Valyoo Technologies has raised Rs 53 crore in Series B investment led by Unilazer Ventures, followed by their existing investors IDG Ventures India. IDGVI had invested RS 22 crore ($4 million) in the start-up in October 2011.
Unilazer, the company promoted by entrepreneur Ronnie Screwvala, has been carefully examining sectors riding on the growing India consumption story. And with Valyoo it is making its first investment in this sector. Unilazer that has made strategic investments in greenfield areas like agriculture, healthcare, insurance and education has finally narrowed down on this investment through which it aims to build leadership in the cash and carry wholesale and online eyecare & eyewear market along with the accessories range of bags, watches and jewellery.
Peeyush Bansal, founder and CEO of Valyoo Technologies said, “Our focus has always been on fundamentals. The company’s sales have grown 20 times in the last 15 months. Most customers (98%) have come back and re-purchased within a year and more than 90% refer our brands to others. With this fresh round of investment from Unilazer and IDGVI, coupled with the experience that the Unilazer team brings in building Brands, Scale and Value to business-Valyoo will scale new heights to become a Rs 500 crore company in the next 2-3 years.”
Valyoo through its franchisees LensKart.com, WatchKart.com, BagsKart.com and JewelsKart.com has created a mark in the industry. Valyoo’s strength lies in product design and merchandising -- more than 50% of the products that the company sells are private labels. The company’s most popular franchise, LensKart.com, is India’s first website to sell contact lenses and spectacles online at a mass scale. Valyoo also has offline franchisees and sells it eyewear products to other retailers as well.
"We partner and invest in entrepreneurs and teams. In Peeyush and his co-founding team we see everything that makes us believe we will pioneer and lead in the segments we operate in and grow the industry," said Amit Banka, MD of Unilazer Ventures, who will now also be on the board of Valyoo. "Eyecare and eyewear is a massive and growing unbranded market which Valyoo strives to convert and capture, coupled with fast selling premium and mass offerings in bags, jewellery and watches we see Valyoo having an edge in winning in this market in India," he added.
In the categories Valyoo operates in, it offers more range than the large horizontals. LensKart offers more than 2,000 designs of eyeglasses, contact lenses and sunglasses. WatchKart.com has over 70 brands, along with some rarely available Swiss brands; BagsKart.com sells all kinds of bags ranging from backpacks, wallets, handbags, travel gear to luggage; JewelsKart, which was Valyoo’s last addition, offers precious jewellery and is catching up fast with its attractive range of designs in silver, gemstone, gold and diamond pendants, rings, mangalsutras, nose-pins and coins. Each product in all verticals comes with ample information in content, offering a shopping experience similar to that of an exclusive offline store.
“It gives me great pleasure to see Valyoo grow. Valyoo’s focus has always been on depth of offering and customer centricity. Valyoo already has category ownership in eyewear and market leading sales in the watches segment. It is poised to achieve leadership in bags and jewellery segment in the coming year with this round of funding. All of this is achieved by Valyoo with market leading matrices such as pay-back period of less than one year on marketing costs. This demonstrates our belief that companies with strong fundamentals will always find investment, irrespective of market conditions,” said TC Meenakshisundaram, MD of IDG Ventures India, who is also on the board of Valyoo.
