In a move to strengthen its position in the home services market, Quikr has announced the acquisition of Mumbai-based Zimmber for around $10 million in an all-stock deal. This is Quikr’s tenth acquisition, which reiterates its commitment towards the market.
Post acquisition, Zimmber will continue serving all its on-demand service customers and focus on quality. But, as part of the overall integration process, Amit Kumar, the co-founder and chief operating officer (COO) of Zimmber, along with another senior executive Siddhartha Srivastava, and the entire Zimmber team will continue to work under Quikr.
Quikr says that the said decision will help the company accelerate its growth in the household services segment and continue towards its goal of organizing this fragmented category.
This marks the fourth acquisition by Quikr in the home services space in last 12 months. Quikr had earlier acquired home beauty start-ups Zalosa, Zapluk and Stayglad in quick succession last year. In January last year, the company had committed an investment of Rs 250 crore to expand the category.
Commenting on the acquisition, PD Sundar, Head of QuikrServices, said,
Household services is an exciting category which is seeing increasing adoption among urban consumers. The acquisition allows us to further scale our deep stack service capabilities and provide a superior service experience to Quikr users.
This category perfectly complements our existing marketplace solution for one-off service needs such as interior design, packers and movers etc.
Zimmber was founded by Anubhab Goel, Amit Kumar, and Gaurav Shrivastava. It provides on-demand home services like plumbing, carpentry, pest control, deep cleaning, sofa and carpet cleaning, among others. Their services are currently operational in Bengaluru, Mumbai metropolitan region, NCR (National Capital Region), and Pune.
The company says that till now, around 1,500 service providers have been on the platform, with over 1 lakh customers served. So far, it has raised more than $7.4 million from IDG Ventures, Aarin Capital and Omidyar Network, along with few angel investors.
As per Tracxn, there are more than 270 home services startups in the country, however, only a handful of those have been able to raise significant funding from venture capital firms.
Major players in this space include UrbanClap and Housejoy. UrbanClap is backed by SAIF Partners, Accel Partners, and Bessemer Venture Partners among others. It has raised about $35 million while Housejoy is backed by Amazon.com Inc., Matrix Partners, and Qualcomm Ventures among others. It has raised about $27 million since its inception.
