Grocery delivery startup Instacart has raised $400 million in a new round of financing at a valuation of $3.4 billion, according to sources familiar with the deal. Axios broke news that Instacart was in talks to close the deal last week. Instacart executives declined to comment for this story. However, Instacart CEO Apoorva Mehta confirmed the deal, tweeting out a company blog post on Wednesday.
Over the past year, Instacart has weathered a number of controversies after raising prices for consumers and cutting rates for its workers. Previously, the startup had raised around $260 million at a reported $2 billion valuation.
Some of its competitors have faltered significantly since Instacart last raised funding. Close to home, San Francisco-based organic food delivery startup Good Eggs went through a change in leadership, layoffs and general belt-tightening. In India, ridesharing operator Ola axed its grocery delivery service entirely. Other competitors have grown, like Google Express and Amazon PrimeNow.
To date, Instacart has operated solely within the U.S., where consumers spend more than $727 billion annually on food for consumption at home, according to the most recent available data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Instacart’s Aporva Mehta speaks at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco
As TechCrunch has previously reported, Instacart has multiple revenue streams. The company charges customers a markup on groceries, plus a fee for delivering items to their doors. In addition, consumer packaged goods brands pay Instacart to advertise on its platform. And the startup strikes revenue share agreements with partners including grocery chains like Whole Foods.
The Wall Street Journal reported that early investor Sequoia Capital contributed $100 million to Instacart’s latest round of funding. According to Instacart’s company statement, other investors in the Series D round of funding included: Wellcome Trust, Y Combinator Continuity, Andreessen Horowitz, FundersClub, Khosla Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB), Initialized Capital, Thrive Capital and Valiant Capital.
Emerging competitors like Shipt, Postmates and StorePower may be hard-pressed to raise funding following this round. Instacart will likely be able to outspend smaller competitors for a good long while given this latest cash infusion.
Updates: After Instacart published a company statement about it, we added information about investors participating in its Series D funding round to this post.