Shadowfax, one of India’s largest express delivery platform has raised $10 million (Rs 68 crore) in Series B funding led by existing investor Eight Roads Ventures, an investment arm of Fidelity International Ltd. The investment will use to build its network, consolidate its market position and stabilise performance in existing cities, Eight Roads said in a statement.
The company provides logistics support for intra city movement across multiple segments such as F&B, grocery, and e-tailing in 15 cities. It has recently launched low cost express delivery in an additional 10 cities. The latest expansion takes its total pin code coverage to more than 1500 adding cities like Ahmedabad, Indore, Faridabad, Kolkata, Chandigarh, Vadodra, Vishakhapatnam, Nagpur, and Lucknow. The startup will now be able to make intra-city deliveries within a couple of hours.
ShadowFax was founded by IIT graduates Abhishek Bansal and Vaibhav Khandelwal in May last year. The company had secured seed funding of $300,00 from Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal of Snapdeal, Powai Lake Ventures’ Zishaan Hayath and Limeroad co-founder Prashant Malik.
Bansal, who is also the CEO, said that the company is seeking to fulfil the need for quality on-demand logistics in India and that merchants can focus on their core business by outsourcing last-mile delivery services. ShadowFax’s clients include fast-food chains McDonalds and Burger King, e-tailer Amazon, grocery delivery startup Big Basket and hospital chain Fortis, he said.
Kabir Narang, partner and head of technology at Eight Roads Ventures, said that Shadowfax has shown growth with “attractive unit economics” across key markets since the investment firm first put money. “The company has built a differentiated technology platform and diversified from being a food-only delivery player to now delivering for grocery, pharmacy and e-commerce clients,” Narang said.
Eight Roads, which specialises in early-stage and growth-capital investment, had put $9 million in ShadowFax’s Series A round in September last year. A couple of months after the Series A round, Gurgaon-headquartered ShadowFax acqui-hired Pickingo in a cash-and-stock deal.