Accel Partners have led an investment of $10 million in HomeLane, a startup in the home furnishings space. The others who participated in this round of investment include Sequoia Capital India, an existing investor in the project as well as RB Investments, a Singapore based venture capital firm. With this, HomeLane has raised $25 million.
The business model adopted by HomeLane, typically targets new home buyers to provide them complete interior solutions from designing to execution. This includes the furniture, wardrobes, modular kitchens and so on. The startup uses outsourced agencies to help with the designing and the manufacturing of the ordered stuff. Again, the actual execution is carried out by third parties engaged by HomeLane but the entire management is with the startup.
Having started in the year 2014 by Srikanth Iyer and Rama Harinath, HomeLane claims to have completed 1,700 such installations at an average ticket value of around Rs 6.5 lakh. The venture sees the market for latest designs in interiors and furniture and furnishings is growing in India and the project sees an excellent future for its business.
“We are a provider for giving fit-outs and interior design solutions to people who have just moved into a new apartment. At the back-end we have three partners: designers, manufacturers and installations partners, but HomeLane does the complete project management,” Mint quotes Srikanth as saying.
With their main operations in Bangalore, HomeLane offers its services in Chennai, Hyderabad, Mumbai and the National Capital Region. The fresh funds now sourced will go towards further expanding the existing offerings in these cities.
HomeLane has recently acquired an online home furnishings startup, Capricoast.com, spending Rs 90 crore.
HomeLame competes with Livspace, a home furnishing startup backed by Bessemer Venture Partners and Jungle Ventures.
The founder of HomeLane, Srikanth Iyer, who was CEO of Pearson India left the company to venture out on his own, floating Erudite, an education technology startup that he sold later.