It's official: Snapdeal acquires designer wear portal Exclusively.com

After days of speculation, Snapdeal today announced that it had acquired designer clothing online retailer Exclusively.in for an undisclosed sum and said that it hoped it would help it strengthen its fashion business. Snapdeal said it hoped to reach a Gross Merchandise Value of $2 billion in the fashion category this year aided by the acquisition. “We have witnessed a surge in the demand from consumers across the country for premium and luxury products, however, given that access to luxury brands is severely limited in our country, we have brought Exclusively into our family to provide our 40 million+ users the access to widest range of aspirational, high end products and services,” Kunal Bahl, co-founder of Snapdeal, said in an official statement. [caption id=“attachment_2105555” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image[/caption] Like other acquisitions in this space, Snapdeal said that Exclusively would continue to operate as an independent site. Snapdeal said it would only help the e-retailer scale up and expand its current business. “With Exclusively’s fashion experience and Snapdeal’s scale of operations, we look forward to not just servicing large metros, but also the aspirational demand in smaller towns across India,” Sunjay Guleria and Mohini Boparai-Guleria, co-Founders of Exclusively said in the statement. Founded in 2010, with offices in New York and New Delhi, Exclusively offers a comprehensive collection of designer apparel and accessories, showcasing over 200 labels. The site features high-end traditional Indian apparel as well as scarves, jewellery, handbags, crafts, paintings, photography and other home goods made by Indian designers. It also recently launched travel and wedding verticals. Snapdeal has so far raised $1.5 billion (roughly Rs 9,300 crore) from a clutch of investors that include Japan’s Softbank which owns 33 percent and Ratan Tata, among others. The competition in the fashion space is only heating up and consolidation seems the only viable option for players. Last year, Flipkart acquired Myntra for Rs 2,000 crore as part of its fashion push and Amazon is planning its own fashion label.