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Healthcare is going to fundamentally transform in years to come. No doubt the technological advancements will be helming such a change. The newfound health awareness is also a result of the emergence of the internet, and the spread of both mental and physical diseases. All of these are leading people to approach healthcare through a preventive and fitness lens. These trends are permanent and will only exponentially manifest themselves in years to come. Along with the rising culture to train the human body physically in order to help it stay active and promote the best functioning, people are now also inclined to opt for preventive care methods, which includes the intake of beneficial nutrients and effective supplements.
HealthKart is a healthcare startup that believe in supporting the health and well-being of people. The Gurugram-based wellness startup brings a wide array of health products online in India, which helps the users stay fit and active and enjoy their lives in the best possible way. Besides, HealthKart also brings a variety of fitness products and services too, to help consumers achieve their fitness goals.
Founded in March 2011 by 2 IIT graduates, with a significant experience in healthcare and technology domains, both in India and US, HealthKart is hailed as India's No. 1 authentic online supplement store.
Hee's learning all about the HealthKart company, How it started, its Founders and Team, Business and Revenue Model, Mission, Growth, Revenue, Competitors, Acquisitions, HealthKart Challenges, Future Plans, and more in this StartupTalky article ahead.
HealthKart - Company Highlights
- Startup Name-HealthKart
- Parent Company-Bright Lifecare Pvt. Ltd.
- Headquarters-Gurugram, Haryana, India
- Industry--Healthcare, Fitness
- Founded-2011
- Founders-Prashant Tandon and Sameer Maheshwari
- CEO-Sameer Maheshwari
- Funding-$61 mn (June 2022)
- Revenue -$89.41 mn (INR 700 cr)
- Area Served-India
- Website-www.healthkart.com
HealthKart - About and How it Works?
HealthKart is an online health and fitness store for men and women, which offers health products online and health services to help consumers achieve their fitness goals. The company sells authentic health supplements, fitness equipment, weight loss products, protein supplements, sports gear, and wellness products.
HealthKart offers a comprehensive range of high-quality supplements such as proteins, vitamins, minerals, etc., sourced from across the world. These supplements are used for athletic performance, fitness, and wellness. It delivers these health products online through a combination of an online portal and 95+ retail stores. The company also offers assistance to its customers in product selection and diet planning through trained nutritionists.
HealthKart has served over 1.5 mn customers and delivers 80,000+ HealthKart products to 500+ cities in any given month. HealthKart's MuscleBlaze is known as one of India’s largest bodybuilding and sports nutrition supplement brands, whereas its HK Vitals, is the first choice in India in the multivitamins segment. HealthKart India provides a wide range of protein supplements, weight loss products, gym memberships, personal trainers, and many products and services, thereby enabling customers to access all fitness products on one platform.
HealthKart - Industry
The wellness market in India has been steadily rising over the past couple of decades. Going by the FICCI's latest estimates, this industry is currently valued at a staggering $6.25 bn.
HealthKart - Founders and Team
HealthKart, a part of Bright Lifecare Pvt. Ltd. is an online portal for Dietary supplements and health devices in the Health care industry in India. Prashant Tandon and Sameer Maheshwari founded the company in 2011.
Prashant Tandon
Prashant is a founding member of HealthKart along with Sameer Maheshwari. He is currently a Founder/Entrepreneur at Tata 1Mg since he left HealthKart in March 2015. Prashant Tandon is an IIT Delhi alumnus, who has done his BTech in Chemical Engineering from the IIT and afterward completed an MBA, in Business, from Stanford University. He was previously a Summer Associate at McKinsey & Company, a Vice President at MapmyIndia, then a Sr. Associate at McKinsey & Company, before starting an entrepreneurial career by founding HealthKart.
Sameer Maheshwari
Sameer Maheshwari currently serves as the Founder and CEO of HealthKart. He also has a BTech degree in Civil Engineering from the IIT Delhi, along with an MBA from the Harvard Business School. Sameer was previously the Senior Sales Consutant at MicroStrategy, then a Summer Associate at Jefferies & Company, an Associate Director at the UBS Investment Bank, and a Manager Business Consultant at LucidEra before he started up with HealthKart.
"We have been expanding rapidly and currently employ over 1000 people", says the Linkedin profile of the company.
HealthKart - Startup Story
“I think both of us were very much aligned in our thought processes. We wanted to do something of our own. We wanted to come back to India. We were working out of the same building in the US and used to exchange a lot of ideas. Finally, healthcare technology seemed like a great fit. We had compatible skills, non-overlapping skills. We were a good team and everything was right about coming back to India,” said Tandon.
Founded in March 2011, HealthKart India was formed on the grounds of giving simple, effective solutions to health enthusiasts. Today, HealthKart offers India’s largest range of genuine health care products online across various categories and all major brands. HealthKart.com is an online portal where people can find healthkart products, and compare and buy health products online.
