Announcing Shadowfax’s $22 million Series C funding round
NGP Capital leads the investment in India’s market leader in the Online-2-Offline (O2O) logistics segment along with Qualcomm Ventures, Mirae Asset and existing investor, Eight Roads Ventures
Shadowfax has survived the chaotic infancy period in the Online-2-Offline (O2O) logistics industry, and emerged as the winner amongst India’s hyperlocal delivery start-ups.
The rise in Indian consumers’ expectations for door-step deliveries has created a critical need for a national last-mile, independent logistics provider. The team at Shadowfax has demonstrated its ability to scale and serve customers using sophisticated mobile technologies and strong execution capabilities to create India’s last-mile logistics leader.
We deliver more than 90,000 unique orders everyday for grocery, food, fashion and electronics. This is more than three times the orders we delivered last April.
We are glad that the market sees the potential in our business and appreciates the work we have done. This latest round of funds reflects the faith our investors have put in our team and technology. It brings us closer to our mission of connecting the next million micro entrepreneurs and suppliers in logistics to bridge the information gap and eradicate inefficiencies across the value chain.
Shadowfax uses an AI-based location stream processing engine, Frodo. The system allows our team to take fast decisions in the direction to optimise costs and offer high service levels.
Our approach towards deliveries focuses on flattening the daily demand curve for our delivery partners. We encourage our partners to pick up orders across a different vertical during off-peak hours. Our partners love the model since it means a less stressful day for them at work and much more money.
We fulfill orders using a crowd-sourced network of micro-entrepreneurs. Our delivery partner network has been key to create efficiencies that return us up to 20% on every order.
We were impressed by Shadowfax’s ability to deliver efficiencies in the hyperlocal segment by harnessing the power of mobile. We look forward to supporting the company through our investment and enabling collaborations with technical experts, who have domain expertise in mobile, to help the company’s quest towards delivering enhanced user experiences
We are projecting a 150% year-on-year growth for the next five years. The funds that we have raised in this round will allow us to do a 360° scale-up. Our goal is to connect 4 lakh new businesses and delivery partners by 2021, up from the current 40,000 connections.
Our immediate focus is to expand our network from 80 cities to 100+ locations in the next three months.
As we move into the next phase of Indian O2O story, the market needs efficient and distributed hyperlocal logistics platforms such as Shadowfax that serve evolving customer needs of faster and cheaper product delivery.
We previously raised $18.5M from Eight Roads Ventures in 2015 and 2016. We are grateful for the faith that our investors have had in our team and our technology.
Eight Roads Ventures’ backing in this third funding round reflects our belief in the Shadowfax model and its ability to deliver outstanding results to customers. It’s been a fascinating ride so far, and we are excited to see the next chapter unfold.
