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How D2C Brand FreshToHome Cracked Product Market Fit In UAE To Reach INR 1,300 Cr ARR In 3 Years?

Half way through 2019, FreshToHome’s cofounders Shan Kadavil and Mathew Joseph decided to expand their D2C fresh meat and seafood brand to the UAE. However, all their projections came to a staggering halt when they realised that cracking the code to the product-market fit in the region would not be as easy as they thought.

Given that FreshToHome was a leader in their category in India, the cofounders got too optimistic that they could achieve the same success in the UAE within a span of just three months. On the contrary, it took more than a year before revenues started pouring in from the region.

Now, almost after three years of cross-border operations, the company has already expanded to all seven emirates in the UAE. The Singapore-headquartered company also saw a two-fold rise in its revenues between CY20 and CY22. It earned a total revenue of INR 600 Cr in CY20, which grew to INR 1,100 Cr in CY22. It is currently running at an annual revenue run rate of INR 1,300 Cr for the month of March 2023.

“Here, the UAE contributes 12% of our total revenues. Including the seven emirates in the UAE and the 150+ cities in India, we are currently operationally profitable at the city level (excluding our overhead costs) by 7%-8%, which is rare in our category,” Kadavil said.

The India numbers reported for the company are quite different though. As Kadavil explains, the company follows a marketplace structure like Flipkart and Amazon. This makes it difficult to portray the correct numbers in India filings, which come down to usually 4% of its total revenue.

Shan Kadavil, CEO and Co-Founder, FreshtoHome

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Ex-UAE resident’s FreshToHome portal nets Amazon in $104m fund round, gets ready for Saudi Arabia

 

Shan Kadavil, CEO and Co-Founder, FreshtoHome 

Dubai: FreshToHome, a direct-to-consumer portal selling fish and meat started by an ex-UAE resident, has hooked $104 million in its latest funding round, which is led by Amazon. Existing contributors such as Investment Corporation of Dubai, ADQ and Bahrain’s Investcorp added to their earlier stakes.

Abdul Aziz Al Ghurair, the Dubai-based billionaire, had also been an investor in a previous round.

The portal, which launched operations by sourcing fresh catch direct from fishermen in India, is operational in the UAE, including having two physical locations at Dubai Waterfront Market. With the $104 million, FreshToHome has raised more than $240 million, and sees the time as being right for major forays into Saudi Arabia and other markets.

“Our business model will be direct-to-consumer, and for now we do not see any need to supply fresh supplies to third-parties such as supermarkets,” said Shan Kadavil, co-founder and CEO. (An alumni of Sharjah Indian High School, Kadavil had an extensive stint in Silicon Valley, including in gaming ventures, before launching FreshToHome in 2015.)

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FreshToHome closes $104 mn Series D funding with Amazon Smbhav VC, others

Shan Kadavil, CEO and Co-Founder, FreshtoHome

FreshToHome, a platform that sells fresh fish and meat, has closed $104 million in Series D funding with Amazon Smbhav Venture Fund leading the round.

New investors joining this round included E20 Investment Ltd., Mount Judi Ventures and Dallah Albaraka while existing investors in FreshToHome including Iron Pillar, Investcorp, Investment Corporation of Dubai (the principal investment arm of the Government of Dubai), Ascent Capital and others were also part of this round, said the company in a statement.

FreshToHome has pioneered the revolution of making 100% preservative and antibiotic-residue-free fresh fish, seafood, meat and meat products accessible and affordable to all and that was the platform’s biggest USP,’‘ claimed Shan Kadavil, CEO & Co-founder, FreshToHome.

“We are now a ‘Proficorn’ with operational profitability across the company. As we strive to offer more value to our farmers and fishers, customers, employees and investors, our focus is on profitability and sustainable value creation,’‘ he added.

D2C Meat Startup FreshToHome Raises $104 Mn Funding To Build Omnichannel Presence

D2C meat and fish brand FreshToHome has raised $104 Mn in a Series D funding round led by Amazon Sambhav Venture Fund. The round also saw participation from E20 Investment, Mount Judi Ventures, as well as existing investors such as Investcorp, among others. FreshToHome will use the fresh funding to expand its presence in the domestic market, especially in the 100 cities that it entered over the last 18 months, as well as in Saudi Arabia, its cofounder and CEO Shan Kadavil told Inc42.

Shan Kadavil, CEO and Co-Founder, FreshtoHome

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Amazon backs Indian meat startup FreshToHome in $104 million funding

Indian startup FreshToHome, which sells fresh fish and meat to consumers in the South Asian market and the Middle East region, has courted a new backer: Amazon.

Amazon, through its India-focused Smbhav Venture Fund, has led a $104 million Series D financing round in the Bengaluru-headquartered startup, the two companies said Tuesday. The new round for the startup, which also counts the development arm of the American government among its backers, also saw participation from the government of Dubai and Iron Pillar.

This is the largest check that the $250 million Smbhav Venture Fund has written so far. The new round takes FreshToHome’s all-time raise to over $250 million.

Started in 2015, FreshToHome is one of the largest players battling for a slice of the $100 billion Indian fish and meat market. Most Indians are not vegetarians, but the current market is run on an age-old system.

FreshToHome is bringing efficiency to the market by streamlining the sourcing infrastructure of meat and fish and improving the quality of the produce and their delivery time by using its own rigorous processing plants and vast supply chain network.

