The company that sells customisable pet food will continue to function as a separate entity with its own production processes and supply chain, a senior Licious executive said.
This is Licious’ first strategic investment. It did not share further terms.
“We are looking at businesses that are complementary and adjacencies. We will look at acquiring businesses in the ready-to-cook, ready-to-eat category or offer front-end or back-end opportunities,” Nichelle Kamat, vice-president, category, told ET.
Founded in 2020 by Arpita Ganesh, Pawfectly Made sells homemade and healthy pet-friendly meals.
“Pawfectly Made is a good strategic fit for us given the shared vision and synergies across the value chain. The investment will give us access to a unique consumer play and product portfolio that will complement our existing infrastructure,” Kamat said.
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The fresh pet food segment in India is at an inflection point, driving both Indian and international players to introduce their variegated product offerings to a fast-expanding user base.
According to TechSci Research, the Indian pet food market is growing at a compounded annual rate of 18% and expected to reach $642 million by 2022-end. In spite of the growth opportunity, the pet food sector in India has restricted choices and customers have to be largely dependent on pre-packaged processed food.
Founded in 2015 by Abhay Hanjura and Vivek Gupta, Licious is India’s first D2C unicorn. It serves more than 2 million orders a month to consumers across 23 Indian cities, the company claims.
In March, Licious raised $150 million from investors led by Singapore-based Amansa Capital. Kotak PE and Axis Growth Avenues AIF-I are also among the investors in that round.
