GoKwik raises Rs 40 cr in pre-Series A round led by Matrix Partners India

E-commerce enablement company Gokwik has raised Rs 40 crore ($5.5 million) in a pre-Series A round led by Matrix Partners India. This round also saw the participation of global investor RTP Global.

Angel investors and serial entrepreneurs like Jitendra Gupta - Founder & CEO of Jupiter, Nitin Gupta – Co-founder of Uni, Utsav Somani - Partner at AngelList India, Amit Lakhotia - Founder at Park+, Pradeep Parameswaran - President, Mobility, the Asia Pacific at Uber, Manish Vij - Co-Founder of Smile Group, Asish Mohapatra - co-Founder & CEO of OfBusiness, Arjun Vaidya - Ventures Lead, India at Verlinvest, Ramakant Sharma - Founder, LivSpace, Siddharth Puri - co-Founder & CEO, Tyroo, Umang Kumar - co-Founder, CarDekho, Anupam Mittal - Founder & CEO, Shaadi.com and other leading industry figures also participated in the round.

The new investment will primarily be used for scaling up & establishing a footprint in MENA and SEA regions and hiring talent across tech, data, and product engineering. Also, the platform is going to invest in building many industry-first tech and data solutions to optimise the conversion funnel for online brands.

Commenting on the fundraising, Chirag Taneja, co-founder & CEO, GoKwik said, “E-commerce enablement players will play a pivotal role in fuelling the burgeoning Indian e-retail market which is projected to touch $120 billion in next 4-5 years. GoKwik is poised to redraft the traditional playbook by offering personalized solutions to improve overall conversion rates, help register higher GMV with increased RoI and provide protection against risks such as RTO to e-commerce and D2C brands.”

Founded in the post-pandemic era, GoKwik is the brainchild of Chirag Taneja (CEO) and includes Vivek Bajpai (CTO), and Ankush Talwar (Chief Data Scientist) as part of the founding team. GoKwik believes in a ‘merchant-first’ philosophy and uses AI/ML technologies to solve problems like Return to Origin (RTO) to solve & better Cash on Delivery (CoD) conversion rates for e-commerce players including D2C brands.

GoKwik's checkout and UPI solutions help improve checkout conversion rates ensuring higher GMV realisation, increased profitability, reduced customer acquisition cost, and increased delivery rates, claimed the company.

More than 75 brands including digitally native brands, traditional players and marketplaces have put their trust in GoKwik leading to a million-plus monthly transactions, almost doubling every month. Many leading D2C brands like boAt, Mamaearth, The Man Company, Heads Up For Tails, The Moms Co., OZiva, TCNS Clothing Co. (W, Aurelia and Wishful), LimeRoad, ManMatters, Neemans, The Whole Truth, The Souled Store, EyeMyEye and more are already leveraging GoKwik’s solutions to empower their online businesses to deliver a BEST-IN-CLASS experience to their customers.

On leveraging the platform, Varun Alagh, co-founder of MamaEarth, said, “Conversion rates across the funnel and RTO are major pain points for any e-commerce business in India, and GoKwik is focusing on solving exactly these problems. With a razor-sharp focus on propelling D2C businesses, the GoKwik team shows a lot of promise with its advanced AI capability and a deep understanding of the e-commerce space.”

“India is seeing a surge of direct to consumer brands and the share of non-marketplace, digital transactions for traditional as well as new-age brands is increasing rapidly. Some of this is driven by Covid but the trend is secular. This will create opportunities for companies such as GoKwik, to offer unique to India solutions that help merchants to sell more effectively online. This market timing combined with Chirag, Vivek and Ankush’s deep and relevant experience to build such a company makes it a compelling investment for us," said Alagh.

"Globally the e-commerce enablement and especially the one-click checkout space is seeing significant interest with multiple large companies emerging over the last 18 months. We believe that the same will be true in India as well and we’re thrilled to be partnering with GoKwik on this journey of democratising the e-commerce shopping experience,' said Rajat Agarwal, MD, Matrix India.