Rohlik, a Czech online grocery business and the country’s first unicorn, has raised a €160m equity and debt round led by the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development, with the participation of existing investors and the European Investment Bank.
The announcement comes at a time when the speedy grocery business is shrinking across Europe after the pandemic boom.
Turkish speedy grocery company Getir acquired its troubled Berlin competitor Gorillas in late 2022, before pulling out of Europe earlier this year. Other players, like UK-based Zapp and Germany’s Flink, have been reducing the number of markets they operate in and laying off staff.
Meanwhile, Rohilk has grown 40% post-Covid. The 10-year-old company has always stressed it’s different from the likes of Getir and Gorillas. Its service is not as speedy as theirs — orders are delivered in hours rather than minutes — and it offers a much wider assortment for its customers (with around four times more choice than those offering rapid delivery).
Its business model relies on fully-automated fulfilment centres in every city.
The company is now present in 13 cities in the Czech Republic, Romania, Hungary, Austria and Germany. It has already reached profitability in some Czech and Hungarian cities, and in Munich — and with the fresh funding it’s hoping to expand to another 10 cities in DACH and central eastern Europe.
Rohlik last raised a €220m Series D in 2022 led by Sofina, with participation from Index Ventures.
Who has invested?
- The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s venture arm
- Sofina, a Belgian family-controlled investment company
- Index Ventures, a London-based VC
- Quadrille Capital, a Paris-based VC
- TCF Capital, an investment and family property management company founded by Rohlik’s founder Tomáš Čupr
- European Investment Bank (EIB) under its Scale-Up Initiative
