Wow Express Raises $4.5 Mn To Expand To 100 Cities By 2019

Mumbai-based ecommerce delivery platform Wow Express has raised $4.5 Mn in a Series A round of funding from its existing investor — the Tamarind Family Private Trust of the Mansukhani family.

The Tamarind Family Trust is the co-promoter of Mirc Electronics, which owns consumer durables brand Onida.

The Series-A round also included previously issued compulsorily convertible debentures, which were converted in with this round. Wow Express last raised $2 Mn (INR 15 Cr) in a Pre-Series A round of funding led by US-based investors in May 2016.

The company plans to use the capital raised to expand its geographical presence, ramp up its technology platform, and strengthen its senior management team.

“We want to expand our ecommerce footprint, from the current 42 cities to over 100 cities in the next 12 months. We are also in talks to bring on board professional executives for our chief operating officer and chief financial officer positions,” said Sandeep Padoshi, cofounder of WOW Express.

Wow Express also launched its health and diagnostics delivery operations earlier this year. A large part of the business expansion will also focus on growing its six-month-old health and diagnostics delivery business, WOW Health Express. Through this platform, Wow Express delivers blood samples and bodily fluids from labs to diagnostic companies.

“Currently, forming 5-7% of its revenue pie at 50,000-60,000 samples per month, WOW Express plans to grow this vertical (health and diagnostics delivery) to about 20% of its revenue share by the end of FY19,” as claimed by the founders in a media statement.

Wow Express: The Growth So Far

Started in 2015 by three industry veterans, Jayesh Kamat, Mazhar Faruqi, and Sandeep Padoshi, Wow Express provides first mile, last mile, warehousing, and e-fulfilment solutions and is considered a preferred and innovative service provider by its clients.

Wow Express covers over 1600 zip codes across 40 cities, with 70 branches as of June 2017. The number of cities it is present in increased from 15 to 40 in the same period.

As shared by the company in an earlier interaction with Inc42, WOW Express targets INR 100 Cr revenue in the next two years with 70% coming from ecommerce and 30% coming from Consumer-to-Consumer, Healthcare Express, Warehousing, E-fulfilment, and Banking.

Also, the company’s average monthly last-mile deliveries increased from 64,520 in 2015 to 4,68,000 by the end of the last financial year. Wow Express has declared INR 19.2 Cr revenue in FY17 and was expecting to achieve INR 30 Cr revenue during the last financial year.

While currently servicing a major share of Nykaa’s orders, Wow’s clients also include marquee ecommerce players such as Amazon, Myntra, Jabong, and Voonik.

With the latest funding round, Wow Express is certainly aiming to go aggressive with its expansion strategies.

[The development was reported by ET.]