Covid-19 blues, funding crunch, made Urban Ladder do a fire sale to RIL

Urban Ladder was valued at around Rs 1,200 crore in 2019 and this dropped to about Rs 750 crore in 2019

Online furniture and home décor store Urban Ladder had been struggling for fund for the past two years, and the Covid-19 pandemic worsened its financial woes, forcing it to have a fire sale to Reliance Industries’ (RIL’s) retail arm, analysts said. 

Reliance Retail Ventures this week acquired 96 per cent in Urban Ladder for a cash consideration of Rs 182.12 crore.

The Bengaluru-based company had raised about Rs 857 crore from marquee investors, including Sequoia, SAIF Partners, and Tata Sons Chairman Emeritus Ratan Tata. Also after an internal round of funding two years ago, Urban Ladder couldn’t raise significant capital.

“The company fired