Milkbasket Plans IPO Launch Next Year

Grocery delivery firm Milkbasket has taken ahead its plan to launch initial public offer (IPO) by the second half of 2021 as the business during the recent months in the wake of the novel coronavirus pandemic registered robust growth, said a top executive at the firm.

Milkbasket Plans IPO Launch Next Year

Co-founder and CEO of Milkbasket Anant Goel told PTI that they could target their IPO launch in just a year owing to consumers' fast acceptance to at-home grocery delivery service given the pandemic situation, which demands of adhering to social distancing norms as well as avoiding unnecessary movement.

"Milkbasket has a near-perfect record of reaching growth targets since being founded in 2015. The rapid adoption of at-home grocery delivery amongst consumers due to the pandemic has provided us with an impetus to target IPO in just a year, which we had initially planned for the year 2023," he said.

"We are now working on the process for an IPO... The process takes time and we are still in early stages, but we are looking at possibly next year... second half. For now, the thought process is to list in India, we are an Indian company and well recognised in India," he added.

Also, he declared reports of being in talks to sell the company's business to Paytm Mall and RIL as untrue. "These are reports that I also keep reading. We are not looking at getting acquired. Like any other start-up, we are open to investments, but we aren't selling off the business," he said. "We are seeing strong growth and are scaling it up further. We are EBIDTA-positive already, so whether we receive the funding or not, the IPO plan is on," he said.

With substantial growth in the company's business during the last few months, Goel noted "We are approximately Rs 700 crore-turnover company and we are growing, we should be Rs 1,000 crore in the next couple of quarters".

The company has amassed US$ 33 million via equity funding from Inflection Point Ventures, Mayfield India, Beenext, Kalaari Capital, Unilever Ventures, Blume Ventures, Lenovo Capital (LCIG), few family offices, and venture debt funding by Innoven Capital.

Milkbasket offers delivery of more than 9000 products across FMCG, dairy, fruits and vegetable categories in 5 cities namely Noida, Gurugram, Delhi, Ghaziabad and Bengaluru and commands an average revenue run rate (ARR) of about USD 100 million as of now.

Another grocery delivery platform Grofers backed by Softbank also advanced its proposal of coming up with an initial offer by the end of 2021 as its profitability surged amid the pandemic.

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