FreshMenu Bags $6.5 Mn From Former Blackstone MD’s Fund

Foodtech and cloud kitchen startup FreshMenu will be raising $6.5 Mn or INR 50 Cr from former Blackstone India MD Cyriac Mathew’s Florintree Advisors. The startup in an extraordinary general meeting held in the last week of March decided to allot 1.4 Mn Series C non-cumulative compulsorily convertible preference shares and 100 equity shares to Florintree. 

The move seems to be a part of a bigger round that FreshMenu is likely to raise in the coming months. 

The startup is also increasing its authorised share capital from existing INR 9 Cr to INR 10.7 Cr. Apart from this, FreshMenu will also add 1,86,623 ESOP options to its ESOP 2015 Scheme, thus expanding the pool to 3,11,623 ESOP options. 

Founded in 2014 by Rashmi Daga, FreshMenu offers a meal kit delivery service from its cloud kitchens located in Bengaluru, Mumbai, Delhi-NCR, Kolkata, among other cities. 

FreshMenu was among the startups that were severely impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Even before the pandemic, Bhavish Aggarwal’s Ola Foods, and IPO-bound Oyo wanted to acquire the cloud kitchen startup to strengthen their respective product offerings. 

The startup is backed by marquee investors such as Lightspeed Partners, Zodius Capital, and Innoven Capital, among others. In 2015, it raised $5 Mn in Series A from Lightspeed Partners. A year later, it raised $17 Mn in Series B round from Zodius Capital, among others. 

Since then, the startup has been raising smaller rounds, mostly bridge rounds, to continue its operations. 

At present, FreshMenu is facing competition from publicly-listed Zomato, Swiggy, cloud kitchen aggregator Curefoods, Rebel Foods, among others. 

The startup saw its revenue from operations drop to INR 50 Cr in FY21 from INR 104.5 Cr in FY20. The startup’s total revenue stood at INR 51.3 Cr in FY21, almost a 51% drop from INR 104.8 Cr in FY20.

However, the startup managed to reduce its expenses to INR 58.6 Cr in FY21 from INR 115.8 Cr in FY20. FreshMenu also managed to reduce its loss to INR 7.3 Cr in FY21 from INR 11 Cr in FY20.

The development was first reported by news portal Entrackr