AVCJ

Mitsui leads $21m round for India's Naaptol

  • Andrew Woodman
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Japanese trading house Mitsui has led a INR1.36 billion ($21 million) round for India home shopping and e-commerce start-up Naaptol Online Shopping. Existing investors New Enterprises Associates (NEA), Canaan Partners and Saama Capital also took part.

Set up in 2008, Naaptol operates as an online comparison-based social shopping portal, and also generates a large portion of its revenue via a television shopping platform selling electronics, apparel, jewelry to home and lifestyle products.

According to AVCJ Research data, Naaptol originally attracted a INR40 million investment from Canaan and Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) in 2010. Canaan and SVB then returned to invest $25 million alongside NEA a year later. Naaptol will use this latest investment to upgrade its studio capabilities, expand its supply chain, and invest in technology.

Naaptol's main competitors in India are HomeShop18 and Star CJ Network India, both of which have received venture capital and private equity backing. HomeShop18 launched the same year as Naaptol and is backed by SAIF Partners and OCP Asia. The company abandoned plans for a US IPO last November after its parent - Network18 - was bought by Reliance Industries.

StarCJNetwork was set up in 2009 as joint venture between Rupert Murdoch's Star Group and Korea-based CJ O Shopping. Star exited the business last June when Providence Equity Partners bought its stake for an undisclosed sum.

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