Exclusive: Ecommerce Unicorn FirstCry Creates $100 Mn ESOP Pool

Supam Maheswari-led kids marketplace FirstCry has created a $100 Mn ESOP pool. On January 21, 2022, the ecommerce unicorn passed a resolution to create an ESOP pool of 1,10,80,827 equity shares with immediate effect.

In order to find the worth of the new ESOP pool, Inc42 has taken the equity share price of INR 702.17 including premium. This is the price at which FirstCry had allotted equity shares to Premji Trust last year in March to raise INR 95 Cr. 

When calculated, the ESOP pool size stands at $103 Mn (INR 778 Cr). It must be highlighted that ESOP pool worth might be much higher depending on the valuation it is seeking for its upcoming round. 

The development comes just a few days after CCI gave a nod for the investment of around $100 Mn in a secondary sale by NIIF (National Investment & Infrastructure Fund) in FirstCry. 

Earlier this month, reports suggested that NIIF was buying shares of FirstCry from its largest shareholder SoftBank. This means the investment will not be channelled to FirstCry’s coffer. Early investors such as Chiratae Ventures and Newquest Capital Partners will also be selling some of their shares from the Pune-based startup. 

The IPO-bound startup was founded in 2010 by Supam Maheshwari and Amitava Saha. FirstCry offers different categories of baby and kids products from clothing to other essentials. 

With a user base of 4 Mn+ and a retail footprint of over 300 stores, FirstCry is spread across 125 cities. The Pune-based startup claims to offer 200K baby and kids products across 2,000 brands.

FirstCry had entered the unicorn club in 2020, after raising $296 Mn (INR 2,120 Cr) in a Series E round from Japan-based SoftBank’s Vision Fund.

Earlier this week, logistics startup Xpressbees, a spin-off company of FirstCry achieved unicorn status after bagging $300 Mn from TPG, and Blackstone. In December 2021, FirstCry’s roll-up ecommerce venture GlobalBees also entered the unicorn club after bagging $111 Mn from SoftBank and FirstCry.

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