Zilingo raises US$ 8 million in Series A funding

Mumbai: Bangkok-based Indian e-commerce company, Zilingo, announced that it had raised $8 million from Venturra Capital, Sequoia India and Susquehanna International Group. The company, which claims it is one of the leading e-commerce portals in Thailand, said it will use the influx of capital to capture new markets such as Indonesia and increase presence in Singapore and Thailand by on boarding more sellers. 

Zilingo charges 10-20 per cent commission from its sellers, while its competitors, in their quest for market share, are charging nothing. 

“We charge our sellers over 10-15 percent commission... and share discounts with them and stopped doing business in verticals where there was no margin to be made. It means we reduced our burn and extended our runway while our competitors increasingly ran out of cash,” said Ankiti Bose, CEO and co-founder, ZIlingo.

The company, which has its tech centre in Bangalore, has recently been using artificial intelligence, powered by Mad Street Den, and augmented reality to keep its customers engaged.

“In the Snapchat age, drab homepages, frankly, just don’t cut it anymore. Consumers today are unforgiving, demanding and have very short attention spans,” Bose said.

Zilingo is chasing a market where the long tail fashion and beauty market is over $20 billion in South East Asia.

“Zilingo has one of the strongest founding teams we have come across in the region. We are confident that Zilingo's ability to execute, coupled with its proprietary technology, will allow the company to expand and become the regional leader in its category," said Tee Suraphongchai, Partner at Venturra Capital, lead investor in Zilingo's series A.

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