Brazil’s Olist gets its horn with new $186M funding round

Olist, a Brazilian e-commerce marketplace integrator, confirmed it is now valued at $1.5 billion after securing $186 million in Series E funding, led by Wellington Management.

The new round follows quickly behind a $23 million Series D extension the company announced in April, led by new investor Goldman Sachs Asset Management to bring its total Series D financing to $80 million.

It was then we profiled Olist, which connects small businesses to larger product marketplaces to help entrepreneurs sell their products to a broader customer base. Its technology enables small merchants to gain market share across the country through a SaaS licensing model to small brick and mortar businesses.

This investment by Wellington is the company’s first contribution to a private company in Latin America, according to Olist. Joining Wellington in the round were funds managed by SoftBank, Corton Capital, Valor Capital Group, Goldman Sachs, Globo Ventures and Kevin Efrusy.

Olist said it tripled its size in 2021 and closed on four acquisitions within the last year, including social commerce startup Clickspace, logistics company PAX and VNDA and Tiny ERP, both offering commerce tools for small businesses.

“With more than 45,000 shopkeepers and retailers as clients, Olist has always been at the forefront of digital retail, long before the e-commerce hype that helped drive the search for our solutions,” said Tiago Dalvi, founder and CEO of Olist, in a written statement. “With this new round, we want to go beyond what we do today and deliver more and more value to our customers.”

In fact, the company wants to go beyond marketplaces, and the new capital will enable it to offer a fulfillment operation, set to open early next year, and financial services. Retailers on Olist already have access to credit lines for working capital, but the company plans to expand that technology to include risk management, accelerated sales and internal credit models for merchants.

Meanwhile, the company recently began operations in Mexico and intends to expand its footprint across Latin America next year.