Alibaba to infuse $10 mn more in logistics firm Xpressbees

Xpressbees, the Alibaba Group-backed e-commerce logistics company, is in line to raise $10 million in a fresh round of funding from Alibaba.com Singapore E-commerce, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding.

The fresh round will be used for growth and expansion of business, according to regulatory filings.

Xpressbees has issued 9,317 Series D1 compulsorily convertible cumulative preference shares at $1073.306 per share, the documents show.

In January 2018, the company had raised $35 million in its Series D round of funding from the same Alibaba entity.

Later in February this year, it secured $5 million in venture debt from InnoVen Capital.

Previously in early 2016, Xpressbees raised about $12.5 million from existing investors SAIF Partners, IDG Ventures India, NEA, Vertex Ventures and Valiant Capital.

Xpressbees started as the logistics arm of Pune-based baby products retailer FirstCry about eight years ago. In September 2015, the business was spun out from FirstCry and commenced independent operations as BusyBees Logistics Solutions Pvt. Ltd.

Today, the company offers first- and last-mile delivery and reverse logistics chiefly to the e-commerce sector. It serves more than 30 clients including Snapdeal, Paytm, Flipkart, Reliance, Clubfactory and Firstcry. 

It has a presence in more than 1,000 cities and serves more than 10,000 pin-code areas through 53 hubs and 1,300 service centres across the country.

Xpressbees competes with players such as Delhivery, Rivigo, and BlackBuck. Rivigo Services raised $20 million in a growth round from returning investors private SAIF Partners and Warburg Pincus in December.

Last month, BlackBuck raised $7.8 million in Series D round from Trifecta Ventures via a combination of equity and debt. The Zinka Logistics Solutions-owned platform, which has posted a loss of Rs 118 crore in FY18, is also aiming for profitability by 2021. 

In May, Locus, a logistics platform owned by Mara labs, raised $26 million from 17 investors in a fresh funding round led by Tiger Global and Falcon Edge.