Eyewear producer Lenskart and Japanese Direct-to-Consumer eyewear model Owndays on Thursday introduced a strategic merger to construct the area’s largest Omni-channel eyewear enterprise. This will take the group’s attain to 13 markets in Asia together with India, Singapore, Thailand, Taiwan, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Japan.
Lenskart didn’t disclose the worth or monetary particulars of the transaction. However, the present main shareholders of OWNDAYS together with L Catterton Asia and Mitsui & Co., Principal Investments will exit their positions to Lenskart.
Owndays’ Co-founders, CEO Shuji Tanaka, and COO Take Umiyama, will proceed to be shareholders and lead the administration crew of Owndays Inc., which can proceed to function as a separate model.
Founded in 1989, OWNDAYS is a number one eyewear model in Asia headquartered in Japan and Singapore with round 460 shops throughout 13 markets within the area – Japan, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, Cambodia, the Philippines, Australia, Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia, Hong Kong, India, and the UAE. Aiming to develop into the worldwide chief within the fast-fashion eyewear class, the corporate is targeted on offering superior buyer experiences via parts together with quick service, a easy pricing mannequin, and an intensive guarantee system.
“Owndays has been recognized as the eyewear brand of choice across multiple countries in Asia ever since we opened our first overseas store, in Singapore in 2013. Our growth accelerated following L Catterton Asia’s and Mitsui & Co., Principal Investments’ participation in us in 2018, as we leveraged their strong commercial network in Japan and across the region to expand our operations to cover a total of 13 markets today. I believe digital transformation is the key to our next phase of growth in the post-pandemic operating environment and I am excited to partner with Lenskart, which has deep expertise and intellectual capital in the information technology field,” Owndays Founder and CEO Shuji Tanaka mentioned in an announcement.
Lenskart has been stepping up its enlargement past its house turf via M&A offers and a big fundraiser of $200 million lately via its subsidiary that follows a home of manufacturers technique. Neso Brands, a subsidiary of eyewear producer Lenskart, has raised $100 million in a seed funding spherical, which can allow the agency to create a home of manufacturers catering to the worldwide market.
Lenskart, which owns Singapore-headquartered Neso, has earlier raised giant sums in funding from outstanding traders comparable to KKR, SoftBank, Alpha Wave Global and Temasek. In a current funding spherical in April, Lenskart was valued at greater than $4 billion.
The eyewear start-up with its 300 folks engineering crew, estimated to scale as much as 500 folks in FY23, will assist construct a stronger on-line and Omni expertise for OWNDAYS. The unicorn eyewear producer has additionally been investing million of {dollars} in deeper provide chain integration and automation which can now be leveraged by each the manufacturers to additional improve buyer proposition and unit economics.
Lenskart added that it’ll proceed its speedy enlargement in India and South East Asia to serve the mass to mid-premium segments whereas OWNDAYS scales swiftly to cater to premium segments. LENSKART’s management in India and OWNDAYS’s sturdy geographical competitiveness within the South Asian markets have enabled the group to develop into the quickest rising Pan Asian eyewear firm.
“With OWNDAYS we move a step closer to democratizing eyewear. I have known Shuji-san and Take-san for over five years and have been an admirer of the disruptive brand and customer experience they have built with OWNDAYS. To bring about a revolutionary change such as the one the world needs in eyewear, we need to work with like-minded and complementary founders…There is much we can achieve together which will be greater than the sum of its parts,” Peyush Bansal, Co-Founder, and Group CEO at Lenskart mentioned in an announcement.
Founded in 2010, Lenskart is the biggest direct-to-consumer (D2C) eyewear model in India. While solely 10 years previous, it has already modified eyewear retail behaviour in India with its high-fashion, value-for-money, and Omni channel enterprise mannequin. Lenskart claims to ship over 10 million pairs of eyewear yearly and has over 20 million app downloads, 300 house eye take a look at representatives in addition to over 1,100 shops throughout India, Singapore, and Dubai.
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Source: www.financialexpress.com”