Lenskart

Lenskart is an Indian optical prescription eyewear retail chain. As of September 2019, Lenskart had over 500 stores in 70 cities in India.[1][2] The company had a valuation of $1.5 billion by Dec 2019 after Softbank invested around $275 million.[3] Peyush Bansal, a former Microsoft employee, founded Lenskart in 2010 along with Amit Chaudhary and Sumeet Kapahi.[4] In 2020 Lenskart generated total revenue of Rs.1000 cr. plus[5]

Lenskart Solutions Pvt Ltd
Private
IndustryPrescription Eyewear, Opticians
Founded2010
FounderPeyush Bansal, Amit Chaudhary and Sumeet Kapahi
Headquarters
Faridabad, Delhi NCR, India
Area served
Worldwide
Key people
Peyush Bansal (CEO), Amit Chaudhary (COO)
Websitehttps://www.lenskart.com/

Financial backers of Lenskart include TPG Growth, International Finance Corp and Adveq Management.[6] Ratan Tata (of Tata Sons) and S Gopalakrishnan (of Infosys) have also invested in Lenskart.[7] In March 2018 Wipro Chairman Azim Premji invested 400cr in the group taking the valuation of the company to 3000 Crore.[8] By 2016 Lenskart had become one of the two top optical chains in India, along with Titan Eye Plus.[7] Its manufacturing facility in Delhi manufactures 300,000 glasses a month.[9] Lenskart also has a factory in Zhengzhou (China) which manufactures about 50% of the production.[10] Lenskart launched the eyewear brand John Jacobs in 2017 and for that brand aimed to touch Rs 500 crore in revenue in two years.[11][12] In 2018 the company became profitable (EBITD).[9]

The company is in talks with Japanese group SoftBank as well as the private equity firm Kedaara Capital for investment. These investments will make Lenskart the next unicorn.[13][1]

In October 2017, Lenskart's first brand ambassador was Katrina Kaif.[14][15] In March 2019 the company roped in Bhuvan Bam as their first male brand ambassador.[16]


See also

References
  1. Dash, Sanchita (2 September 2019). "9 years later, Lenskart set to be a unicorn having fought off losses and welcomed investors". Business Insider. Retrieved 2019-09-08.
  2. Sikdar, Shubhomoy (4 March 2019). "Lenskart sees more scope of growth in non-metros: CEO Peyush Bansal". Business Standard India. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  3. "SoftBank Vision Fund invests $275M in India's Lenskart". TechCrunch.
  4. Poduwal, Sunanda (6 November 2011). "Peyush Bansal, founder of Lenskart in India, selling eyewear talks about his business journey". The Economic Times. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  5. Lenskart
  6. Sharma, Samidha; Gooptu, Biswarup (27 May 2019). "Lenskart set to turn unicorn with likely $350M SoftBank funding - ETtech". Economic Times ETtech.com. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  7. Sarkar, Ranju (23 May 2016). "How LenskartBold text is defying the start-up trend". Rediff. Business Standard. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  8. Gooptu, Biswarup; Srinivasan, Supraja (2 March 2018). "Lenskart valuation touches Rs 3,000 Cr after a secondary transaction - ETtech". Economic Times Tech. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  9. Bali, Shinmin (4 November 2018). "Expansion Plan: Lenskart eyes 50% market share". The Financial Express. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  10. Gooptu, Biswarup (2018-12-10). "Lenskart losses drop sharply in FY2018, Revenue up 70% for the fiscal ended March 2017". The Economic Times. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  11. PTI (13 January 2019). "John Jacobs to clock ₹500 cr revenue by March 2021". The Hindu Business Line. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  12. PTI (4 February 2018). "Lenskart invests $4 million to expand John Jacobs brand stores". Livemint. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  13. "Lenskart to become the next unicorn! Softbank to invest $350m at $1.3bn valuation". Business Today. 27 May 2019. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  14. "Lenskart ropes in Katrina Kaif as brand ambassador". Moneycontrol. 9 October 2017. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  15. "Katrina Kaif is Lenskart's first-ever ambassador". The Economic Times. 10 October 2017. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
  16. "Lenskart announces Bhuvan Bam as its new brand ambassador". Economic Times Brand Equity. 29 March 2019. Retrieved 2019-08-31.
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