Snapdeal acquires gift recommendation firm Wishpicker

Snapdeal has acquired in its first acquisition after $627-million Softbank fund infusion, has acquired Wishpicker, an online gift retailer founded by IIT-Delhi graduates.

The acquisition amount for the company, founded last year by IITians Apurv Bansal and Prateek Rathore, was not disclosed.

"We are investing in strengthening our technology platform and Wishpicker.com is an excellent platform with top-tier entrepreneurial, engineering talent and fits in perfectly with our vision," Snapdeal Co-Founder Rohit Bansal said in a statement.

Wishpicker claims to provide gift ideas from across the internet through intelligent gift recommendation engine. It uses parameters like relationship with the recipient, age and personality for suggesting gifts.

Bansal said that as consumer buying trends are evolving, intelligent recommendations will be one of the key drivers for business volume for sellers.

This is the fifth acquisition by the e-commerce company since inception.

Snapdeal had said it would use the investments from Softbank to expand its chain of fulfilment centres and make acquisitions in the coming few months, specifically in the area of mobile technology.

The online marketplace had earlier acquired Bangalore-based group buying site Grabbon.com (June 2010), esportsbuy.com (April 2012), Shopo.in (May 2013) and Doozton (April 2014).

"This is an important acquisition for us in terms of adding new technology capabilities and helping sellers connect with buyers in newer ways," Bansal said.

Co-founder Kunal Bahl had told PTI earlier: "Snapdeal is looking at acquisition opportunities across sizes, ranging from less than $1 million to $100 million."

With over 30 million members and more than 50,000 sellers, Snapdeal.com delivers products to 5,000 cities and towns in India. It has received funding from several global marquee investors like Softbank, BlackRock, Temasek, eBay, Premji Invest, Intel Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners, Ratan Tata, Nexus Venture Partners and Kalaari Capital among others.