Prashant always wanted to do something in the Healthcare industry. As he noticed that the health sector was known to be one of the most unorganized sectors and availing of good quality health products was an extreme painpoint in India, he got in touch with Sameer Maheshwari and shared the idea with him. Then they get together and started Bright Lifecare Pvt. Ltd., HealthKart's parent company.
A degree from Stanford or Harvard Business School would automatically win anybody tickets to a lucrative job. And it was no different for Sameer Maheshwari and Prashant Tandon. While the former is a Harvard graduate, the latter got his degree from Stanford. In fact, Maheshwari and Tandon quit their jobs to start, Healthkart.com, a one-stop online shop for healthcare needs. They worked with doctors and health institutions before launching a consumer-facing unit.
"Before starting the portal, we tried our hand in different sub-sectors within healthcare,” recollects Tandon.
From venturing into public healthcare to offering practice management software for independent physicians and small clinics, the duo tried two to three different business models.
HealthKart - Mission
HealthKart's mission statement says, "We Understand Your Needs. Our mission is to deliver a premium-quality and affordable product range that covers the entire spectrum of all body types."
The Sameer Maheshwari-led startup focuses on Quality, Authenticity, Affordability and Accessibility while delivering good health at the doorstep of people.
HealthKart - Logo and its Meaning
HealthKart's logo has "HK" highlighted in the middle (H stands for Health and K stands for Kart).
HealthKart - Business and Revenue Model
From venturing into public healthcare to offering practice management software for independent physicians and small clinics, the founders tried two to three different business models.
But the two also realized that they wanted to be in the consumer space, so after gaining enough experience and understanding of how the healthcare industry works, they started HealthKart India for direct retail of healthcare products to consumers.
HealthKart, in a nutshell, is an e-commerce store that aims to be a one-stop-shop for all health and fitness-related products. It follows a traditional retail model, wherein, it stocks most of the items that a consumer sees on display, and one can place their orders online. HealthKart manages its logistics through third-party vendors that includes the top Indian courier service providers like Blue Dart, Shadowfax, DTDC, AFL, FedEx and India Post, and many others.
HealthKart makes a significant amount of its revenues (over 90%) from the sale of self-manufactured nutrition and wellness products. The remaining revenues are earned via other services like home delivery etc.
HealthKart - Revenue and Growth
HealthKart in India has grown from a humble team of 4 in March 2011 to a strength of over 1000 people, heading towards the cherished goal of becoming India’s e-health mega store. Focusing on consumer healthcare products, HealthKart India presently has over 200 brands and authorised vendors listed on its website and offers fitness, personal care, and health products online across different categories.
HealthKart has scaled impressively to be known as India’s largest health and nutrition-based online marketplace now. The trusted house of brands takes pride in helping two of its products - MuscleBlaze and HK Vitals to become India’s no. 1 sports nutrition and online vitamin brands respectively. HealthKart claims to have served over 10 mn customers to date.
The growth story of HealthKart can be summarized in briefly as:
2011 - HealthKart started with its website: HealthKart.com
2012 - HealthKart launched 2 brands - MuscleBlaze, HealthViva
2013 - HealthKart launched its first flagship store at Punjabi Bagh
2014 - HealthKart fuelled the offline expansion of MuscleBlaze
2015 - The company focused on scaling numerous nutrition brands like Incredio and Phyzo; spinning off 1MG
2016 - HealthKart focused on amplifying brand awareness. It introduced HK consult in the same year and aimed to scale up HealthKart Store
2017 - HealthKart ran MuscleBlaze campaign (Tum Nahin Samjhoge), as the first campaign of the brand
2018 - The second campaign (Ziddi Hoon Main) was launched this year. Besides, it also introduced a reseller app for dieticians, gym trainers, and nutritionists, called Olime
2019 - It launched the third MuscleBlaze campaign (Naam Hai Ziddi) this year. TrueBasics, Biozyme, GritZo, and Nouriza are some of the new brands that the company launched in 2019. Besides, it also set up its first manufacturing plant.
2020 - HealthKart came up with MB Foods and BGreen even in the pandemic year. Besides, HealthKart also launched its fourth MuscleBlaze Campaign (Phirse Zidd Kar) in 2020 along with the HealthKart TeleConsult platform.
2021 - HealthKart massively focused on Influencer Marketing in 2021 and expanded its physician channel during the second wave of the Covid19 disease.
2022 - HealthKart is currently working on scaling up Biozyme, HK Vitals, MBFoods, GritZo, MT GT Pharmacy, and expand internationally.
HealthKart owns and manufactures 8 nutrition brands and popular supplement providers like MuscleBlaze, The Protein Zone, TrueBasics, HKVitals, bGreen, Nouriza and Gritzo. The company currently boasts of having over 110 offline stores that are spread across 40+ cities.
HealthKart Financials: Revenue, Expenses and Loss
Registering its revenues at Rs 310 crore in FY21, HealthKart has witnessed a drop of 7.4%. Its revenues in the earlier fiscal stood at Rs 334.80 crore. However, the company rose massively in terms of revenue in FY22, which was registered at nearly Rs 700 crore.
