Consumer Electronics Startup boAt Raises INR 25 Cr Debt Funding From InnoVen Capital

Consumer electronics startup boAt, through its parent company, Imagine Marketing Pvt Ltd, has raised INR 25 Cr (around $3.4 Mn) in debt from venture debt and specialty lending firm InnoVen Capital.

Founded by Aman Gupta, a chartered accountant, and Sameer Mehta, a former executive director at Kores (India) Ltd in 2016, boAt has over the years expanded its product range and offers headphones, earphones, speakers, travel chargers & premium cables. The company claims to be keeping consumer needs and desires at the core of its design. According to a report by IT market research and advisory firm International Data Corporation (IDC), boAt was ranked No 1 in the earwear segment for 2019, with a market share of 27.3%.

“We are delighted to strengthen our partnership with InnoVen Capital. We continue to stay focused on delivering on our brand promise to our boAtheads. It’s been an exciting journey to build one of the leading Homegrown Digitally Native brands from India but we are more excited about the next phase as we expand our product offering,” said Sameer Mehta, cofounder boAt.

InnoVen Capital had also invested around INR 16 Cr (around $2.1 Mn) in boAt in July 2019. Before that, boAt had raised INR 20 Cr (around $2.9 Mn) in venture debt from Sachin Bansal’s BAC Acquisitions. Prior to that, the company had raised INR 6 Cr (around INR $872,000) from Fireside Ventures in May 2018.

boAt’s products are made through contract manufacturing in India and China, and are available both online (Amazon, Flipkart, Myntra, Snapdeal, etc.) and offline (Croma Retail, Vijay Sales, Poorvika Mobiles, etc). In February this year, Inc42 reported that boAt had decided to cancel a sale of its products due to the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic in various countries, including China, where 99% of boAt’s headphones are manufactured. The company was reportedly planning to start manufacturing its product line in India, as it anticipated further difficulties in procuring items from China amid the US-China trade war as well as the pandemic.

The company claimed that it sold 8,000 to 10,000 units every day in 2019, and was hoping to sell over 10,000 units daily this year. Gupta added that boAt had registered gross sales worth INR 100 Cr in the financial year 2018 and was planning to achieve INR 500 Cr in 2021. He noted that the company had a 30% repeat rate.