
How is InMobi doing these days?
Once a poster child among all startups InMobi now seems to have lost its charm. Is everything good and how is current work culture especially for tech and product folks?
Here's an AI summary of how this South Asian D2C beauty unicorn went from a $1.2 billion valuation to struggling for funds.
The Beginning: MyGlamm - Founded by Darpan Sanghvi in 2017, MyGlamm entered a rapidly growing Indian online beauty market. They even had a decent first year with a revenue of 13.7 Crore Rs.
The CAC Problem and the "Genius" Content Plan - MyGlamm faced a huge challenge with a customer acquisition cost (CAC) of around 1000 Rs, which was higher than the average order value. To combat this, Sanghvi came up with the idea of "content-to-commerce" – creating organic beauty content (articles, tutorials) to attract customers instead of relying heavily on paid ads.
The POPxo Acquisition: A Turning Point? - Realizing building a content brand takes time, MyGlamm acquired POPxo in May 2020, a leading digital media platform for women with around 60 million monthly visitors. This merger was a success, driving traffic to MyGlamm's website and drastically reducing CAC from $15 to $1. They even became operationally profitable.
Ambitions and Funding Frenzy - Riding this success and in a booming year for Indian startups (2021), Good Glamm Group raised over $220 million, reaching a $1.2 billion valuation and becoming South Asia's first D2C beauty unicorn. Founder Darpan Sanghvi had massive ambitions for a $10 billion IPO by 2023.
The Acquisition Spree and Rebranding - With significant funding, the company rebranded from MyGlamm to The Good Glamm Group and embarked on an aggressive acquisition strategy, aiming to buy 4-6 brands for 2,000 crore rupees. The vision was to create a digital FMCG conglomerate by acquiring content platforms, influencer marketing companies, and D2C brands targeting different audiences.
Rapid Revenue Growth but Mounting Losses - By the end of 2022, they boasted hundreds of millions of customers, and FY23 saw revenue grow to 600 Crore Rs (a 10x growth in two years). However, their losses ballooned from 43 Crore Rs to a staggering 917 Crore Rs in the same period, with almost 2200 Crore Rs spent, mostly on acquisitions.
The Unsustainable Model: A "Pyramid Scheme"? - The video argues that Good Glamm's strategy of continuous acquisitions fueled by fresh funding was unsustainable, comparing it to a pyramid scheme that collapses when the money stops flowing.
Failure in the Content Market - Despite the initial success with POPxo, the Good Glamm Group failed to adapt to the evolving content landscape. The rise of independent creators after 2020 led to a decline in engagement for their major content platforms like POPxo, ScoopWhoop (which also faced an internal crisis), and MissMalini. POPxo's founder even left in 2024.
Exodus of Founders and Leaders - The declining engagement on content platforms directly impacted their D2C brands, leading to the exit of founders from acquired companies like The Moms Co., Sirona, and Organic Harvest. Even two of the three co-founders of Good Glamm Group have left.
Struggling for Funds and Massive Valuation Cut - With a failed business model, the company is now struggling to raise funds, even at a 90% discounted valuation (around $120 million) from its peak of $1.2 billion in 2021. Salaries have been delayed.
Doubling Down on Expansion Despite Issues - Ironically, even with these struggles, the company continued to push for offline retail and even launched in the US, drawing parallels to BYJU's playbook.
Current Situation: Selling Assets - Good Glamm Group is now selling its assets, leaving its future uncertain.
The video concludes by highlighting the importance of business sense and questioning the role of the board in such situations. It's definitely a cautionary tale for startups and investors alike.
What are your thoughts on this? What's your biggest takeaway?
If running a business is tough, Building one from scratch is one step away from being impossible. I know the difficulty.
But its time, we stop calling these start ups a legit business. They spent 917 cr. to earn 600cr. This is not running a business. far away from anything that remotely resembling a business. And before their company makes any money, they talk about building conglomerates. It sounds more like money laundering than a Business.
If any employee fails to meet the set targets, they are humiliated. They are talked down, made to feel the failure. Its high time, we call out these people. so called entrepreneurs. They are not entrepreneurs. They are far away from anything that can be called entrepreneurship.
I worked for one of there subsidiaries in 2023 thats why i left- they were hay wire had no direction it was bound to happen
Once a poster child among all startups InMobi now seems to have lost its charm. Is everything good and how is current work culture especially for tech and product folks?
Indian VC's will never learn. With losses mounting to INR 3000 Crores, this is another debacle in making.
-Online brands are expanding offline to achieve scale -Late stage startups are gearing towards profitability earlier than planned -Biz models built on behavior during Covid are struggling (like edtech) -Startups which got funded due t...