowfax at around $250M, two people well-known with the substance told TechCrunch. Flipkart has single-handedly given around $30M to the round, they mentioned. Shadowfax refused to remark on the assessment and individual input of its sponsors.
Shadowfax functions a strangely developed business-to-business logistics system in over 300 cities in India. Moreover, the startup operates with nearby stores to make use of the real estate to store catalog and an extensive network of freelancers for the delivery.
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Shadowfax’s Bansal said, “Anyone with a bicycle or a bike or a truck can join our platform and deliver items for us.” The startup, which even has set up its fulfillment hubs and warehouses, presently processes over 10M deliveries a month.
He even said, “So we have not built any assets on the ground. We are essentially bringing the inefficiency of the market on to the platform and catering large enterprises.”
This network of logistics holds good in different categories, including e-commerce, fashion, hot food, and grocery.
He said, “It’s a very reliable logistics network. And each grocery store is only serving to users in a kilometer radius, so the delivery could be incredibly quick. These grocery stores, whose staff also participates in delivery, only have to work with us for a few hours in a day. It’s an easier way for them to make extra money.” The podium has amassed over 100,000 delivery associates.
Flipkart, which is one of the clients of Shadowfax, said it is going to discover methods to work more directly with the startup going forward deliberately. Kalyan Krishnamurthy, the chief executive of Flipkart, said Shadowfax is going to assist the organization, “significantly reduce delivery time and provide superior customer experiences across product categories.”
Adding further, he said, “By leveraging kirana stores and the deep delivery capabilities of Shadowfax and other Flipkart-led innovations, we are building a strong foundation to make inroads into a dynamic hyperlocal consumer market.”
Flipkar owns chance in different logistics firms, which include QikPod, a parcel-delivery locker service and Blackbuck, a freight service provider. E-commerce organizations globally are progressively attempting to presume enhanced regulations over their logistics. Alibaba, Chinese giant said the previous month it was driving an extra $3.3B into Cainiao, a logistics organization it co-founded. In current years, it has improved its stake in additional logistics agencies, including ZTO, YTO, STO Express, & Best Logistics.
The space of logistics is progressively viewing more desirability in India as a fresh wave of startups effort to tackle the in-competencies in the area. Just like Shadowfax, Elastic Run is even tapping the millions of pop & mom stores that small cities, villages and towns in India and has or else established hard to hit for e-commerce giants, as well as super-chain retailers.
Bansal said, “Currently, when customers purchase a Smartphone from an online shopping website, the delivery takes a day or two. We can deliver it in an hour.”
That is music to the ears of Flipkart. Smartphones are a few of the hottest-selling products for the largest ecommerce giants of India and it is even seeking to come into the food retail business.
