Lenskart has earmarked $10 million (about Rs 71 crore) towards building its touch lens enterprise, with the TPG-backed, omnichannel eyewear solutions company bringing on board a senior executive from Bausch and Lomb to go vertical. The Faridabad-based employer has named Indranil Chakravarty as the chief business officer of its AquaLens contact lens business, consistent with agency chief government Peyush Bansal. Chakravarty, who became Bausch and Lomb’s industrial director and commercial enterprise unit head for almost six years on the Rochester, New York-based eyewear massive, previous to joining Lenskart, joined the latter formally in January. “We want to disrupt contact lenses, and repeat what we’ve got accomplished in the eyeglasses zone, wherein we’ve got emerged as the biggest participant inside the organized market inside u. S. A .,” Bansal told ET. AquaLens, which became launched a year ago, is the 0.33 private label logo from the corporation’s stable. The different are premium eyewear brands John Jacobs and Vincent Chase. According to robust industry estimates, India’s organized eyewear section is envisioned at Rs 2,000-three,000 crores, while the overall market possibility is assumed to be approximately $three billion (Rs 21,300 crore).
According to Bansal, the category in India is drastically below-penetrated, with most effective five% of eyewear customers carrying touch lenses. Globally, in line with the Lenskart CEO, this range rises to about 35%. “The contact lens marketplace in India is a small one up to now—approximately Rs 600 crore currently—and which has no longer seen any disruption to date, and has been ruled with the aid of some international names… It must be a Rs 2,000-three,000 crore marketplace, if no longer greater,” Bansal said. Lenskart will spend on product innovation, backend integration and allowing trials while positioning it as a style category. It is targeting among 1 million and 2 million touch lens users over the close to period. The capital dedication of $10 million towards the category is over the following -3 years. The employer is currently uploading the touch lenses from the United Kingdom and Europe, however, can also remember putting in place a production facility in India, depending on the boom of the enterprise segment. In December, ET had said that the organization turned into additionally upping its capital expenditure spends as its regarded to bring underneath control its manufacturing and delivery chain capabilities, driven through the launch out of its facility in Gurgaon in 2018, and the acquisition of a 2d production facility in China, also remaining 12 months. Lenskart, which had a capex spend of Rs 30-40 crore inside the remaining monetary, has now upped the identical to Rs a hundred and twenty-130 crore and is projecting it to the touch Rs 170 crore next monetary. “We plan to make this (touch lenses) a $100 million business right away… There are some opportunities, and I wish we can build an emblem with the intention to be larger than the overall category as it is nowadays,” Bansal stated.
