Arvind acquires ecom company Freecultr

Arvind Internet has acquired private label e-commerce company Freecultr. Arvind Internet is the online arm of the textile manufacturer and flagship company Arvind. Freecultr is a lifestyle apparel brand started in 2011. Arvind Internet, established in 2013, is a hybrid start-up of tech and fashion, with its headquarters in Bangalore and a creative division in Mumbai. The company kicked off with custom clothing platform Creyate in 2014.

The Freecultr website isn’t working at the moment. There has been no update on its Facebook page since March this year. Freecultr’s Chief Product Officer Talvinder Singh quit the company within a few months of joining in April 2016. In March 2015, Freecultr launched crowd sourcing platform Freecultr Express that had over 25,000 designers on board. The company also operates nine Freecultr-branded brick-and-mortar stores including in the NCR, Mumbai, Dehradun, Lucknow, and Bangalore.

The start-up, incubated by the Smile Group raised a total funding of more than 13 million dollars (Rs 86.49 crores) from investors. It raised four million dollars (Rs 27 crores) in Series A round from Sequoia Capital in 2011, and nine million dollars (Rs 59 crores) in Series B round from Ru-net Holdings in 2012. Post Series B round, investors gained a majority stake in the company, and had differences in vision on how to build a brand.