Trell raises $45 mn Series B

Trell Experiences Pvt Ltd, which operates a lifestyle community commerce platform, has raised Rs 335 crore ($45 million) in its Series B funding round led by Mirae Asset, H&M Group and LB Investments.  

The company’s existing investors KTB Network, Samsung Ventures, and Fosun RZ Capital have also participated in this round, a statement said.  

The Bengaluru-based startup claim to have raised $62 million in funding till date.  

Trell aims to utilise freshly infused capital to further develop its AI and ML technologies across regional languages as well as strengthen the team.  

 “Trell has enabled millions of Indian language internet users to discover and buy lifestyle trends and we are grateful to have a community that has shown us incredible support, which has further fuelled our need to diversify content creation, commerce in India and create sustainable opportunities for wealth creation and economic growth,” Pulkit Agrawal, co-founder and CEO at Trell, said.  

 Trell was founded in 2016 by IIT Bombay alumni Agrawal, Prashant Sachan, Arun Lodhi, National Institute of Industrial Engineering (NITIE) graduate Bimal Kartheek Rebba, and New Jersey Institute of Technology alumnus Nirav Sheth.  

The company’s mobile app allows users to create videos of their travel and local experiences and share them as a classic slideshow or copyrighted images on other platforms.  

It monetises its platform via social commerce.  

 “Trell’s roadmap and vision of empowering millions of Indian’s to become micro-entrepreneurs has really resonated with us and we are glad to see the love that the platform has witnessed this past year,” Ashish Dave of Mirae Asset-Naver Asia Growth Fund, said.  

The platform claims to have achieved over 100 million downloads and over 50 million monthly active users on its app.  

Trell’s vast content library features videos from the said categories in 8 regional languages garnering over 20 Billion monthly views. By the end of this year, the social commerce platform intend to launch 6 more languages expanding its footprint to over 2000 cities and towns in India.  

 The company had raised Rs 85 crore in its Series A funding round led by KTB Network, a South Korean financial services group in August last year.  

The social commerce space has seen increased investor interest over the last year with DealShare, a Jaipur based social commerce startup, securing $144 million in a Series D round of funding led by Tiger Global last week. Another social-commerce platform Meesho was being valued at $2.1 billion earlier this year.    

The space has also seen competition from influencer-led ecommerce platforms such as Bulbulshop. Homegrown ecommerce giant Flipkart also recently launched its own social commerce platform, Shopsy.