Arzooo Raises USD 70 Million In Series B Round Funding

Arzooo, the business-to-business (B2B) retail tech start-up has announced that it has raised USD 70 million in its Series B round from SBI Investment, an arm of Japan’s SBI Group, and Trifecta Leaders Fund. Tony Xu, the founder of DoorDash, also invested in the current round, making Arzooo his first India investment, the company said in a statement.

Existing investors Celesta Capital and 3 Lines VC participated in this round too. The company had previously raised a Series A round from Celesta and 3 lines, followed by an investment from Zoom’s founder Eric Yuan. Including the latest fundraise, Arzooo has raised USD85 million since its inception in 2018.

According to the state, the company will use these proceeds to scale its “technological might” focused on scaling stores’ growth and for market expansion.

It was founded by Khushnud Khan and Rishi Rathore. Arzooo is building a leading tech platform for transforming offline retail in India. Its platform provides retailers access to a wide variety of stock keeping units (SKUs) across leading and emerging brands. It helps retailers overcome challenges like extensive inventory holding and access to pricing.

The company says the consumer electronics market in India is a USD 65-billion opportunity. “We are excited to partner with Arzooo and scale India’s leading B2B platform for consumer durables and electronics. This is large category of consumption that is ripe for disruption through the efforts of companies like Arzooo, especially in non-metro markets,” said Lavanya Ashok, partner at Trifecta Capital.

According to a Economic Survey 2021-22, India has over 61,400 start-ups recognised by the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), with at least 14,000 recognised during fiscal 2022. The survey is an annual report card of the economy which examines the performance of several sectors and suggests future moves. It also puts forward a GDP growth projection.

The survey added that 555 districts in India had at least one new start-up, highlighting that start-ups in India have grown remarkably over the past six years, with most of them in the IT and knowledge-based sectors.

“Startups in India have grown remarkably over the last six years. The number of new recognised start-ups has increased to over 14,000 in 2021-22 from only 733 in 2016-17,” the survey said.

India has become the third-largest start-up ecosystem in the world after the US and China, it said. A record 44 Indian start-ups achieved unicorn status in 2021.

The survey also highlighted the string of IPOs by new-age companies. “In April-November 2021, INR 89,066 crore was raised through 75 IPO issues, much higher than in any year in the last decade,” it said.

The survey also pointed to the growth of space tech start-ups in India. The number of start-ups in the sector has increased from 11 in 2019 to 47 in 2021, according to the survey. In recent years, Delhi has replaced Bengaluru as the start-up capital of India. Over 5,000 recognised start-ups were added in Delhi while 4,514 start-ups were added in Bengaluru between April 2019 and December 2021. Maharashtra has the highest number of recognised start-ups with 11,308, the survey said.