Wahanda secures $5.5 million B series round fund

CEO Lopo Champalimaud: We want to do for beauty products what Amazon did for books

Wahanda, an online marketplace for health and beauty products, has secured a $5.5 million B investment round led by Fidelity Growth Partners Europe (FGPE). A partner at FGPE Davor Hebel will join the board at Wahanda.

The series A investment of $2 million, led by Ambient Sound Investements, occurred in 2008. Other backers of Wahanda include Brent Hoberman, founder of lastminute.com; Stefan Glaenzer, former executive chairman of last.fm and founder of Passion Capital; and Wolf Hengst, the former COO of Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts.

Wahanda was founded by Lopo Champalimaud, formerly of lastminute.com, and Salim Mitha of Yahoo! in 2008. With listings of "hundreds of thousands" of health and beauty organizations, Wahanda strives to be the Amazon of beauty products. Users can search and browse these listings, and make bookings online.

“Our vision is to do for health, beauty and wellness what Amazon did for books. We have created an online destination where people can find, discover, share and book anything they want to do with health, beauty and wellness," said Lopo Champalimaud, CEO of Wahanda, via a press release. "We’re thrilled to partner with Fidelity Growth Partners Europe and we are looking forward to the passion and experience Davor will bring to our board.”

“We have been very impressed by the traction that Wahanda has gained in the short time since inception. Lopo had an original idea to transform the health and beauty market by partnering with merchants, while offering the customers a one-stop shop for their wellness needs," said Davor Hebel of FGPE.

The site got about 25k unique daily visits in September '11, down from last March when it racked up 45k. "Wahanda" is a Native American word meaning "great spirit and creator." Wahanda was selected by ElleUK.com as one of their "Best Online Beauty Websites."