Crownit, the leading local merchant discovery and privileges platform, has secured funding from the founders of some of the leading tech companies in India. FreeCharge founders Kunal Shah and Sandeep Tandon, Freshdesk founder Girish Mathrubootham and ex-Snapdeal CPO Anand Chandrasekaran have invested undisclosed amounts into Crownit, underlining its rapidly growing stature within the country’s entrepreneurial community as the Meituan of India.
Commenting on the investment, Sameer Grover, Founder & CEO, Crownit, said, “To be recognised and supported by some of the most successful tech entrepreneurs in the country is a major shot in the arm for us. It gives us tremendous confidence to see such belief in our business model and execution approach. We are building India’s largest offline deals company using app-only cost efficient cash-back approach. We are replicating the success of Meituan (China’s largest offline deals company) in India. We will continue to scale using product innovation without the need of large capital. Kunal, Sandeep, Girish and Anand acknowledge Crownit’s product focused approach and we will continue to build on that.”
Kunal Shah, Founder, FreeCharge, added, "Crownit has built a sustainable marketing program for offline merchants. The consumer engagement of Crownit has proven that the product really works and has wide acceptance. At scale across 25 cities and 50k merchants it will work beautifully. Crownit is clearly turning into the Meituan of India. Kudos to the team at Crownit which has helped in building such a comprehensive and economical platform!”
Anand Chandrasekaran , ex-CPO, Snapdeal, said, “Crownit and Sameer have built a product that's both fun and beneficial for consumers, and has day-to-day usage relevance. They have focused on the right metrics and levers to drive habit-forming behaviour. As the O2O market is soon poised to become competitive in India, the winners will be the ones who have built a simple and intuitive customer experience.”
Sandeep Tandon, Founder, FreeCharge, said, “The offline merchants segment is a big opportunity in India. With 95% fragmentation in this domain, it is a tough challenge to build a deals company which is acceptable to both merchants and consumers. I have strong belief in the approach Crownit and Sameer have taken.”
Girish Mathrubootham, Founder, FreshDesk, said, “Crownit has razor sharp focus on customer satisfaction. A company at such early stage with so much passion on customer delight is something which awed me. And clearly the business model is disruptive and solving a big problem which local merchants face in India.”
Targeting the offline merchants’ segment, Crownit has emerged as one of the largest players in the direct consumer discounts and deals category in India.
Crownit is India’s leading O2O platform, connecting consumers with local merchants. Launched in July-2014, Crownit has seen widespread growth across four cities including Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. The company offers its users cashback at local merchants, and customers can redeem their crowns (Cashback) by shopping online, book movie tickets, pay their bills and many more. The retail program helps attract customers for outlet partners by marketing them through the app. Crownit has over 9,00,000 users and has over 15,000 merchants listed on the O2O platform. Crownit targets to have 20 million users and drive $1.2Bn of annual GMV across 25 cities in India by 2019.
