Indian furniture and home products marketplace Pepperfry.com has raised USD 15 Million in a fresh round of funding led by Bertelsmann India Investments (BII), the investment arm of the international media company Bertelsmann in India. Pepperfry’s current investors, Silicon Valley based Norwest Venture Partners (NVP) also participated in the funding. The company had earlier raised USD 13 million from NVP in previous rounds of funding.
Commenting on the development, Ambareesh Murty, Co-Founder and CEO, Pepperfry.com, said: “Our vision is to be India’s one-stop shop for furniture and home products and we have focused on leveraging our in-depth category expertise to establish the merchandising and supply chain infrastructure required to fulfill this vision. We are well positioned to become a household name in the country and partnering with a global powerhouse like Bertelsmann along with the continued support of NVP will ensure Pepperfry becomes India’s most preferred Furniture and Home products destination.”
Pankaj Makkar, Managing Director of Bertelsmann India Investments, who will also join the Board of Pepperfry.com added: “We are very impressed with the strong business foundations on which Pepperfry.com has been built and the leadership position it has attained, especially in the Furniture segment. Our thesis is that vertically focused companies like Pepperfry who have built specialised capabilities and a differentiated market offering will serve consumers’ needs for selection and overall experience better. We are excited to partner with Pepperfry.com on this journey.”
Niren Shah, Managing Director, Norwest Venture Partners India (NVP India) stated that Pepperfry.com has a strong team with extensive e-commerce and marketplace expertise combined with great execution abilities. In the last 2 years, the team has revolutionised customers’ access to affordable high quality furniture and home products by connecting buyers in metro and tier 2 cities to small businesses and manufacturers located in India’s remote furniture hubs. He said that having worked closely with the team NVP is confident of the business direction and wished the team the very best.
Bertelsmann India Investments (BII) focusses on investments in the digital, education, media and services sectors. Bertelsmann is an international media company with its core divisions encompassing television (RTL Group), book publishing (Penguin Random House), magazine publishing (Gruner + Jahr), services (Arvato), and printing (Be Printers) in some 50 countries. In 2013, the company’s businesses generated revenues of €16.4 billion.
Norwest Venture Partners (NVP) is a global, multi-stage venture and growth equity investment firm that has partnered with entrepreneurs to build businesses for more than 50 years. The firm manages approximately $5 billion in capital and has funded more than 550 companies since inception. Headquartered in Palo Alto, Calif., NVP has subsidiaries in Mumbai and Bengaluru, India, and Herzelia, Israel. NVP makes early to late-stage venture and growth equity investments across sectors including technology, information services, business services, financial services, consumer products/services and healthcare.
Commencing operations in January 2012, Pepperfry.com lists almost 1,000 merchants.
