Updated: Rocket Internet Backed Jabong Looks For A New CEO; Mohan & Praveen Sinha To Exit

Update: Post publishing this news, we got following official response from Jabong:

Before:

Rocket Internet backed fashion ecommerce company, Jabong is reportedly looking for a new CEO. According to a report, current CEO and co-founder, Arun Chandra Mohan and Managing Director and co-founder, Praveen Sinha are moving out of the company.

Mohan has confirmed that he is moving from the company and also mentioned that he will be working on his new venture in the internet mobile segment.

We have reached out to Praveen Sinha for the same, his reply is awaited.

While Mohan is expected to leave the company this month, Praveen will exit the company by the year end.

Last year, two of its co-founders, Mukul Bafana and Manu had also left the company. Post that, Jabong had raised $100 Mn funding round and since January 2015, investors have pumped in over $45 Mn (INR 300 Cr.) in the company, according to the documents filed with the Registrar of Companies.

A source close to the development told Mint that the hunt for a new CEO is on from a month. He further added, “The global team has given the mandate to an international executive search firm.”

Earlier in July, we have reported that two will be moving to new roles with Rocket Internet, but, according to the source, both are moving out of Rocket.

In a separate development, Jabong has recently shut its design office in London and has also fired 10-15 people from the London team, under pressure from the parent company. Earlier this year, the company had also announced its plans to launch firm’s first technology lab in Bangalore.

In April this year, Jabong was merged with Global Fashion Group (GFG), formed out of five Kinnevik and Rocket Internet-backed online fashion startups active across dozens of emerging markets. These include Dafiti (Latin America), Jabong (India), Lamoda (Russia and CIS), Namshi (Middle East) and Zalora (South East Asia and Australia). The merged entity had also raised $35 Mn funding round led by Tengelmann Ventures and Verlinvest.

Currently, Jabong offers 190,000 products from more than 1,800 brands. The company faces fierce competition from Myntra which was acquired by Flipkart last year. Jabong is also under pressure from the parent company for losses and has been asked to cut down expenses.

Well this is not something new in context of Rocket Internet portfolio companies in the country. In the past few months, number of people from the top management team of Rocket’s companies have moved out. Recently, Fabfurnish cofounders, Mehul Agrawal and Vikram Chopra have left the company and prior to that, Foodpanda founder, Rohit Chadda had also stepped down.

Rocket Internet also has a history of shifting roles within its group, for instance, earlier in March, Saurabh Kochhar, who was CEO at Printvenue was appointed India CEO of another Rocket Internet company, Foodpanda. Later, Rocket had appointed Printvenue Co-founder and Chief Marketing Officer Gagan Arora as the CEO.

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