Sofa so good: Made.com bags £40m from Partech Ventures and Fidelity Growth Partners

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Online retailer Made.com, which sells plush furniture at cheaper prices than on the high street, has bagged millions of pounds in new investment to fuel growth.

The five-year-old company, co-founded by Brent Hoberman of Lastminute.com fame, has picked up a new round of investment totalling £38m led by Partech Growth Fund, along with Fidelity Growth Partners and existing investor Level Equity.

Made.com will splash the new cash on growing in several existing European markets, including UK, France and Germany, where it launched last month. International markets outside the UK currently account for 30 per cent of revenues but the company hopes to increase this to 50 per cent.

Retail chief Susanne Given, formerly of SuperGroup, TK Maxx and John Lewis will also join the Made.com board as an independent director, joining chairman Hoberman, as will Partech partner Bruno Cremel.

“The company’s clever and agile business model and the exceptional quality of the management team give us strong confidence that Made will become the European leader of online design furniture,” said Cremel.

"With the support of Partech Growth, we now have the funding and board expertise to fully execute on the next stage of our ambitious international growth plans and to further progress towards our aim of becoming Europe’s number one destination for home design,” said chief executive and co-founder Ning Li.
 
Made.com was founded by Li, Hoberman, Julien Callede and Chloe Macintosh in 2010. It now employs more than 170 people in London and Shanghai and reported revenue of £42.7m in 2014, up 63 per cent on the previous year.