Gemvara Inks $25M Series D
Gemvara, Inc., the leading online retailer of customizable fine jewelry, announces the closing of a $25 million oversubscribed round of Series D funding. Led by Norwest Venture Partners (NVP), a global venture and growth equity investment firm, the round also involves participation from all existing investors including Highland Capital Partners, Canaan Partners and Balderton Capital. Sergio Monsalve of Norwest Venture Partners will join Gemvara’s Board of Directors. Gemvara plans to use the capital to further enhance all aspects of the customer shopping experience and continue to drive innovation that will bring the jewelry industry to the cutting edge of commerce.
“Gemvara is a very strong company with a stellar team, and happens to be at the epicenter of three e-commerce megatrends that we have been watching closely– the emergence of personalization, the rapid growth of Pinterest as a ‘wishlist’ aggregator and the rising adoption of the iPad as a visual shopping platform. Gemvara is quickly becoming a major player in this rapidly changing next generation e-commerce sector and we’re looking forward to partnering with the team to grow the company further,” said Monsalve of NVP.
“We are redefining the rules of commerce and we’ve proven that people will buy meaningful jewelry online,” said Matt Lauzon, CEO and Founder of Gemvara. “This investment accelerates our mission of having more loyal customers than any other jeweler.”
“Gemvara’s unique customization technology platform is revolutionizing the fine jewelry market,” said Bob Davis, General Partner at Highland Capital Partners. “We have been an investor with Gemvara since 2007 and it has been exciting to see the company grow from inception to the innovative e-commerce trend-setter it is today.”
Gemvara developed out of a business cofounded by Lauzon and Jason Reuben while they were Babson undergraduate students.
About Gemvara
Gemvara (www.gemvara.com) is the only online personal fine jeweler that offers a virtually unlimited selection of designs through its unique made-to-order technology platform. Offering the largest fine jewelry selection in the world, shoppers have access to over 1.5 million unique design possibilities with more than 1,500 original designs that can be customized using 26 gemstone and 8 precious metal options. Each piece is handcrafted in the U.S. using just-in-time manufacturing to produce unique,made-to-order designs.
About Norwest Venture Partners (NVP)
Norwest Venture Partners (NVP) is a global venture and growth equity investment firm that manages more than $3.7 billion in capital. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, NVP has subsidiaries in Mumbai and Bengaluru, India and Herzelia, Israel and Hong Kong. NVP makes early to late stage venture and growth equity investments across a wide range of sectors including: information technology, business services, financial services, infrastructure, technology enabled services and consumer. NVP has actively partnered with entrepreneurs to build great businesses for more than 50 years and has funded over 500 companies since inception