MONEY CONTROL – Nov 27 – Matrimony Pvt Ltd runs the largest matchmaking service in India, which has 65% of its population under 35 years of age. Murugavel Janakiraman, founder & CEO of Matrimony.com, became an entrepreneur accidentally after he got laid off from his job during the 'Y2K' crisis in the year 2000. He moved back permanently to India to concentrate on his venture. Matchmaking was one of the key drivers of Internet in India in its early days which saw competitors such as Shaadi.com. The crucial factor for the company's success, Janakiraman says, was their frugal nature of doing business. "When we started, we invested just $10 per month in marketing," he says. Matrimony has raised Rs 99 crore ($15M) in two rounds over the last 17 years from investors such as Yahoo, Mayfield and Canaan Partners. Only in 2017, in a pre-IPO placement it raised $35M (Rs 225 crore) from investors such as HDFC, Goldman Sachs and Baring Private Equity. Today it has a consortium of ~300 community matrimony websites including ChristianMatrimony, MuslimMatrimony, SikhMatrimony, JainMatrimony and so on. The company's IPO in Sep was oversubscribed by 4.41 times. Matrimony.com claims to enjoy a 60% market share in the segment ahead of major competitors Shaadi.com, JeevanSaathi.com and others.
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Summarized by the Courtland Brooks team