Tiger Global has invested in DealShare, a startup in India that has built an e-commerce platform for middle- and lower-income groups of consumers, just three months after the Indian firm concluded its previous $21 million Series C funding round.
The New York-headquartered firm has led the $100 million Series D round in three-year-old social commerce startup DealShare, two people familiar with the matter told TechCrunch. Tiger Global declined to comment, and a founder of the Indian startup didn’t return an email sent on Sunday.
DealShare kickstarted its journey the day Walmart acquired Flipkart, the startup’s founder and chief executive Vineet Rao said at a virtual conference late last year. Rao said that even as Amazon and Flipkart had been able to create a market for themselves in the urban Indian cities, much of the nation was still underserved. There was an opportunity for someone to jump in, he said.
The startup began as an e-commerce platform on WhatsApp, where it offered hundreds of products to consumers. It didn’t take long before a major consumer spending pattern was visible, Rao said. People were only interested in buying items that were selling at discounted rates, said Rao.
Over time, that idea has become part of DealShare’s core offering. Today it incentivizes consumers — by offering them discounts and cashbacks — to share deals on products with their friends. The startup, which has since launched its own app and website, now operates in over two dozen cities in India.
Consumers wanted products that were relevant to them and they wanted to buy these items at a price that instilled the most value for their bucks, said Rao. “We focused on locally produced items instead of national brands. Even today, 80% to 90% of items we sell are locally produced,” he said.
How DealShare model works. Image Credits: Bain & Company
Amazon and Flipkart have captured less than 3% of the retail market in India, leaving room for firms to explore other models. Social commerce is one of the bets we’re seeing being played out in India. The other bet gaining traction is digitizing neighborhood stores in the country — without so much of the social element — that dot tens of thousands of towns, cities and villages in India.
The investment comes as Tiger Global looks to close over two dozen deals in India this year, TechCrunch reported on Monday. Tiger Global, which recently closed a $6.7 billion fund, last week led investments in social network ShareChat, business messaging platform Gupshup, and investment app Groww, and participated in fintech app CRED’s round, helping all of these startups attain the much sought-after unicorn status.
Meesho, the market leading social commerce in India, also turned a unicorn last week after SoftBank led a $300 million round in the Indian firm, valuing it at $2.1 billion.
DealShare counts WestBridge, Falcon Edge Capital’s Alpha Wave, Z3Partners, and Omidyar Network among its investors.
