Windo, a Bengaluru-based social commerce focused technology platform for individual and small-sized sellers, has raised $1.5 million in pre-Series A round led by Unicorn India Ventures. The round also witnessed the participation of CapriGlobal, Aravind Sanka (Rapido), K Ganesh (Portea) among others. The company plans to use the fund to focus on product development and also expand in a few countries apart from India.
Company handout
"The funding that we have raised is a big step towards realizing our mission to help SMB owners and solopreneurs in taking their business online and growing. We believe our unique approach to the problem will help us win in this space even amidst a seemingly crowded space. We have included new features in the app which is being well received from many of our users already," said Silus Reddy, CEO and co-founder, Windo.
Last year, the social commerce platform witnessed 150 per cent growth in their active users. The app, currently stands at two lakh downloads with users spanning across more than 140 countries. It boasts of 50,000 monthly active users. Currently, a host to more than one lakh online shops. Windo is targeting an ARR of $1 million in the next 12 months, claimed by the company in a statement.
"The global social commerce market is blooming. We have seen a huge wave of small and midsize D2C brands take to social media platforms to establish their businesses. With the expansion, there is a rapidly growing need for platforms that can support social commerce entrepreneurs since even the internet-savvy business owners find it hard to create and manage an online website. At Unicorn, we believe that Windo's unique mobile-first approach supports this growth in the social commerce market," said Sparsh Kumar, senior investment associate, Unicorn India Ventures.
Founded in 2020 by Rakesh Vaddadi and Silus Reddy, Windo helps solopreneurs, influencers, small and midsize businesses set up their online stores in minutes and promises to be the CTO of these businesses.
As per market reports, the India's social commerce market is expected to grow 71.5 per cent in 2022 and is predicted that GMV of the market will reach $8258.8 million in 2022. By 2028, this amount is expected to reach $1,43,583.3 million.