VLCC Health Care to acquire men's grooming brand Ustraa for undisclosed sum

VLCC Health Care will acquire Happily Unmarried Marketing which runs the D2C men’s grooming brand Ustraa for an undisclosed amount.

Info Edge (India) said in its filing that it has agreed to sell its entire shareholding held through its wholly owned subsidiary - Startup Investments (Holding)  in its associate company, Happily Unmarried Marketing. 

“Post merger, VLCC will make further investments to accelerate the growth of Ustraa,” VLCC said in its press release. 

The release also said that today, 67 per cent of Ustraa's sales come from the online channel. The brand has over 85 SKUs (stock keeping units) across fragrances, hair care, face and beard care and had 2.2mn customers on their own app. Ustraa is backed by investors including InfoEdge, 360 One (formerly IIFL Ventures) and Wipro.

“This acquisition marks VLCC’s foray into the men's grooming market and our aim is to accelerate Ustraa’s growth journey by leveraging VLCC’s pan-India offline distribution. In parallel, VLCC’s existing product business will benefit from Ustraa’s tech and digital expertise to scale up in new age commerce,” Vikas Gupta, CEO, VLCC said in its release. 

“We are bullish about the synergies that can be realised in this VLCC-Ustraa merger for the platform to become a leading consumer business in the beauty and personal care space and look forward to working closely with the management team and Carlyle post-merger,” Sanjeev Bikhchandani of InfoEdge also said in the release. 

He also said that VLCC’s focused strategy to scale up their products business using digital channels and high-quality product innovation is in sync with Ustraa's founding principles.