Singapore-based fashion technology startup Zilingo on Wednesday suspended its Indian-origin co-founder and CEO Ankiti Bose over alleged discrepancies in the company’s accounts. The B2B online fashion company, in a statement, said its shareholders and board members received the information of discrepancies last month that needed investigation, after which major investors were authorised to suspend Bose.
According to a report by Bloomberg, Bose has lawyered up and disputed allegations of wrongdoing. She further contended that her suspension was due in part to her complaints about harassment.
Zilingo – an online fashion company that supplies technology to apparel merchants and factories — was founded in 2015 by Ankiti Bose and chief technology officer Dhruv Kapoor. The company was started as a Southeast Asia-focused e-commerce firm. Over time, it became a global supply chain for the apparel industry, financing, and other services.
Also read: Singapore’s Zilingo suspends CEO Ankiti Bose amid probe
The company – which has about 600 employees in eight countries – raised $226 million in its last fundraising round in early 2019. The fundraising had valued the company at about $1 billion, according to Reuters. As per publicly available records on Singapore’s accounting regulator’s website, the company has not filed annual returns for 2020 and 2021 so far.
Ankiti Bose began her career at McKinsey & Company in 2012, after which she joined Sequoia Capital as an investment analyst in 2014. She co-founded Zilingo in her early 20s in 2015 and scaled it up rapidly. With millions of users, Zilingo has operations spanning Indonesia, Hong Kong, Thailand, the Philippines, Australia, India, and the United States.
Also read: How a 27-year-old CEO of Indian origin built a near $1 billion fashion startup, Zilingo
The now-suspended CEO had done her schooling in Mumbai and graduated from St Xavier’s College. She has also been featured in Forbes Asia’s 30 under 30 list, Fortune’s 40 under 40, and Bloomberg 50 list in 2019.
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