Funding to e-commerce companies was up 133% in 2014, and maintained that pace in the first three months of this year. As startups and investment continue to crowd into e-commerce, it’s useful to know which companies are moving the fastest.
Overall, e-commerce startups are actually taking a longer to move from Seed to Series A financing. However, there was a slight acceleration in the first half of this year, at least in terms of moving from Series A to B rounds.
- For Seed to Series A, the median time to get funding reached 361 days (12 months) in 2014.
- For the Series A to Series B leg, the median time was 458 days (16 months) in 2014.
- For the first half of 2015, Seed to Series A time continued to rise, to a median of 382 days. But median time between Series A and B round was reduced significantly, to 384 days, the best result since 2012.
The CB Insights database allowed us to identify 4 of the fastest-raising companies for moving beyond Seed to Series A. All these companies went from Seed to A in less than 2 months. Mercari, a mobile flea-market app, received a series A round of $3M three weeks after its seed funding of $500K. See the full list below:
| Company | Days | Industry | Country | Series A raised ($M) | Select Investors |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mercari | 21 | Auction & Classifieds | Japan | $3.0 | United |
| ShopSpot | 29 | Marketplace | Thailand | $1.2 | SingTel Innov8 |
| Lamoda | 41 | Apparel & Accessories | Russian Federation | – | Holtzbrinck Ventures, Kinnevik, Tengelmann |
| Kitchensurfing | 47 | Food & Grocery | United States | $3.5 | BoxGroup, Spark Capital, Union Square Ventures |
We also looked at the companies that were fastest to move from Series A to Series B in the 2010 to Q2’15 period. The fastest-growing mid-stage company was Citydeal, a European deals service (later acquired by Groupon), which received $6.9M in Series B funding only 45 days after its Series A funding of $5.6M. Lazada, a Southeast Asia retailer, received Series B funding of $132M only 2 months after its Series A funding. More companies can be found below:
| Company | Days | Industry | Country | Series B Raised ($M) | Select Investors |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Citydeal | 45 | Discount | Germany | $6.9 | e.ventures, Holtzbrinck Ventures, Rocket Internet |
| Lazada | 61 | Multi-Product | Singapore | $132 | Holtzbrinck Ventures, Kinnevik |
| YesMyWine | 80 | Food & Grocery | China | $10 | Mandra Capital |
| Decide | 104 | Electronics & Appliances | United States | $6 | Dan Levitan, Erik Blachford, Hugh Crean, Madrona Venture Group, Maveron, Ram Shriram |
| FTuan | 105 | Discount | China | $5 | Mitsui & Co. Global Investment, Mizuho Capital |
Want more data and analytics on the e-commerce space? Check out the CB Insights Venture Capital Database. Sign up free below.
If you aren’t already a client, sign up for a free trial to learn more about our platform.