LimeRoad narrows losses in FY18 on 78% revenue spike

Gurugram-based A.M. Marketplaces Pvt. Ltd, which runs social commerce platform LimeRoad, significantly narrowed its losses despite a rise in expenses, thanks to a 78% year-on-year increase in its total revenue for financial year 2017-18. In social commerce, online buying and selling of products and services is facilitated by the social media.

The company was able to narrow its losses from Rs 93.3 crore for 2016-17 to Rs 59.5 crore for 2017-18, according to A.M. Marketplaces’ filings with the Registrar of Companies.

The firm clocked an increase in its total expenses at Rs 219.7 crore for 2017-18 from Rs 183 crore for 2016-17. Employee benefit expense came down a bit from Rs 36.69 crore to Rs 36.25 crore during the period.

Total revenue rose from Rs 89.7 crore to Rs 160.2 crore during the period. Operating revenue increased from Rs 82 crore to Rs 157 crore and other income came down from Rs 7.6 crore to Rs 2.4 crore during the period.

Finance costs continued to be zero for the financial year ended March 2018.

Email queries to LimeRoad did not get any response till the time of publishing the report.

The startup was co-founded by Suchi Mukherjee, who has worked with the executive management team of Skype, along with Manish Saksena, former operations chief of Tommy Hilfiger India, and Ankush Mehra, former head of supply chain at Reliance Hypermarkets. The company operates an online social platform for women to discover, share and shop lifestyle products.

The firm last raised $30 million (Rs 188 crore) in Series C round of funding from existing investors led by Tiger Global in 2015. Existing investors Matrix Partners and Lightspeed Venture Partners had also participated in the round.

The company has reportedly been expanding its offline presence too. Going by several media reports, LimeRoad opened its second retail store in Panipat (Haryana) this month and plans to open 20 new stores in the next three to six months.

LimeRoad has also launched a programme called India Design Cell for young Indian fashion designers to sell their products through thousands of sellers on the company’s platform, media reports said.

Currently, LimeRoad has 4,000 sellers who earn money through the platform every month.