Ninety One, a sustainable mobility brand, has raised 225 crore (or roughly $30 million) in its latest Series A funding, the company announced on Wednesday.
A91 Partners LLP invested approximately 160 crore in the round, with participating investors including Fireside Ventures, Avaana Capital, and Tital Capital investing an additional 65 crore.
With this funding round, AlphaVector (India) Pvt. Ltd.’s Ninety One is now valued at 1,000 crore (or roughly $132 million).
According to the company, the proceeds of the current funding round will be used to invest in manufacturing facilities in Gujarat and to expand its electric cycle portfolio. The brand will also look to expand into new markets around the world.
A91 Partners’ VT Bharadwaj, Fireside Ventures’ Vinay Singh, and Avaana Capital’s Sandeep Singhal will join the startup’s board of directors as part of the round.
Ninety One is a six-year-old direct-to-consumer (D2C) cycling brand that manufactures and sells cycles for adventure sports and urban mobility needs. Currently, the brand pursues an omnichannel retail strategy and maintains an offline dealer presence via the 91CARES programme.
“At Ninety One, our focus has always been on disrupting the bicycle and electric cycles category through engineering-led product innovation and a deep brand connect with our consumers. The current funding round will help us catalyse growth multi-fold as we use the capital to deepen our supply chain, strengthen our distribution channels and build our brand story,” said Sachin Chopra, co-founder and chief executive officer (CEO), Ninety One.
At the moment, the startup sells over 20,000 bicycles per month, has 1,000 store outlets in over 500 cities, and a million monthly unique visitors on its online platform.
“We are excited to back Ninety One as a pioneering new age Indian active lifestyle brand that can truly deliver world-class products to global consumers. Ninety One has out-innovated competition in bicycles and electric cycles and emerged as a strong brand with deep distribution backed by solid manufacturing capabilities,” said VT Bharadwaj, general partner, A91 Partners LLC.
Currently, the brand claims that men account for more than 80% of its sales. However, through research and engineering efforts, the brand hopes to strengthen its position in the children’s and women’s categories. It expects these categories to account for half of its sales over the next two years.
