Nykaa plans to raise up to $15.01m to expand in India

Online skincare and beauty retailer Nykaa intends to raise Rs600m ($9.01m) to Rs1bn ($15.01m) for marketing, establishing warehouses, and opening more retail outlets to expand its business.

In a bid to enhance its offline market, the retail company plans to open five beauty stores this year.

Nykaa.com founder and CEO Falguni Nayar was quoted by Business Standard as saying: "We have one store in Delhi Airport at Terminal Three and would open four more across Bangalore, Mumbai and Delhi during this year.

"We are looking at adding 30 stores by year 2020, but we will get major part of business from online market space."

To start new retail operations across India, Nykaa.com aims to raise the funding from private equity firms and high net worth individuals.

Nykaa.com founder and CEO Falguni Nayar was quoted by Press Trust of India as saying: "We plan to raise another Rs600m ($9.01m) to Rs1bn ($15.01m) from private sources.. .majority of investment will be into marketing to build the brand, warehouses and also on technology to enable more number of shoppers to shop simultaneously on the portal."

Last year, Nykaa.com sourced $9.5m in funding from private investment bank TVS Capital.

The online beauty retailer owns three warehouses in the Indian cities of Mumbai, Bengaluru and Delhi, and plans to establish another at Kolkata.