Online classifieds platform Quikr raises $150 M from Tiger Global and Kinnevik among others
Cross category classifieds major Quikr has raised $150 million in a financing round led by Tiger Global Management and Investment AB Kinnevik as well as first time investor, Steadview Capital.
The raised capital will be used in company’s fast growing mobile business and in key categories where Quikr has leadership positions, including goods, cars, real estate, jobs and services.In March last year Quikr had raised $90 million funding round from a group of investors led by Swedish investment firm Investment Kinnevik. According to some media reports, with this round Quikr had raised $350 million of total funding across eight rounds of funding.
“We’ve undertaken this transaction to further consolidate our leadership in the Indian classifieds market. Our strategy of innovating for the local market has played out really well and we intend to continue to do that as we go forward,” said Pranay Chulet, Founder and CEO of Quikr.
Currently, Quikr has more than 30 million monthly consumers and small business users across 1000 cities in the country.
Like e-Commerce majors shifting their focus towards mobile from web, online classifieds platforms are also betting big on mobile. In past Quikr had launched chat feature on mobile to avoid hassle with unwanted calls faced by users.
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“Quikr has built its market-leading position by steadily innovating new features, such as messaging, which are rooted in its deep understanding of India as a market and mobile as a medium. We are excited to be a part of this growth story, which offers millions of Indians an easy way to transact with one another across a large number of categories,” said Lee Fixel, Partner, Tiger Global.
According to a Ficci-KPMG report on media and entertainment - Online classified market is dominated by job and matrimony but users seem to be more tend to buying and selling a range of used products through portals like Quikr and OLX.
Besides them JustDial is another strong player in the horizontal classifieds play with 11.8 million listings.
Niche online classifieds like auto has been witnessing significant growth. Over the past few years more than $100 million poured into India’s auto classifieds space. After product based e-Commerce and online cab space, now online classifieds is going through an interesting phase and venture capitalists are bullish in verticals like realty.
Japanese investment fund Softbank led a $90 million investment in Mumbai based Housing.com along with Falconedge and other investors.