Global Fashion Group, the e-commerce firm backed by Kinnevik and Rocket Internet, has secured a funding of EUR 300 million, which has been underwritten by Rocket Internet and other existing shareholders.
As part of the transaction, Rocket Internet has agreed to underwrite up to EUR 100 million of the financing. Rocket Internet expects to invest up to EUR 85 million including the conversion of an existing investment at the terms of the financing. The transaction values Global Fashion Group at EUR 1.0 billion.
Commenting on the occasion, CEO of Rocket Internet Oliver Samwer, said, “We continue to be very excited about the prospects of Global Fashion Group, which has successfully built out leading market positions in key emerging markets. We are looking forward to continuing to work with the GFG team as well as Kinnevik and the other Global Fashion Group shareholders to support GFG.”
CEO of Global Fashion Group, Romain Voog, added, “We very much appreciate the continued support of our key existing investors in Global Fashion Group. The financing will provide Global Fashion Group with the necessary capital to continue to execute its strategy of building out its leading position in the online fashion sector in emerging markets. During the first quarter 2016 we have made significant progress on our path to profitability, reducing the loss from operations meaningfully in comparison to the first quarter 2015 resulting in an improvement of the Adjusted EBITDA margin by over 10 percentage points year-over-year. This is in line with Global Fashion Group’s plan to deliver an accelerated path to profitability across its regional businesses while continuing to capture the significant market opportunity available.”
Speaking about the funding, Sanjeev Mohanty, MD & CEO, Jabong said, “The funding will help us enhance our business operations. We have had success over the past few months, with Jabong recently recording its best month in terms of revenue. GFG sees good progress with Jabong in India and this trust will help us strengthen our operations in the country.”
The funding will greatly help Jabong, which is on a path of transformation from a start-up to a professionally run, profit oriented company. Jabong has also revamped its entire top leadership ever since Sanjeev Mohanty took charge of the company as MD & CEO in December 2015.
BRAND HISTORY – GLOBAL FASHION GROUP
Founded in 2014, Global Fashion Group is the leading online fashion business in emerging markets. It combines six regional brands, Dafiti in Latin America, Lamoda in Russia and CIS, Namshi in the Middle East, The Iconic in Australia, Jabong in India and Zalora in South-East Asia.
Global Fashion Group is dedicated to bringing fashion online in emerging markets and offers brands the chance to enter the fashion e-commerce sector in highly promising economies. It operates in 27 countries and employs over 10,000 people. Working closely with the partners, it has crafted the best in-class shopping experience for the customers offering over 3,000 international and local brands to be delivered in a fast and convenient way.
BRAND HISTORY – ROCKET INTERNET
Rocket Internet builds and invests in Internet companies that take proven online business models to new, fast-growing markets. Rocket Internet focuses on five industry sectors of online and mobile retail services that make up a significant share of consumer spending: Food and Groceries, Fashion, General Merchandise, Home and Living and Travel.
Its network of companies operates a variety of business models in over 110 countries on six continents with more than 36,000 employees at the end of 2015. Rocket Internet SEis listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange.
Rocket Internet expects to invest up to EUR 85 million including the conversion of an existing investment at the terms of the financing
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