Though the scale of the company dipped slightly in FY21, HealthKart significantly witnessed a 32.9% decline in its expenses, which reduced from Rs 549.7 crore in FY20 to Rs 369 crore in FY21. For HealthKart it was the cost of materials, which emerged as the largest cost centre in FY21. This has led the company cut off around 79% of its losses, which became Rs 41.2 crore in FY21 from Rs 198 crore worth of losses that it saw in FY20. The EBITDA margin also saw an improvement, declining from -48.79% to -6.10% during FY21
HealthKart - Funding and Investors
HealthKart company has raised a total of $61M in funding over 4 rounds. The latest funding of the company was raised on May 9, 2019, from a Series G round. HealthKart is currently funded by 8 investors. Sequoia Capital India and Sofina are the most recent investors
HealthKart - Acquisitions
In 2012, HealthKart company acquired the online fitness and bodybuilding community and supplement store to expand into Fitness, Weight gain, Weight loss, etc. named MadeInHealth, which is one prominent acquisition of HealthKart. The deal value of this acquisition is undisclosed.
HealthKart - Campaigns
HealthKart has done 4 prominent campaigns, which started with the MuscleBlaze campaign titled "Tum Nahin Samjhoge" in 2017.
The 2nd campaign of the MuscleBlaze product was titled "Ziddi Hoon Main", whcih was launched in 2018. Naam Hai Ziddi was the 3rd campaign launched by HealthKart in 2019. The 4th MuscleBlaze Campaign was launched in 2020 and was titled "Phirse Zidd Kar".
HealthKart - Competitors
HealthKart's top competitors include:
- Gaia Herbs
- Best Priced Products
- 1mg
- Hello Cake
- ROAM Fitness
HealthKart - Challenges Faced
Sameer Maheshwari, Founder, and CEO of HealthKart take the core responsibility to drive the mission of providing affordable preventive care solution to people in an economically viable fashion.
Healthkart Founder
HealthKart was started over 11 years ago, the idea was to identify the need of people wanting authentic products in healthcare industry across the country. So, even though there were quite a few pharmacies in the market, the organized market is literally 2-3% and determining of the authenticity of fake products is a big concern in the health sector.
The initial phase was challenging as they struggled to build a good team and find investors. In healthcare, the big problem is the authenticity of the products. There is a lot of fake, counterfeit products in the market. They overcome this by doing a lot of quality check in terms of making sure that the HealthKart products are authentic.
HealthKart India basically leveraged the channel of e-commerce, which is developing very fast, to shift the authentic branded HealthKart products to pass over the country as they have no proper access to it.
The idea came from the fact that healthcare delivery, which is the backbone of wellness in any country, was highly unorganized (95%+) back in 2009, and there was an opportunity to bring about organization and quality to the sector by leveraging the growth of internet penetration and eCommerce.
In addition to that, there is a huge knowledge gap in healthcare. People don’t know what to buy. HealthKart has a very advanced call centre to support customers in terms of understanding what product is the right fit for them.
Mission at the outset was to make available the largest range of quality medical products to consumers across the country, by setting up the largest online pharmacy platform. Along the way, realizing another large opportunity in the fast-growing preventive care segment, it spun out online pharmacy into 1MG and focused HealthKart on preventive care
HealthKart - Future Plans
" Chasing unviable business models because of macro funding environment, and not pursuing long term value creation driven by your fundamental “self belief” is the biggest mistake occurs. This could not only derail the entrepreneur, but may also lead to significant loss of time, which is the most precious entity in the world we live in, " said Tandon.
A spokesperson for the company said that it would use the funds to further expand its store network, and plans to use data science and artificial intelligence (AI) to improve its customer-facing offerings.
The company has set up a 30-member R&D team, including food scientists and pharmacists, and it’s developing next-gen nutraceuticals or consumable nutrition products built for the Indian market. The company also revealed it is in talks to set up some more manufacturing plants, for quicker product development, tighter control on manufacturing, and fostering innovative nutrition products.
FAQs
When was HealthKart founded?
Prashant Tandon and Sameer Maheshwari founded HealthKart in 2011.
Who founded HealthKart?
HealthKart was founded by Prashant Tandon and Sameer Maheshwari in 2011.
Is MuscleBlaze owned by HealthKart?
Yes, MuscleBlaze is owned by HealthKart.
Who is the Muscleblaze founder?
Sameer Maheshwari, the founder of HealthKart is the Muscleblaze founder.
How does HealthKart make money?
HealthKart follows a traditional retail model, wherein, they stock most of the items that a consumer sees on display, and one can place their orders online. The money that HealthKart earns is mainly through the sale of its manufactured health products online. The remaining revenues are earned via other services including home deliveries and more.
How are HealthKart product authentication checks?
The HealthKart business relies on the authenticity and quality of its products, which is clearly its USP. The Healthkart product authentication check is fuelled by tight quality controls during the sourcing and distribution phase of the products. With stringent product authentication checks, HealthKart promises 100% authentic products.
