OfferMe, the first company to bring Groupon’s group coupon buying model to Australia, announced that it has had to look outside Australia for investors, but is on the verge of finalising a Series A round of substantial venture funding.
OfferMe’s capital raising will allow the company to provide a better user experience and add value to both buyers and sellers, as well as consolidate its position among the ‘Groupon clones’ within Australia with many now backed by large media and technology companies.
“A number of potential overseas investors, including US-based private equity and venture capital fund firms, Insight Venture Partners and Bessemer Venture Partners, have approached OfferMe in the past year,” said Mr. Bekim Ahmedi, Marketing Manager of OfferMe.
“We are happy to find the backing of the strategic investors who support OfferMe’s vision.”
Mr. Ahmedi said there would be consolidation of daily deal sites, transforming the already popular Group Buying industry.
“Small to medium-sized daily deal sites continue to negotiate deals and can list their deals on OfferMe’s sophisticated platform rather than operating individual websites, lowering operating costs significantly,” he said.
“OfferMe has developed a dedicated Group Buying e-commerce platform in a 3-year project which streamlines procedures from deals listing, purchasing, workflows to secure online credit payment facility.”
The chief architect behind the building of OfferMe Group Buying platform is Mr. Sunny Sun, who previously oversaw the web portal development for E-Trade Japan, which offers online stock brokerage service.
“OfferMe has been expanding rapidly and to date, over 500 Australian businesses have offered highly discounted deals on the OfferMe Group Buying platform,” said Mr. Ahmedi.
“With an infusion of capital and human resources abroad, we continue to be confident that OfferMe will consistently deliver double-digit month-to-month growth.”
Mr. Ahmedi added Australian small businesses usually found it difficult to obtain local venture backing.
“We expect to finalize the overseas funding soon and will gradually disclose more details,” said Mr. Ahmedi.
