Price comparison portal MySmartPrice raises under $1M in Series A from Accel Partners and Helion Venture Partners

Hyderabad-based MySmartPrice Web Technology Pvt Ltd, the company behind MySmartPrice.com, a price comparison site for products across categories, has secured additional funding from existing investors Accel Partners and Helion Venture Partners.

When contacted by Techcircle.in, MySmartPrice co-founder and director Sulakshan Kumar said, "We have raised funding but cannot share more details."

He added, "Till today, we concentrated on electronics and books categories, and this funding will help us become a horizontal player which will list almost everything sold in India. We have also developed a separate portal for fashion items, and also working on a mobile platform. A portion of the funding will be used towards developing these products."

The firm has raised around Rs 3 crore each from both the investors, which in effect values it at just over Rs 38 crore or a little over $6 million, sources said.

Earlier it had raised seed funding of around Rs 2 crore from the same investors. At the time it was valued at around $1 million.

The two VC investors are believed to have raised their effective holding from around 30 per cent to around 40 per cent with the fresh funding.

MySmartPrice was founded by Kumar and Sitakanta Ray as a part time project in September 2010. They quit their jobs and started working on it fulltime from October 2010. Prior to MySmartPrice, Ray, an MBA from IIM Bangalore, worked with Oracle and ICICI and Kumar worked with Oracle and Infosys.

The company was originally started as a price comparison site for books, and was later morphed into a broader price comparison site for products across categories.

The platform lets users discover the best products across a wide array of categories that include mobiles, electronics, computers, fashion and lifestyle, cameras, books, appliances and personal care. Its price comparison engine enables users in finding the best price, as well as deals and offers from all major e-commerce stores in India. The firm claims that currently more than four million users across India use its service on a monthly basis.

The firm had clocked gross billing of around Rs 1.4 crore for the year ended March 31, 2013 against Rs 20 lakh in the previous year. Last financial year it also broke even with net profit of Rs 24 lakh against net loss of Rs 3.5 lakh the previous year.

(Edited by Joby Puthuparampil Johnson)