Used Clothing Just Gave Lithuania Its First Tech Unicorn

(Bloomberg) -- Vinted, an online used-clothing retailer, raised 128 million euros ($140 million) in a funding round that valued it at more than 1 billion euros, making it Lithuania’s first tech unicorn.

Lightspeed Venture Partners, the $7.9 billion Silicon Valley venture capital fund, led the round along with Sprints Capital, Insight Venture Partners, Accel and Burda Principal Investments, Vinted said in a statement on Thursday.

The money will go toward geographic expansion in Europe and hiring, with some set aside for acquisitions, Vinted Chief Executive Officer Thomas Plantenga said in an interview. The Vilnius-based company was founded in 2008, and overhauled its business model when Plantenga joined in 2016. He said he hasn’t made a decision about pursuing an initial public offering.

“We’re in a stage that is very unpredictable what exactly the financial future of this company will be,” Plantenga said. “We will take nothing off the table, but we don’t have exact plans for the next couple of years.”

Vinted’s revenue tripled in 2018 to 32.9 million euros but its net loss quadrupled to 42 million euros as the company spent more on marketing and after a change to its accounting, according to the company’s most recent financial filing.

“We know that this business model works, that it provides value to users and it can be profitable,” Plantenga said. “However, our focus is firmly on accelerating our growth across Europe and providing the best possible product to our members -- and we will increase our investments to support this growth.”

The company said revenue has increased fourfold in the past 17 months since it last raised money.

It also has connections with two of Lightspeed’s partners, Bradley Twohig, who was a Vinted board member before he joined Lightspeed last year, and fellow Lithuanian Rytis Vitkauskas, Plantenga said.

Passing the billion-dollar valuation mark makes Vinted Lithuania’s first unicorn as the small European country’s tech industry matures. Capital city Vilnius ranked in the top 20 European hubs for number of deals in Atomico’s 2019 State of European Tech report. Vinted’s funding round will dramatically increase the amount of investment in the country this year, which the Atomico study had previously estimated would come in at about $13 million for 2019.

Europe’s now got about 100 venture-backed tech companies worth more than $1 billion, up from four in 2010, according to the report. Unicorns have proliferated in the last few years as more cash flowed into venture capital funds. Still, high-profile devaluations, like WeWork, are making investors more cautious and focused on profitability.

Vinted was founded in 2008 by Milda Mitkute and Justas Janauskas, originating as a website to help Mitkute get rid of extra clothes. It’s available in about a dozen countries and its largest markets are France, Germany, Belgium and Spain.

To contact the reporter on this story: Amy Thomson in London at athomson6@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Giles Turner at gturner35@bloomberg.net, Nate Lanxon

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