Arzooo.com, a Bengaluru-based online retail startup has raised $1 million (approx ₹7 crore) in its pre-Series A round. Jabbar Internet Group lead the round along with a consortium of investors from India and UK.
The startup will use the infuse funds to seolve challenger faced by retail partners, expand to other countries, and innovate its technology offerings.
“Arzooo.com and its leadership team have understood the deep rooted problems of the physical retailers limiting growth, against the backdrop of ecommerce today,” Hussam Khoury, president of Jabbar Internet Group, UAE said.
Arzoo was launched by former Flipkart colleagues Khushnud Khan and Rishi Raj Rathore in 2017. The startup, through its Go stores, aims to integrate over five lakh brick and motor stores across sectors by 2022.
“Addressing key challenges of selection and price in consumer electronic retail segment, Arzooo.com is at the cusp of revolutionising the space. We are confident that the Arzooo Go Store technology, when integrated across a broad category of retail, will have a positive impact on economies of scale. Backing this venture, we foresee a disruption in physical retail in India with an immediate impact on sustainable business in the traditional format of on ground touch and feel sales, better leveraged by technology,” Khoury added.
The startup currently has over 500 consumer electronics partner stores on its ‘Go Store.‘
Spread across five cities, the Go Store empowers its partner stores to overcome issues of a physical retail and thus, offer large inventory selection, price and faster delivery to the customers.
“We have witnessed tremendous impact of Internet into commerce and how it changed the shopping behaviour for consumers, but despite a widespread application of technology, the offline retail has been, for the most part, untouched or did not benefit as much. With Arzooo Go Store, we have made an immediate and measurable impact to physical retailers. Not only are our retailers empowered with increased earnings, they are now put on the same pedestal to compete with the ecommerce giants,” Khushnud Khan, co-founder at Arzooo.com said.