Zetwerk concludes $8.3 mn share buyback

Business-to-business (B2B) manufacturing services marketplace Zetwerk Manufacturing on Wednesday said it has bought back shares worth $8.3 million (Rs 60.92 crore) from employees and early investors.   

A large part of the Zetwerk workforce of 400 employees participated in its Employee Stock Options (ESOP) liquidation process of three rounds, as per a statement. 

The company did not name or number the impacted employees and investors. 

“The aggressive growth in the past two years reflects the role played by Zetwerk employees, some of whom chose to be a part of the journey when the company existed only on paper… This step materializes in wealth creation for the employees and reaffirms the confidence of the founders and investors in the business” co-founder and CEO Amrit Acharya said. 

A year ago, Zetwerk employed 250 people, 62.5% of the current employee base. The company is backed by marquee investors such as Sequoia Capital, Accel Partners, Greenoaks, Lightspeed Partners, and Kae Capital. 

In February, Zetwerk raised $120 million in Series D funding round led by California based Greenoaks Capital and Lightspeed, taking its overall fundraise to nearly $200 million. Sequoia Capital India and Kae Capital also participated in the round. The fundraise came in seven months after the firm raised $21 million in a Series C funding round. 

The company was founded in 2018 by Amrit Acharya, Srinath Ramakkrushnan, Rahul Sharma, and Vishal Chaudhary.  It connects original equipment manufacturers (OEM) and engineering procurement construction (EPM) companies from India and Southeast Asia to small and medium enterprises (SME) for on-demand manufacturing services. 

It helps customers with procurement of custom products, real-time tracking and project management services, and assists SMEs utilise their manufacturing capacities. 

The Bengaluru based startup works across industries such as railways, water, transmission and distribution, oil and gas, defence, aerospace, apparel and electronics. It claims to work with over 2,000 suppliers with deliveries of over 1,000 projects across over 15 countries. 

"Zetwerk's revenues grew from Rs 300 crore in FY20 to close to Rs 1,000 crore in FY21 and they are expected to grow again at 3x to Rs 3,000 crore next year, but that is not the story for us at Zetwerk. We are building an organisation of values, an institution that could outlive us," a company spokesperson said in a LinkedIn post.