Home service marketplace UrbanClap posts 2.5 times growth in operating revenues

Delhi-based home services marketplace UrbanClap Technologies India Pvt. Ltd has reported 2.5 times growth in operating revenues even as operating losses widened for the year ended March 2019, after shrinking the previous year.

In a statement issued by the company representing its unaudited financial statements, UrbanClap said that it posted operating revenues of Rs 116 crore for the period, up from Rs 46.7 crore the previous year. The numbers confirm a rising trajectory as operating revenues had risen to Rs 46.7 crore for 2017-18 from Rs 11 crore for 2016-17, filings with the companies’ registrar show.

Operating losses widened to Rs 72 crore for the year ended March 2019 from Rs 57 crore the previous year. In contrast, operating losses had shrunk to Rs 56.5 for 2017-18 from Rs 67 crore for 2016-17.

The company attributed the revenue growth for the year ended March 2019 to a rise in service orders and its foray into new verticals.

The firm claimed a growth of three times in the number of service orders to 3.3 million for 2018-19 from 1.2 million for 2017-2018. Gross transaction value rose to Rs 400 crore from Rs 130 crore during the period.

“In the last financial year, we took great strides towards…improving our capabilities in selection, onboarding, training and certification of service professionals. We also invested in areas like product procurement, technology and financing, and establishing our market leadership,” Abhiraj Singh Bhal, co-founder of UrbanClap, stated.

In April 2019, the company claims to have serviced over 620,000 orders, a three times jump over the same period last year. The April number of 620,000 orders translates into an annualised run-rate of around 7.5 million orders for the current financial year of 2019-20, which means an annualised gross transaction value of Rs 1,000 crore and an annualised revenue run-rate of around Rs 200 crore.

UrbanClap was founded in 2014 by Bhal, Varun Khaitan and Raghav Chandra. It is an online marketplace for a host of local services that include beauty services, appliance & basic home repairs, packers and movers, event management, health and wellness, and salon. It recently made forays into newer service verticals that include cleaning, pest control and painting.

Currently, it operates in Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Chennai, Delhi-NCR, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Kolkata, Mumbai and Pune. Last year, it made its first overseas foray in Dubai.

Bhal claimed that the company, which currently has 20,000 professionals on its network, hopes to bring this number to more than one million over the next five years.

The company is also one of the well-funded players in this space, having raised more than $100 million from the likes of Ratan Tata, Steadview Capital, Vy Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners, Accel and SAIF Partners.

In its last-known funding reported last month, it raised Rs 1.6 crore ($230,120 then) from Flipkart Group chief executive Kalyan Krishnamurthy.

Prior to that, in November last, it raised $50 million (Rs 348 crore hen) in a Series D funding from Steadview and Vy Capital.

UrbanClap competes with Housejoy, another well-funded player in the home services marketplace segment, and online classifieds company Quikr.