Udaan sustains $315m loss on top of $134m in revenue

Udaan, the Indian business-to-business ecommerce company valued at US$3 billion at the time of writing, has seen an exponential growth in its revenue in the financial year ended March 2020.

According to its filings, Udaan’s FYE 2020 revenue (from contracts with customers) stood at 9.78 billion rupees (US$134 million), over 21x higher than in FYE 2019.

Udaan co-founders (from left) Amod Malviya, Vaibhav Gupta, Sujeet Kumar / Photo credit: Udaan

This is a much bigger jump in its operating revenues than the 14.3x increase during the previous period.

Over half of Udaan’s earnings came from the sale of traded goods to “cash and carry” entities or retailers, as it raked in 6.32 billion rupees (US$86.7 million) during the financial year ended March 2020.

This revenue stream was practically non-existent in previous years, as the Bengaluru-based startup’s financial statement shows.

The company’s platform enables small manufacturers, farmers, and brands to sell directly to shopkeepers, kiranas (local stores), restaurants, street vendors, chemists, offices, small factories, and contractors.

Udaan and its investors – GGV Capital, Tencent, and Lightspeed Venture Partners – didn’t respond to queries sent by Tech in Asia.

In FYE 2019, Udaan’s largest source of revenue was from making deliveries for its marketplace buyers.

While its delivery business has seen a nearly fourfold growth to reach 1 billion rupees (US$14.5 million) in FYE 2020, it is now the third-highest source of income for the company.

The second-largest revenue generator is earnings from sellers that use Udaan’s platform to list their products. It brought in 1.75 billion rupees (US$24 million) and is also a new source of income, as per the latest filings.

Interestingly, the company’s interest on loans revenue grew by nearly 100%, bringing in 159 million rupees (US$2.2 million) in March 2020 from just 1 million rupees (US$13,700) a year earlier.

It represents a huge growth avenue for the company going forward, and it’s one of the reasons why Udaan is looking to expand its financing capabilities for small and medium-sized enterprises.

Mounting losses

Big money from big investors