Jakarta Post: Beauty Platform Social Bella Secures $58 Million Funding Round
TheJakartaPost.com — Online beauty marketplace Social Bella has announced that it has closed a US$58 million funding round to support its new business unit and increase its growth in the beauty and personal care sector.
The funding round comes from its existing investors, namely Singaporean state investment fund Temasek and its private equity subsidiary Pavilion, as well as Singaporean venture capital firm Jungle Ventures. Last year, the firms contributed $40 million to the company’s series D funding, led by venture capital company East Ventures Growth.
Social Bella, which operates six offline stores, said it wanted to improve its technology infrastructure with the funds as it launched Lilla by Sociolla, a marketplace for expecting women and mothers, in June.
The startup’s cofounder and president, Christopher Madiam, said that the company saw its organic user traffic rise significantly during large-scale social restrictions.
“The pandemic posed a challenge for businesses globally, but we were able to adapt rapidly to continue serving our customers,” he said in a statement on Monday, adding that the company predicted that its user base would grow to 30 million this year.
Euromonitor predicted the beauty industry to be worth $8.5 billion by 2022.
Meanwhile, a 2019 report on online commerce trends from Facebook and Bain & Company stated that personal care and beauty had a 7 percent rate of penetration in Southeast Asia, a $15 billion market.
The study also estimated personal care and beauty to experience robust growth of 25 to 30 percent over the course of a year.
“Our investment in Social Bella is a crucial portfolio in Indonesia as we never saw a comprehensive beauty platform similar to it. This investment opens up the opportunity for us to expand our regional partnerships,” said David Gowdey, managing partner at Jungle Ventures.