Meesho Raises USD 300 Million in Fresh Funding

Meesho, India’s leading social commerce platform, today announced that it has raised USD 300 million in a new round of funding led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2*. The latest investment values Meesho at USD 2.1 billion and saw participation from existing investors — Prosus Ventures, Facebook, Shunwei Capital, Venture Highway and Knollwood Investment.

India has about 60 million micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) currently. Meesho’s vision is to enable 100 million small businesses including individual entrepreneurs to succeed online in India. These small businesses include individual businesses owned and run by women entrepreneurs and homepreneurs who have become financially independent and successful over the years through Meesho, and have carved out their own identities.

Aligning with the new vision, Meesho aims to simplify e-commerce for all small businesses in India. It will help the company to build a platform which is pro-small businesses with policies and tools to help even the smallest of sellers to list and do business on Meesho. This will empower small business owners to reach customers through all online channels.

Commenting on the fund raise Vidit Aatrey, Founder & CEO of Meesho said, “We take pride at the rate of speed and the scale at which Meesho has grown, positively impacting millions of lives, and creating exponential learning along the way. With the new round of funding, we are extremely thrilled to have SoftBank onboard. We are focused on expanding our vision — from helping aspiring women entrepreneurs to creating Meesho as a single ecosystem that will enable all small businesses in India to succeed online. In the last one year, we have seen tremendous growth across small businesses and entrepreneurs seeking to move their businesses online. And with our new vision we will enable 100 million small businesses to start, succeed and lead their operations online with Meesho as their partner in their journey.”

The company has grown over the years with a tech-first mindset that solves for a billion users (consumers, individual entrepreneurs and small businesses). Our exceptional team, driven by immense autonomy and first-principles thinking has played a crucial role in achieving amazing goals and making us a category creator. Meesho will use the new fund raise to strengthen its talent pool across verticals — tech, product, and business, among others.

Munish Varma, Managing Partner at SoftBank Investment Advisers, said, “Globally, SoftBank has always been excited to back founders that provide unique solutions for the local market. By using the power of artificial intelligence and machine learning, Meesho has created a platform for many small business owners to sell to the next cohort of internet users.  We look forward to being a part of this journey.”

Sumer Juneja, Partner at SoftBank Investment Advisers, added: “We have been closely tracking Meesho for the last 18 months and have been impressed by its growth, daily engagement metrics, focus on unit economics and ability to create a strong team. We believe Meesho provides an efficient platform for SME suppliers and social resellers to onboard the e-commerce revolution in India and help them provide personalized experience to consumers.”

Over the last six years, Meesho has successfully enabled over 13 million individual entrepreneurs to start their own online businesses with zero investment, bringing the benefits of e-commerce to more than 45+ million customers in the country. Till date the company has delivered orders from 100K+ registered suppliers to over 26,000 pin codes in more than 4,800 cities, generating over 500 crore in income for individual entrepreneurs and serving customers in more than 4,500 Tier 2+ cities — truly bringing e-commerce to Bharat.