E-commerce platform Snapdeal has reduced its losses considerably in FY24, despite near-flat revenue growth during the year. The company narrowed its net loss by 43% to Rs 160.4 crore in FY24, from Rs 282.2 crore a year ago. On an adjusted basis, Ebitda loss narrowed by 88% to Rs 16 crore from Rs 144 crore in FY23.
Most of this improvement in its bottom line was possible because of a 21% drop in total expenses to Rs 540.8 crore. While it managed to halve its employee-related costs to Rs 158.4 crore in FY24, the company has also cut its advertising expenses by 24% to Rs 70.4 crore, as compared to the preceding fiscal year.
But revenue from operations rose by only about 2% to Rs 379.8 crore during the year, from Rs 372 crore in FY23. After talks of a merger with Flipkart fell through, Snapdeal pivoted its business model in 2017 to focus on the value e-commerce segment, which now competes with Meesho, Amazon Bazaar, and Flipkart’s Shopsy.
The platform, where nearly 90% of the products are under Rs 1,000, targets value-focused consumers in tier-II cities and beyond. During its strategic pivot, the platform removed high-value categories such as electronics and large appliances and decided to focus on categories such as fashion, home and kitchen, toys, and beauty.
Snapdeal also reduced its stake in Unicommerce, a company it had bought in 2015 and later sold a 30% stake to Softbank in 2021. As per regulatory filings, Snapdeal earned Rs 33 crore from a secondary sale of a 3.4% stake last year before the IPO and Rs 81 crore by selling a 9.2% stake, via the offer-for-sale route, during the IPO.