Moda Operandi, one of this year's biggest NYC funding rounds

2015 has been a record year in terms of funding rounds in NYC. The city, which saw a total of 7.65 billion dollars invested across 775 deals in 2015, had some of the largest funding rounds in the U.S.

According to data gathered by the ‘New York Business Journal’, the amount of capital raised exceeded 2014’s 4.5 billion dollars injected into NYC start-ups (a breakout year in its own right.)

However, by comparison, NYC is still second to the San Francisco Bay Area, which would close the year with 34 billion dollars invested across 1,900 California companies.

Fashion has become an appealing investment for eager investors and capital firms willing to bid high for tech companies with a twist.

A good sample of this increasing interest in fashion from an investment point of view is how Moda Operandi has made it to the top 15 fundraising rounds of the year in NYC.

The fashion online platform co-founded by Lauren Santo Domingo and CEO Deborah Nicodemus is, along with start-ups SeatGeek and AppNexus, one of the New York-based companies with the largest funding rounds in 2015.

Over the past twelve months, the online luxury fashion retailer raised 138.4 million in total. Back in February alone, Moda Operandi secured 60 million dollars in a Series E investment round from the likes of Fidelity Investments, Advance Publications, LVMH, New Atlantic Ventures, New Enterprise Associates, and RRE Ventures.

Commenting that round of funding, Moda Operandi Chief Executive Deborah Nicodemus said that “With this investment, we’ll actually be going after clients now.” In this regard, Nicodemus said her company’s model is different than traditional e-commerce sites as it makes the entire collection available for pre-purchase within one hour of the show. Customers put down a 50 percent deposit on items which they receive roughly five months later, around the same time the high-end retail stores receive their shipments.

Fidelity portfolio manager Ramin Arani said Moda’s profit margins, which are around 58 percent, are among the reasons the firm led the round, reported the ‘Wall Street Journal’ back in the day. “Most retailers have 10 percent to 15 percent of sales that come from online e-commerce. For luxury, it’s well below that and is somewhere around 1 percent,” Arani further added.

Moda Operandi increased its revenue 70 percent to more than 50 million dollars in 2014.