HomeLane Plans To Use The Funding Towards Expansion And Marketing
Bengaluru-based online home furnishing startup HomeLane has raised $3.54 Mn (INR 24 Cr) from Brand Capital, the strategic investment arm of the media giant Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd (the Times Group) in a fresh round of funding.
Prior to this, the startup raised a total funding of $64.5 Mn (INR 413 Cr) with backing from Accel Partners, Sequoia Capital and RB Investments amongst others. It plans to use this latest funding for expansion and strengthening its brand to attract customers. It counts Accel Partners, Sequoia Capital, Baring PE, Aarin Capital, GrowthStory & RB Investments as its investors.
Commenting on the development, Srikanth Iyer, co-founder and CEO, HomeLane said, “With HomeLane, our goal is to offer our customers a smoother and more streamlined home designing experience enabled by technology. We have been working towards offering Indian homebuyers an unbeatable combination of transparency and predictability, which is unheard of in this largely unorganized business.”
Founded in 2014, HomeLane is an online provider of home fit-out solutions. It offers personalised design service to customers through their panel of interior designers who work with them to customise the house designs. At present, it operates in Bengaluru, Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Delhi-NCR.
It also acquired modular furniture platform Capricoast for $14 Mn (INR 90 Cr) in November 2017 and later announced its shut down after a month, while absorbing its 120 ,member team in HomeLane.
The startup plans to double the number of experience centers in existing markets by end of this year and is looking to achieve $29.57 Mn (INR 200 Cr) in run-rate by March 2019.
As an organised online home furnishing marketplace, HomeLane offers an industry-first 45-day delivery guarantee for fit-outs. It claims that the value proposition is solving the interior design problem with technology and predictable timelines. HomeLane claims to have delivered 2500 projects since inception.
On the latest development, Sam Subramaniam, CEO, Brand Capital, said, “Homelane addresses a key gap and need in the market for home buyers in a seamless and efficient way. The continued growth in and attraction to private home ownership will propel Homelane’s market strongly over the coming decade.”
Other major startups like operating in this space include Urban Ladder, LivSpace, Pepperfry and FabFurnish which are taking the home interiors to a different level.
