India-based on-demand logistics provider Shadowfax received $60m yesterday in a series D round led by e-commerce marketplace Flipkart and backed by mobile chipmaker Qualcomm’s corporate venturing subsidiary, Qualcomm Ventures.
Mirae Asset – Naver Asia Growth Fund, a vehicle established by internet company Naver and investment firm Mirae Asset Daewoo, also contributed to the round, as did Eight Roads Ventures, a subsidiary of financial services group Fidelity.
Venture capital firm NGP Capital and International Finance Corporation, the private sector-focused arm of the World Bank, filled out the round, which valued the company at $250m, people familiar with the matter told TechCrunch.
Founded in 2015, Shadowfax runs a last-mile logistics platform that relies on artificial intelligence and location data to calculate the most efficient routes. Its activities span more than 500 cities and it maintains a network of more than 100,000 delivery partners.
The company processes some 10 million shipments per month across areas like groceries and take-out deliveries, electronics and fashion. Flipkart was rumoured in August 2019 to be investing as much as $40m in Shadowfax, but the size of its contribution to the latest round was not confirmed.
Shadowfax has an existing partnership with Flipkart involving the delivery of goods across various categories. The corporate’s commitment to the series D round will deepen the relationship to also cover shipments from Kirana, Flipkart’s chain of brick-and-mortar stores.
The series D cash will go toward bolstering Shadowfax’s technology capabilities, hiring additional staff and working to increase the number of monthly shipments it manages tenfold.
Shadowfax has now secured nearly $101m in funding altogether. Qualcomm Ventures, NGP Capital, Eight Roads Ventures and Mirae Asset participated in its $22m series C round in August 2018.
Eight Roads had already led a $10m series B round for the company in 2016, having supplied it with $8.5m in funding the year before.
