Japan’s SoftBank has made a fresh investment of Rs 100 crore in Housing.com to help the realty portal consolidate its position in the heavily contested online property segment.
Housing.com, which competes with the likes of Rupert Murdoch-backed PropTiger, Magicbricks and Commonfloor, said it is building scalable revenue streams around its product. “Housing.com has secured a fresh round of funding from Softbank, its largest investor. The new Rs 100 crore infusion will well-capitalise the company to drive its new strategy and growth plans,” the Mumbai-based firm said in a statement.
In December 2014, Softbank had led a $90 million funding round in Housing.com. It had over 30 per cent stake in the portal. However, neither parties disclosed the increase in stake after the fresh infusion. “We continue to remain excited by Housing’s prospects and we know that this infusion will help Housing get to the next level and further consolidate its presence in the Indian real estate market,” said Jonathan Bullock, SoftBank Representative on Housing Board. SoftBank had said last week that it may scale up its planned investment of $10 billion in the coming years as the telecom and Internet giant sees the “beginning of Big Bang” for the world’s second most populous market. SoftBank, had in 2014, announced plans to invest $10 billion in India over a decade. It has already put in $627 million into online marketplace Snapdeal and other companies like Housing.com and Ola.
Founded in 2012, Housing.com has raised over $100 million in capital from leading investors, including SoftBank, Nexus Ventures, Falcon Edge and Helion Ventures. “Softbank is one of the world’s largest and most successful investors... (It) signifies their long-term commitment to the company. We are now well-capitalised to aggressively execute on our focused strategy and growth plans,” Housing.com CEO Jason Kothari said. Housing.com has decided to focus on buying and selling homes, the largest and most lucrative segment of the real estate market, and the funds will be deployed towards the same. Earlier, its focus was on listings of properties.