Urban Company reports 96% jump in FY20 losses to Rs 137 crore; revenue up 82%

Ratan Tata-backed home services startup Urban Company’s losses for the financial year 2019-20 have jumped 96 per cent to Rs 137.8 crore from Rs 73.6 crore in FY19 amid a 92 per cent increase in expenses to Rs 394.2 crore from Rs 205.1 crore during the said period. The financial results, which are based on the IND-AS accounting norm, that Urban company moved to last financial year from I-GAAP, also reported an 82 per cent growth in its total revenue to Rs 256 crore in FY20 from Rs 131 crore in FY19. The operating revenue for the company had increased to Rs 212 crore from Rs 108 crore.

Comments from Urban Company on FY20 performance will be updated here as and when shared.

The beauty and wellness vertical for the company had contributed around 55 per cent to the FY20 revenues, according to the regulatory filing sourced from business intelligence platform Tofler, even as the business was impacted during the nationwide lockdown beginning from March 23, 2020. Nonetheless, Urban company had resume operations in May. During FY20, it had also made ‘considerable’ investment to increase its customer acquisition, acquire and retain the top talent, and various other growth measures that had led to its net loss of Rs 137.8 crore, the filing noted. Among major components in Urban Company’s expenses were Rs 132 crore in employee benefit expenses, Rs 106 crore in ad promotional expenses, Rs 35.5 crore in miscellaneous expenses, Rs 56.6 crore towards the cost of materials consumed, etc. “However, company is on its growth path and your board expects promising years ahead,” Urban Company said.

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Moreover, the net booking value of all transactions on the platform had increased 138 per cent from Rs 385 crore in FY19 to Rs 918 crore in FY20, the company had said in its unaudited financial results back in May 2020. “We would have grown by at least 10 per cent more to 115-120 per cent from 103 per cent,” Abhiraj Singh Bhal, Co-founder, Urban Company had told Financial Express Online.

The company had acquired Australia-based on-demand beauty startup Glamazon in March 2020 to venture into the Australian market. It has so far raised $190.9 million across 10 funding rounds from investors including Tiger Global, Vy Capital, Steadview Capital, and others. Urban Company was rated as the top gig employer in India recently among other leading unicorn and large internet companies in India, according to the UK-based FairWork Foundation, supported by The Oxford Internet Institute. Based on the report published on the labour standards in India’s ‘platform’ economy, most workers at Urban Company earned above the local minimum wage after factoring in costs. Also, Urban Company was the only platform to provide evidence that its workers earn above minimum wage while working (on average) a 48-hour working week for most categories of services in comparison to other apps such as Flipkart’s eKart, Amazon Transportation Services, Swiggy, Uber, Zomato, Ola, BigBasket, and Housejoy.