South Korean Fashion Reseller Kream Secures $168M in Series C

Kream, a South Korean platform that enables individuals to buy, sell, and trade luxury goods, has raised $168 million (220.6 billion won) in a Series C funding round.

Kream, which was spun off from Snow, a camera app-focused branch of Naver, in January 2021, wants to position itself in the rapidly growing market estimated to be worth $30 billion in 2020 and is projected to grow at 10% to 15% every year for the next decade, per a recent report by McKinsey.

The company claims to have 5.3 million monthly active users, up almost 2.5 times from the 2.2 million MAUs in October 2021. The platform's gross merchandise volume (GMV) increased 270% and 190% in Q3 and Q4, respectively, in 2022, year-over-year. There are currently over 290,000 items listed on Kream.

Kream says it will use the Series C funds to make more investments, mainly in Asia, which aligns with the company's long-term objective of strategically connecting Asia-based reselling platforms.

The funding round was led by Altos Ventures, a returning investor, and featured participation from Naver, SoftBank Ventures Asia, Mirae Asset Capital, Samsung Securities, and Axiom Asia.

The company has now raised a total of over $266 million with the latest round of funding valuing the platform at about $742 million, over twice its previous valuation of $306 million in October 2021.