Manipal Group’s Ranjan Pai has acquired the remaining shareholding of JSW Ventures in online beauty retailer Purplle. The venture capital fund is said to have exited its total stake at Rs 216 crore, including its previous partial sale to Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, according to industry estimates.
“With this transaction, JSW Fund 1 made 18X on the initial investment in Purplle and returned 2.7x of the Fund 1 corpus to investors so far,” the fund house said in a statement, adding that Purplle was one of its earliest investments as a fund and it has delivered a 57% internal rate of return.
According to Tracxn data, JSW Ventures had initially invested nearly Rs 12 crore in Purplle in 2016. Earlier in May, the fund had sold a part of its stake in Purplle to Abu Dhabi Investment Authority for an undisclosed amount.
JSW Ventures is an early-stage venture capital fund sponsored by the family office of the JSW Group. It invests in technology-led startups at pre-series A to series A stages, including startups such as HomeLane, HealthPlix, Cureskin, MoEVing and Zvolv.
Founded in 2012, Purplle is an e-commerce platform for beauty and personal care products and competes directly with Nykaa. In FY22, its revenue rose 72% to Rs 219.9 crore while losses widened to Rs 203.6 crore. For FY23, the company has not yet filed its results.
According to Tracxn data, the company has so far raised $385 million in funding from investors such as Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, Blume Ventures, and IvyCap Ventures and currently stands at a valuation of $1.1 billion.
