Licious, the online meat service startup run by Delightful Gourmet, on 26th April 2019 said that it has expanded its services to Mumbai and Pune markets. The company, which is based in Bengaluru, had raised a round of funding of 25 million dollar in December 2018. The four-year-old brand is already there in Bengaluru, Hyderabad, NCR & Chandigarh.
Unlike in these markets, Pune as well as Mumbai with their strategic coastal location have a stable supply of seafood & meat. Nevertheless, growing consumer concerns regarding the quality of meat and seafood has impelled Licious to venture into these predominantly unorganised markets, the firm said.
Co-founder of Licious, Vivek Gupta said, “The addressable market in Mumbai and Pune are very dissimilar from our previous markets. The customers here seem spoilt for choice, yet there is a big unmet demand for hygienic & fresh, meat, fish, seafood & meat-based products”.
Last year in December, the firm had raised 25 million dollar investment led by Nichirei Corp (Japan) in Series-D round of funding, with its existing investors Bertelsmann India Investments, 3one4 Capital, Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia & India, UCLA, Sistema Asia Fund. The money is apparently being used to reinforce their market presence, by expanding to 7 new markets that includes Mumbai and Pune in 2019.
Licious, which was established in the year 2015, provides a product portfolio of fresh meat, seafood and value-added products such as spreads, pickles and marinades in the fragmented $40 billion meat ecosystem of the country.
