It has been announced that Shopclues fired 45-50 employees from different domains.
A company spokesperson confirmed the layoffs but pointed out that they were made according to the individuals’ work performance, which according to the firm “has impacted less than 4% of the company’s overall workforce.”
“Unfortunate as it might be, the rigors of a merit-based system requires that we keep the bar high on individual performance. As we wrap up the review cycle for FY 2018, this decision has impacted less than 4% of the total workforce,” the company spokesperson said.
The firm currently employs between 1,150-1,200 individuals.
The layoffs come at a time when Shopclues is losing long strides to India’s two biggest e-commerce companies – Flipkart and Amazon. Snapdeal is also changing their business strategy to a pure-marketplace model focusing on non-branded products, which will undoubtedly add to Shopclues’ worries.
The fiscal 2017 revealed that the online marketplace’s total revenues remained flat, registering a poor 5% jump to Rs188 crore in FY17, according to regulatory filings to the Registrar of Companies. They did however decrease their loss for the same period by 13% to Rs332 crore after deducting their advertising and promotional expenses from Rs236 crore to Rs188 crore.
According to reports, the company raised a bridge round of $1 million from early investor Unilazer Ventures. The Indian art of Clues Network distributed around 1,027 equity shares to Shopclues to raise this round.