InnoVen Capital injects $3.4 mn into consumer electronics brand boAt

Venture lender InnoVen Capital on Tuesday said it has infused Rs 25 crore (about $3.4 million) into a startup from its existing portfolio of investments, Imagine Marketing, the parent company of consumer electronics brand boAt.

InnoVen had first invested in the Delhi based startup in July 2019.

Founded in 2016 by Aman Gupta and Sameer Mehta, boAt manufactures products ranging from headphones, earphones to wearables, speakers, travel chargers and cables. It sells through marketplaces, online and offline, as well as directly through its website.

“We continue to stay focused on delivering on our brand promise to our boAtheads. It’s been an exciting journey to build one of the leading Homegrown Digitally Native brands from India but we are more excited about the next phase as we expand our product offering,” Mehta said in a statement, without specifying details of the product offering expansion.

boAt did not respond to TechCircle’s request for comment on the utilisation of the fresh infusion.

One of boAt’s products, a 20,000 mAh power bank, was included as one of Amazon’s most popular products in the e-commerce giant’s Prime Day sale in India, as per an Amazon blog post.

Recently, boAt audio was ranked as the leading brand in the ear wear segment with a 27.3% market share, as per market research and advisory firm International Data Corporation’s (IDC) data for the year 2019.

The startup had raised its first institutional round of funding, about $900,000, from Fireside Ventures in early 2018. Post that, Fireside invested additional capital of about $2.2 million, late 2018. 

In 2019, apart from InnoVen’s debt round, boAt secured about $2.9 million from Flipkart founder Sachin Bansal’s investment firm Navi Technologies.

The company’s net revenue rose to $34.48 million in the financial year March 2019, from $16.4 million, a year earlier, as per VCCEdge data. Profit for the period rose about 37% to $1.3 million.

It is yet to report its financials for the period from 2019 to 2020.

“boAt is one of the high performing companies in our portfolio, which has not only grown over 3X since we started the relationship but has managed to do that while being profitable. It’s a perfect case-study on how to build a new age brand, through superior customer insights, effective marketing and relentless execution,” InnoVen Capital India CEO Ashish Sharma said in the statement.

InnoVen Capital India’s other investments in 2020 include technology-enabled logistics startups LetsTransport and Shiprocket, and Zetwerk, an online marketplace that connects buyers and suppliers for manufacturing jobs.

It said it has completed over 250 transactions with over 180 startups, including Byjus, Swiggy, Oyo Rooms, CureFit, Myntra, Eruditus, DailyHunt and FirstCry.