boAt wants to trade its branding paddle for an IP motor

Five-year-old audio wearables brand boAt rowed its way to the top with tight pricing, sleek designs, and margins that added to its kitty despite the products being entirely imported. It’s now chasing bigger ambitions but it will have to find a new playbook to achieve them

boAt claims it has crossed Rs 1,000 crore in annual run rate for the year ending March 2021, bolstered by work-from-home demand

It has $100 million in fresh funding—valuing the company at $300 million— a new CEO to boot

But its IPO goals will mean it’ll need to change the way it does business; importing from China and selling on Amazon had been key once, not anymore

The future of boAt depends on its Make in India ambitions, coupled with next source of demand from offline and tier-2 and beyond markets

There’s a complaint that’s common amongst the smartphone and audio wearables sellers that dot the buzzing market bylanes of South Delhi’s Green Park neighbourhood. It’s about the “cheap” prices that consumer electronics brand boAt offers online. One seller adds that the company never reaches out to offline dealers like him. Another complains that they don’t get wholesale prices.

Even salespeople at premium electronic retail chains such as Vijay Sales and Croma seem reluctant to promote products from the five-year-old company. Instead, they point The Ken towards other brands such as JBL or Sony even when asked about boAt.

AUTHOR

Bhumika Khatri

Bhumika covers e-commerce, consumer internet, and everything startup for The Ken in Delhi. In her previous stint at Inc42, she spent two and a half years writing about a breadth of startups and topics. A commerce graduate, Bhumika completed her postgraduate in journalism from the Indian Institute of Journalism and New Media, Bengaluru. You can reach her at [email protected]

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