Online classifieds firm Quikr India Pvt. Ltd has acquired on-demand home beauty services provider StayGlad for an undisclosed sum after the start-up failed to attract new investors and ran out of cash, making its eighth acquisition of struggling rivals in a weak-funding market.
StayGlad, operated by Glow Prime Technologies Pvt. Ltd, was founded in May 2015 by IIT Kharagpur alumni Prateek Jain, Shashank Gupta and Kavish Desai. The 100-member team of StayGlad, including its founders and stylists, will now be a part of AtHomeDiva.
“StayGlad is one of the largest and highest quality players in beauty services with a 70% customer repeat rate, which makes them a great fit for our overall vision for AtHomeDiva.” PD Sundar, Head of QuikrServices said about the acquisition.
This is Quikr’s third acquisition in the on-demand home beauty services space. In May, Quikr acquired Gurgaon-based home beauty services provider Salosa for an undisclosed amount to bolster its presence in the segment. In July, Quikr rebranded Salosa as AtHomeDiva and launched a separate home beauty service under the QuikrServices vertical. In August, the company acquired another home beauty service provider Zapluk.
Quikr which was founded in 2008 by Pranay Chulet, and modelled on Craigslist, is part of India’s list of around a dozen unicorns with a valuation of over $1.5 billion, has been looking for acquisitions to strengthen its verticalisation strategy. Quikr has raised $346 million in six rounds from investors such as Tiger Global, Warburg Pincus and Norwest Venture Partners.
