Snapdeal acquires Sequoia backed Shopo.in
Snapdeal.com, India’s largest online marketplace has acquired the assets of Shopo.in, an online marketplace for Indian designer and handcrafted products. Shopo’s investors included Sequoia Capital and Sashi Reddi, among other angels. In a span of two years, the company, started by Theyagarajan S and Krithika Nelson (Nelson had to leave the company a couple of months ago due to personal reasons), has built a wide assortment of handcrafted products across categories such as apparel, accessories, home décor, among others.
Speaking about this acquisition, Kunal Bahl, Co-Founder & CEO, Snapdeal.com said
The Indian designer and handicrafts market is large but highly fragmented and the demand for such products is tremendous. Snapdeal’s mission is to provide a platform for small businesses across India to be able to sell to consumers nationally. The team at Shopo has built a very strong supply side for niche Indian handicraft and designer products. With this acquisition, we will now provide these unique products at great prices to Snapdeal’s 20 million members, and warmly welcome Shopo’s sellers to leverage Snapdeal’s nationwide reach.
Snapdeal itself recently raised a fresh round of $50 million from eBay which brought the company back into the reckoning after some dampening thoughts about the company's growth. Shopo also generated some great traction initially and went on to raise funding from Sequoia but their growth had plateaued to an extent. The acquisition strengthens Snapdeal's proposition and gives Shopo a good exit.
Stay tuned for more details.