Axiata invests $16m in Bengaluru start-up StoreKing

The Dollar Business Bureau

Axiata Digital, an arm of Malaysian telecom major Axiata Group Berhad, has made an investment of $16 million (around Rs.106 crore) in StoreKing, a Bengaluru-based e-commerce start-up.

While this is the first investment by Axiata Digital in India, its holding company already has a 20 percent share in the Indian telecom major Idea Cellular.

Earlier, StoreKing had raised $6 million from Luxembourg-based venture capitalist - Mangrove Capital Partners.

Sridhar Gundaiah, Chief Executive Officer, StoreKing, said, “From the beginning, our aim was to support thousands of marginal businesses in rural India to attain a brighter future by making them capable to use technology. We hope to gain from the experience of Axiata in widespread geography-based services.”

With the fresh capital, Storeking is planning to start focussing towards its aim of achieving 100,000 retailers by next year.

A rural commerce startup, run by LocalCube Commerce, StoreKing has tied up with domestic retailers by establishing kiosks to offer a simple self-service shopping experience to the shoppers of small towns.

Currently, StoreKing has 16,000 kiosks spread across small towns of south and west parts of India. It manages 150,000 orders per month with a million users’ base. The startup is eyeing to fill the gap which big players such as Flipkart and Snapdeal are not able to address in the online commerce market.

Mohd Khairil Abdullah, CEO, Axiata Digital, said, “StoreKing has created a platform that solves the fundamental constraints in our markets with last mile logistics and payments while building trust amongst mass market consumers.”

Axiata Group is one of Asia’s leading telecommunications groups with around 290 million subscribers in 10 countries. The Group controls stakes in 6 mobile operators under the brands of ‘Celcom’ in Malaysia, ‘Dialog’ in Sri Lanka, ‘Ncell’ in Nepal, ‘Robi’ in Bangladesh, ‘Smart’ in Cambodia and ‘XL’ in Indonesia.