Rocket Internet’s, office supply e-tailer Officefab which operates in Southeast Asian countries including Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Indonesia is shutting down its operations, reports Sgentrepreneurs.com. The move comes almost a year after the company shut down Mizado.com, an online shopping site based out of the Middle East.
Though the website is still live and processing payments for customers and suppliers. As per TechinAsia, the site got doomed because of change in strategy by Rocket Internet. According to one of the staff member, the offices were shut down on 28 June and the news was shocking as the company was doing well with high revenue and margin.
The capital from all the 4 Southeast Asian branches of Officefab is said to be relocated to Rocket Internet’s Officeyes.com, based in India, which deals in the similar category and after the closure of Officefab, it will remain as a sole supplier of office products in the Asian region. According to a source, OfficeYes is recording the highest revenue in this category.
According to OfficeYes.com CEO, it has raised $3-5 million of funding from Rocket Internet and its strategic partner investors in Q2 of 2013, to ensure growth for 12-18 months.
“Our business model is profitable already in all variable costs. We do not need additional funding at this stage for the foreseeable future as we are on plan to become profitable in early 2014. Our CAC/CLV ratios are above 100%,” said Siddharth Nambiar, Co-Founder and Managing Director at OfficeYes.com.
The news of Officefab shutting came just after few of Rocket Internet ventures operating in the same regions including Foodpanda, Lazada & Zalora secured millions in funding. This will be among few ventures of Rocket Internet which has faced shutting situation, other were Home24 which had ceased its operations soon after its launch and 21Diamonds.in which had recently shut down its operations.
