Lenskart-Backed Neso Brands announces USD 100+ million funding for eyewear brands and appointment of DTC executive Bjorn Bergstrom as CEO

SINGAPORE, May 30, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Eyewear House Neso Brands announces investment of more than USD 100 million into eyewear brands. Neso is an initiative of omni-channel eyewear unicorn Lenskart, whose investors include KKR, Softbank, Alpha Wave Global and Temasek. Neso Brands will partner and invest in consumer eyewear brands around the world and grow these brands by leveraging synergies across the Lenskart Group to accelerate international expansion.

Neso Brands also announces that Bjorn Bergstrom has joined the founding team as CEO. Bjorn Bergstrom has vast experience from consumer scale-ups, venture capital and management consulting. 

Neso Brands is a Singapore-based global eyewear company founded in 2022 to enable the most promising direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands across the world to become brands of the future. Eyewear has to date been a very traditional industry with large incumbents, but is now ripe for a tech-enabled global transformation. With general e-commerce adoption skyrocketing and technologies such as AR and AI becoming more mature, the time has come for nimble eyewear brands to capitalize on these trends and capture market share. Neso Brands will house these brands and enable a quicker global roll-out by giving the brands access to shared resources; particularly technology, supply chain, distribution, capital and best practices. 

To lead this endeavor, Neso Brands has appointed Bjorn Bergstrom as founding CEO. Mr. Bergstrom is an experienced investor and DTC operator, having most recently served as Chief Growth Officer and interim Chief Product & Technology Officer for the global fashion brand NA-KD. Based out of Sweden and launched in 2016, NA-KD expanded to more than 100 markets and reached net sales of over USD 200 million in just five years. Bergstrom's experience prior to that includes working as a venture capital investor focusing on early stage growth startups, management consulting as well as operational roles at consumer startups. 

Bjorn Bergstrom, CEO of Neso Brands, comments: 

"Today there is a perfect storm in the eyewear industry that makes it ripe for disruption. Consumers have increasingly high demands when it comes to customer experience, branding, and choice, but incumbent players have been unable to keep up. By investing in the most promising new brands in the industry and leveraging centralized resources across technology, manufacturing and distribution, Neso Brands will be uniquely positioned to scale the eyewear brands of the future. I am very much looking forward to leading the company on this journey and working closely together with our investors and partners" 

Peyush Bansal, CEO of Lenskart, comments:

"With this investment in Neso Brands, we want to accelerate our mission of transforming the way people see and experience the world. Consumers want better and better every day and while people's quality of life has been uplifted through all other lifestyle products such as shoes, apparel and wearables, eyewear products are the same old with no innovation, just more expensive. It is our firm belief that the eyewear brands of today will not be brands of the future. And Neso is our initiative to partner with founders globally to help create eyewear brands of the future. "

ABOUT NESO BRANDS

Founded in 2022, Neso Brands is a next generation venture in the eyewear industry which will invest in and house the consumer brands of tomorrow. By leveraging joint resources across analytics, tech, supply chain and distribution, a network effect within the group is created by every new brand joining. Based out of Singapore, Neso Brands has a global reach and is passionate about improving the customer experience in eyewear for millions of people worldwide by partnering up with the best entrepreneurs in the industry.

ABOUT LENSKART

Founded in 2010, Lenskart is Asia's largest omnichannel retailer and manufacturer of premium and contemporary eyewear. With a unique click and mortar business, Lenskart is transforming the eyewear industry by offering disruptive services like home eye check-up and trials, 3D try-on and automated lens fitting. The company aims to provide every consumer access to high-quality glasses by eliminating middle-persons, using hi-tech robotic technology, and incorporating world-class designs into its products. 

Lenskart serves over 10 million customers with a presence in 235 Indian cities and Singapore across a network of 1000+ omnichannel stores, and has now entered the Middle East and US markets.

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