Homegrown ecommerce marketplace Flipkart is ready for another round of funding. It is reported that Flipkart is in talks with investors to raise about $1.4 Bn (INR 9,200 Cr) in a new funding round to be led by existing and a few new investors.
It is speculated that the US-based Sands Capital Management will lead the round and will be investing about $700 Mn. It is also expected that existing investors would invest almost the same amount to bring the valuation of the company, somewhere between $15 Bn to $18 Bn.
Till date Flipkart has raised around $3.15 Bn, and plans this new round of funding to cement its leadership in the online retail market. The company had raised over $700 Mn in private equity from existing investors in July 2015. The valuation of the company was then about $15 Bn.
Flipkart is backed by investors Accel Partners, DST Global, Steadview Capital, Tiger Global Management, GIC, Dragoneer Investment Group, Greenoaks Capital, Iconiq Capital, Morgan Stanley, Naspers, Qatar Investment Authority, Singapore GIC, Sofina and T. Rowe Price.
The Bangalore-based Flipkart was incepted in 2007 with a concept to sell books online. However, the company launched itself as a marketplace in April 2013. It’s co-founders Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal secured their position in Forbes magazine’s India rich list 2015, under top 100, in September 2015.
Flipkart invested in number of companies last year which included Mech Mocha Game Studios, BlackBuck, Qikpod, Cube26, NestAway and Zinka Logistics.
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