Gurugram-based UpScalio, a five-month-old e-commerce brand investor and operator, has raised $42.5 million in its Series A funding round led by Presight Capital and an undisclosed global hedge fund, per an announcement.
The startup’s funding round also saw participation of Heliad Equity Partners, MPGI, 468 Capital, Whiteboard Capital, alongside capital commitments from a consortium of lenders including freshly-minted unicorn OfBusiness, Innoven Capital, and Alteria Capital.
Prominent angel investors including Suhail Sameer (CEO, BharatPe), Radhika Ghai (co-founder, ShopClues), Rohit Kapoor (CEO, OYO India & SEA), Arjun Vaidya (Founder, Dr. Vaidya’s), and Erik Podzuweit (Founder, Scalable Capital) also joined the round.
“We feel privileged that so many leading investors and advisors have chosen to invest in us. We are also humbled by the talented e-commerce entrepreneurs that have built resilient businesses in the face of the pandemic and are grateful for their trust in partnering with us to scale their business,” Gautam Kshatriya, CEO and Co-founder of UpScalio said.
Founded by former McKinsey & Company consultant Gautam, former Bain & Company consultant Saaim Khan, and former Disney Hotstar and Purplle marketing and growth executive Nitin Agarwal, the Thrasio-style venture UpScalio has built a team of over 50 specialists across functions with experience in scaling e-commerce companies in India.
This team is expected to double to over 100 by the end of the year as the e-commerce accelerator launches operations with its partner businesses.
The Thrasio model, popularised by US-based Thrasio, the world’s largest acquirer of third-party private label businesses such as Amazon and Flipkart, has been drawing a lot of investor attention over the past few months.
Last month, GlobalBees announced that it has raised $150 million in one of the largest Series A rounds, led by FirstCry. Lightspeed Venture Partners also participated as a part of the round, along with Premji Invest, Chiratae Ventures and SoftBank. A month prior, 10club raised $40 million co-led by Fireside Ventures and an undisclosed global investor active in the space.
Earlier this year, Myntra and Medlife executive Ananth Narayanan founded Mensa Brands raised $50 million as part of its Series A led by of Accel, Falcon Edge Capital and Norwest Venture Partners.