Farfetch raises USD18million for international growth

Farfetch.com announced Monday that it has raised a second round of funding of $18 million (£11.75m) from Index Ventures, eVenture Capital Partners and existing investors Advent Venture Partners. The eboutique plans to use the new capital boost

to fuel the expansion of its operations in Europe, North America, Asia and Brazil.

“Farfetch.com is growing extremely fast and now has a strong international presence, aggregating an unrivalled product selection from boutiques in 12 different countries. We felt it was the right time to scale up our team and operations and seize some fantastic opportunities we have in our core business in Europe and beyond in the US and Brazil and Asia,” summed up Chief Executive José Neves, who founded farfetch.com in 2008.

As revealed by the company lately, its American business development team will ocunt on Dara Gary, previously sales director at BCBG MaxAzria, while Robin Klein, venture partner at Index Ventures, will join the farfetch.com board.

Farfetch.com currently has more than 56,000 customers in 100 countries for the luxury clothing its more than 200 boutique partners sell. In Europe and the US it has 110 partner boutiques, as well as 60 in Brazil, and reports sales currently growing by 204% a year. It also says half of its sales are delivered to emerging and new markets.

The company has a current run rate of $60 million, up 200% year-over-year and it is worthy a note that U.S. accounts for about 25% of sales, followed by the U.K., Australia, Brazil and France. Fifty percent of buyers come from new or emerging markets, pointed out Neves.

The four-year-old London-based venture has made the inventories of 200 boutiques in 12 countries available for purchase through its website and caters coveted brands such as Balenciaga, Yves Saint Laurent, Alexander Wang, Mary Katrantzou, Marc by Marc Jacobs, and True Religion.