Exclusive: Reliance Owned O2O Fashion Platform Fynd Converts Into Public Company

Reliance acquired ecommerce platform Fynd is converting into a public company. As per the regulatory filings accessed by the Inc42,  Fynd’s registered company Shopsense Retail Technology Private Limited will be converted into Shopsense Retail Technologies Retail Limited. 

As per Inc42 sources, Fynd is converting into a public company to comply with SEBI’s regulations which seeks a subsidiary of a listed company to convert into a public company. The filings further revealed that one the cofounders of Fynd – Harsh Shah who was supposed to retire will be reappointed as a director in the startup. 

Reliance’s Harish Madnani, additional director at Fynd will also be appointed as a director in the startup. Madnani had earlier been chief financial officer of Jio Payment Bank, Marks and Spencer Reliance India Ltd, and Reliance Jio Media Private Ltd.

Founded in 2012 by Farooq Adam, Harsh Shah, and Sreeraman MG, Fynd is an omnichannel fashion platform which sells products across various categories – including clothing, footwear, jewellery, and accessories, from prominent brands in the country. 

It enables small and medium sized businesses to go online by helping them list their inventory on multiple ecommerce platforms such as Amazon, Nykaa among others. The startup also helps these small businesses with last mile logistics delivery.  The Mumbai-based startup optimises delivery time by sourcing products from the outlets nearest to the customer. 

The startup currently employs more than 250 employees spread across design, engineering, data science, operations and sales. It claims to deliver products from over 600 brands and 10,000 stores.

Prior to the acquisition, Fynd had closed an undisclosed round in its Series C round led by US tech giant Google in 2018. Existing investors Kae Capital, IIFL, Singularity Ventures, GrowX, Tracxn Labs, Venture Catalyst, Patni family office and HongKong based Axis Capital had participated in the round back then. The startup in 2017 had raised $3.4 Mn across three rounds.

As per sources, Fynd will be clocking INR 100 Cr in revenues by end of March 22 and is actively hiring talent across its teams.  Last year, Fynd has also partnered with Walmart-owned Flipkart before the festive sale of Diwali.  The purpose of the partnership was to extend Fynd’s omnichannel strategy and help more brands sell with ease on Flipkart.

In 2019, Reliance Industries Limited acquired an 87.6% stake in Fynd for INR 295 Cr (about $42.33 Mn), according to Reliance Industries’ filings in the Bombay Stock Exchange. According to the terms of the deal, Reliance Industrial Investments and Holdings Ltd, a subsidiary of RIL, has an option to further invest up to INR 100 Cr by December 2021 in Fynd.  Fynd had a turnover of INR 4.84 Cr, INR 0.70 Cr and INR 0.52 Cr, with a loss of INR 18.64 Cr, INR 10.64 Cr and INR 1.51 Cr in FY 2018, FY 2017 and FY 2016 respectively.

The online fashion market is on the rise majorly due to massive shift in consumer behaviour caused due to the ongoing pandemic. The online fashion market was valued at $17.8 Bn in H1 2021 and is expected to touch $43.2 Bn by 2025, as per Inc42’s report — Decoding India’s $100 Bn+ Opportunity. The report further highlighted that the online fashion market contributes to 33% of the entire fashion market in the country and is likely to touch 50% of the market share by 2025.