Last week Global Fashion Group (GFG), an international online fashion group focusing on growth markets – including Russia and neighboring countries where the group is represented by Lamoda – raised some €120 million in gross proceeds.
The group issued new shares on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, where it is has been listed since July 2019. These 16.5 million shares were placed with institutional investors at the price of €7.30 each.
The group said the additional capital will be used “to accelerate the execution of its mid-term strategy, particularly by investing in the expansion of its Marketplace and Fashion Services businesses.”
“This will further power GFG’s platform capabilities, embed its role in the digital fashion ecosystem and strengthen its proposition to customers and brands.”
The corporate statement underlines the “high scalability and significant scope for future growth” of the two business branches. In particular, Marketplace has “tripled its share of Group NMV since 2017 to 34% in Q3 2020.”
The group did not specify which fraction of the proceeds would go to each entity. In an exchange with East-West Digital News, the press service said the group’s strategy “applies to all regions, including Lamoda.”
On the fast-growing Russian e-commerce market, Lamoda has to put up with such strong competitors as Wildberries (Russia’s number one site with a historic focus on fashion), Ozon and Yandex Market. The latter received important capital injections this past summer, while Ozon is preparing to raise up to $1 billion through a NASDAQ IPO in the nearest future.