A customer ordering fish from Delhi to Dubai on a Monday gets their item, which was procured on Monday morning, delivered by Tuesday, for instance.

But for FreshToHome, and a handful of other startups vying for the same $100 billion Indian meat market, one of the biggest challenges is establishing trust with the customers. The wet market commands the lion’s share in all meat and fish sale in India, offering customers the ability to inspect each item before reaching for their wallet.

Shan Kadavil, co-founder and chief executive of FreshToHome, told TechCrunch in an interview that it took the startup about seven years to establish the competitive moat that it has today.
Shan Kadavil, CEO and Co-Founder, FreshtoHome

FreshToHome Raises Series D Funding, Led By Amazon Smbhav

Direct-to-consumer meat delivery brand FreshToHome has closed $104 million (Rs 861.3 crore) in a Series D round led by Amazon Smbhav Venture Fund, a top executive told VCCircle.

“The fresh capital would be used to deepen FreshToHome‘s presence in the 160 cities cities it currently operates in,” founder and chief executive Shan Kadavil said in a telephonic interaction.

In a bid to focus on omnichannel going ahead, the meat deliverer is also looking to expand into Saudi Arabia, Kadavil added.

Shan Kadavil, CEO and Co-Founder, FreshtoHome

FreshToHome to Invest Rs 1K crore in Telangana

Shan Kadavil, Co-Founder, FreshtoHome

Hyderabad: FreshToHome (FTH), the world’s largest fully integrated e-commerce platform for fresh fish, meat, and seafood, has announced fresh investments in a phased outlay of up to Rs 1,000 crore in Telangana.

In the next five years, FreshToHome will deploy funds to strengthen its presence across the state that has the largest percentage of meat consumers with more than 98% of its population consuming non-veg. Studies reveal that the average per capita consumption of non-veg is 1.4 kilos per month in Telangana.

An investment-friendly hub, Telangana is one of the high traction customer bases in South India. In the last two quarters alone, FreshToHome has witnessed 6x growth in Hyderabad and has been successfully acquiring new customers month-on-month both at online and offline touchpoints.

Shan Kadavil, Co-Founder, FreshToHome, said, “Telangana is one of the fastest-growing states in India, and is a huge potential market for FreshToHome. We will, directly and indirectly, invest in capabilities that will help us serve our customers in distribution, cold chain, and sourcing capabilities. Our recent growth in Telangana is propelled by customer feedback who are choosing ‘100% fresh, 0% chemical’ formalin-free fish, seafood, and antibiotic residue-free and chemical-free meat. There is a market appetite for players like us and we will strive to leverage our core strengths to serve more customers in newer geographies in the shortest span.”

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‘We will not participate in the 10-minute or 15-minute delivery race’

Shan Kadavil, Co-Founder, FreshtoHome

The online meat ordering and delivery market in India has been growing in leaps and bounds over the last few years, with the coronavirus pandemic giving the startups in the segment a major boost. D2C meat and seafood startup FreshToHome, which completed its last fundraising at the end of 2019 — the largest Series C fund-raise in Indian food tech — and is purportedly eyeing a Series D funding round at a post-money valuation of over $1 billion, has become rather aggressive in its expansion and communication drive in recent months. Shan Kadavil, co-founder, spoke to Alokananda Chakraborty about its recent moves.

E-commerce players, especially those in the food business, are in a race to deliver orders as quickly as possible. You already have a 90-minute delivery option; can you go any faster? What sort of capabilities do you need to shorten the delivery window?

We work with our partners to deliver in under 90 minutes, and 60 minutes in some regions, which we are certain is the optimal time to deliver with customer convenience and the safety of our delivery executives in mind. We are working on bringing down the 90-minute option to 60 minutes, and in the next 12 months, we target to reach this in all regions. However, we will not be participants in the 10-minute or 15-minute race game. Furthermore, the use of technology has been game-changing for us for demand planning in geographies, routes, and ETA (estimated time of arrival) of orders.

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FreshToHome announces investments upto ₹1,000 crore in Telangana

Shan Kadavil, Co-Founder, FreshtoHome

Leading e-commerce platform for fresh fish, meat, and seafood — FreshToHome (FTH) — on 23 June announced fresh investments in a phased outlay of up to 1,000 crore in Telangana.

The platform aims to deploy funds to strengthen its presence across the state that has the largest percentage of meat consumers with more than 98 per cent of its population consuming non-veg. As per study in Telangana, the average per capita consumption of non-veg is 1.4 kilos per month.

FreshToHome expects to clock revenues of ₹1,500-2,000 crore in FY23

Shan Kadavil, Co-Founder, FreshtoHome

Clocking in promising revenue growth last year, FreshToHome, a direct-to-customer meat and seafood start-up, expects to continue growing its revenue base in FY23. The company told BusinessLine that it expects to reach a turnover of ₹1,500-2,000 crore in FY23.

“We are the largest company in this segment, both in terms of revenue as well as orders. Last year, our revenue figures stood at ₹1,200 crore, which we expect to reach ₹1,500-2,000 crore in FY23,” said Shan Kadavil, CEO and founder, FreshToHome. The company receives a total of 2.5 million orders every month, across all categories.

Kadavil said that there are plans to expand both nationally and internationally. On a national front, the company is building itself as a retail major.

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