ShopX Acquihires Gabbardeals To Expand Its Omnichannel Brand

Bengaluru-based B2B enterprise application for small retailers — ShopX — has made its first acquisition of a mobile phone retail brand, Gabbardeals, as part of its plan to expand its chain of omnichannel retailers.

In five years of its inception, Gabbardeals had been raking a GMV (gross merchandise value) of INR 1K Cr ($141.6 Mn), and has offline stores in Pune and Jalgaon in Maharashtra, ShopX claimed. These stores have now been brought under ‘ShopXEdge,’ the company’s chain of technology-enabled mobile and electronic stores of ShopX.

The company, however, did not reveal the deal amount maintaining that it is strategic in nature. “It’s more about the talent coming on ShopX’s board, and working with us to take our vision forward,” ShopX cofounder Amit Sharma told Inc42.

GabbarDeals’ 10 employees — a mix of technical, business development, marketing and category experts — have now joined ShopX, taking the latter’s total employee headcount to 180.

Gabbardeals cofounder Niraj Raka has been appointed as ShopX senior vice-president and head of the company’s organised retail department. Gabbardeals website has now been pulled down as their works have now all been rolled into the ShopX platform.

“ShopX and Gabbardeals share a similar vision where the industry needs to go, which is the blend of online and offline, commonly called omnichannel. This is a step forward to build next-gen mobile stores, working with what GabbarDeals was doing,” Sharma said.

Sharma and Apoorva Jois launched ShopX in 2015. The startup works existing kirana and mobile store, both in mobile and electronics, and FMCG sector, from across the country. Sharma maintains the company to be already working with major brands in the country.

“ShopXEdge gives these brands an opportunity to reach consumers through an omnichannel mobile retail format. About 70-80% of leading brands are already working with us, and we plan to bring onboard more new entrants,” he said.

According to Sharma, ShopX currently has a network of more than 1 Lakh retail outlets across 350 towns in India catering to 50K populations. The founder claims to be raking $300 Mn of annualised GMV, and plans to inch towards the billion-dollar mark by 2019-20.

“However, it’s still an early days and with Gabbardeals’ team, we hope to drive sustainable growth,” Sharma said.

ShopX is backed by industrialist Nandan Nilekani and is run by 10I Commerce Services. Last year in August, the startup last raised $35 Mn funding from Fung Strategic Holdings. In June of that year, the startup had launched ShopXpress to drive its supply chain delivery model that promises to deliver products within 24-72 hours.

Currently, India has more than 48 Mn offline retailers, according to RedSeer Consulting. Other startups in the fray include IndiaBuys, StoreKing, and IPay, etc.

[ShopX was part of the 2018 edition of the most coveted list of India’s most innovative startups — 42Next by Inc42.]