Personal care brand Mamaearth’s parent company Honasa has raised Rs 130 crore ($18 million) in a Series B funding round led by Sequoia India to fuel its expansion plan.
WHO: Mamaearth was founded in 2016 by husband-and-wife duo Varun and Ghazal Alagh as Asia’s first made-safe certified brand. It offers free and natural skincare, haircare, and baby care products for the Indian market. Mamaearth products are sold on major e-commerce platforms such as Amazon, Nykaa, and Flipkart, as well as over 2,000 multi-brand stores across 40 cities in the country.
WHY: The capital will be used to fuel its expansion plan that includes launching more millennial-focused digital-first brands under the Honasa Consumer Pvt Ltd.
IN THEIR OWN WORDS: “We will be looking at launching more brands for millennials under Honasa to grow strongly in the next three years. With this funding, we will also be looking at Southeast Asia markets,” Varun Alagh, co-founder of Mamaearth said to India Times. “We plan to replicate our online model in other countries which have a millennial presence and also strengthen our presence in tier-II markets.”
“Our vision is to create the FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) conglomerate of the future by building brands that connect strongly with millennials and Gen Z customers using the combined power of digital marketing and e-commerce at large scale,” Alagh continued. “Sequoia India’s investment at this stage of our journey validates this vision of building a global brand of the future.”
Ishaan Mittal, Principal, Sequoia Capital India LLP, told Business Standard, “With 15-20% of Indian shoppers influenced digitally and expected to double in next 7-8 years, digital-first brands have the potential to redefine the architecture of tomorrow’s FMCG companies. Varun’s [Alagh] vision is to ride these market tailwinds to create a multi-brand, cross geo FMCG company over the next decade.”
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