Milkbasket widens losses more than four-fold as expenses shoot up

Doorstep Retail Solutions, the Gurugram-based company that owns micro-delivery platform Milkbasket, widened its losses more than four-fold to Rs 43.1 crore in the financial year ended March 2019, as expenses during the year shot up more than 200% to Rs 129.5 crore.

Costs on account of inventory jumped to Rs 3.4 crore from Rs 30 lakh in the previous year and was the primary contributor to the spike in expenses. Employee benefits costs increased to Rs 23.2 crore in FY19 against Rs 6.6 crore in FY18, the company’s latest regulatory filing showed.  

Revenues from operations during the year grew to Rs 85.1 crore from Rs 28.7 crore in the previous financial year.

Milkbasket also increased its employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) to 2443 options in November 2018, against 1429 in the previous year. The board has granted a total of 837 options to 20 identified employees.

Earlier this week, the company rolled out its in-hand delivery services for fresh meat. The move came soon after it offered 9,000 products across fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG), dairy, fruits, vegetables and other household essentials.

In July, it acquired Bengaluru-based PSR Supply Chain in a deal whose terms were undisclosed. Anant Goel, co-founder and CEO said at the time that the acquisition would help the company in strengthening its customer base and offerings in Bengaluru where it launched operations in January 2019.

It also raised $2.15 million in venture debt from Innoven Capital, in June. The Innoven Capital investment was a part of Milkbasket’s Series B round in which the startup recently raised $10.5 million from the likes of Unilever Ventures, Mayfield India, Kalaari Capital, Blume Ventures and a few Indian family offices.