Lenskart’s Global Vision: Building India’s First Truly International Retail Giant

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Lenskart’s Global Vision: Building India’s First Truly International Retail Giant

When Lenskart first filed its Draft Red Herring Prospectus (DRHP), the headlines were predictable. IPOs from consumer-facing unicorns always grab attention. But the real story here isn’t about listing day fireworks. It’s about something much rarer in Indian startup history: an internet-era company that might just succeed in building a global retail business at scale.

Just last month, alongside the DRHP news, Lenskart quietly announced it was acquiring an 80% stake in Spanish eyewear brand Mela for ₹400 crore ($48 million). That’s not a one-off deal. It’s part of a carefully calibrated strategy that has already given Lenskart a footprint in 14 countries, with international markets now contributing about 40% of total revenue.

This global push is not just ambition for ambition’s sake. It’s a response to a question that haunts every Indian consumer brand that dreams big: how do you scale beyond the limits of a price-sensitive home market?

Unlike Oyo, which expanded recklessly only to retreat, or Zomato, which shut down its overseas “experiments,” Lenskart is resisting the temptation to blitzscale. Founder and CEO Peyush Bansal has the benefit of hindsight. He’s watched Indian startups charge into the US, Canada, and Brazil, only to stumble under the weight of customer acquisition costs, regulatory hurdles, and cultural mismatches.

Lenskart’s approach is far more deliberate. Think of it less as conquest, more as alliance-building. The company enters new geographies by partnering with or acquiring local players. Its first big foreign move — the acquisition of Japanese eyewear brand Owndays in 2019 for $400 million — immediately added 400 stores and decades of local know-how. Instead of burning cash to build from scratch, Lenskart bought its way into relevance.

Strategy in Action

So far, the expansion map looks almost textbook. Lenskart has focused on markets where customer behavior and income profiles mirror India’s growing middle class — the UAE, Singapore, Japan. Places where value-driven consumers want quality eyewear at affordable prices.

To complement this, the company has also built a web of strategic investments:

• 6over6 (Israel): AI-powered optical tech.

• MetaDome (US): immersive product visualization.

• Le Petit Lunetier (France): fashion-forward eyewear design.

• Baofeng Framekart JV (China): scale manufacturing at lower costs.

In other words, Lenskart isn’t just planting stores overseas; it’s building an ecosystem of capabilities across design, manufacturing, and technology.

And Bansal has been notably cautious with capital. He reportedly made five offers before Owndays finally said yes. Even when SoftBank came knocking in 2019, he took six months to accept the deal, waiting until the company had clear product-market fit and cultural alignment.

A Rare Discipline

That restraint may be Lenskart’s biggest differentiator. Where others saw global markets as trophies, Lenskart sees them as long games. It currently has 18,000 employees from 25 nationalities, and in FY25 alone, launched over 100 new collections — including collaborations with celebrities like Karan Johar and cricketer Suryakumar Yadav.

The numbers tell their own story: international revenue grew nearly 17% in FY25, and customers are buying glasses at a frequency of 3.6 per person every two years — twice the Indian average of 1.8. That’s the payoff of treating eyewear as both a healthcare essential and a lifestyle product.

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The Road Ahead

The global eyewear market is worth about $180 billion today and could touch $220 billion by 2030. Prescription eyewear — Lenskart’s core — makes up nearly 70% of that pie. Asia, its home turf, is the fastest-growing region. The opportunity is obvious.

But Lenskart’s next ambition is also its riskiest: cracking the US. Here, consumer behavior is different. Eyewear is as much about fashion as it is about function. Brand loyalty runs deep, with giants like Ray-Ban (owned by EssilorLuxottica) and upstarts like Warby Parker dominating. And then there’s the geopolitical cloud: tariffs, trade tensions, and rising protectionism.

Still, some analysts believe Lenskart has three advantages:

1. A vertically integrated model — controlling design, manufacturing, and retail.

2. A heavy reliance on private labels, which boosts margins.

3. A supply chain that delivers competitive pricing at scale.

That mix has already powered its growth in Asia. Whether it’s enough to take on the US market remains to be seen.

Why This Story Matters

If Lenskart pulls this off, it won’t just be another unicorn going public. It will be the first Indian consumer brand of the startup era to become a true global retailer. Not just exporting services, but competing head-to-head with multinational incumbents in physical retail.

That’s rare. Because so far, Indian startups have either built domestic empires or tech platforms that scale globally without leaving home. Lenskart is attempting something harder: building a world-class brand with stores, supply chains, and customers across continents.

For an economy still trying to shed its image as just a “market for the world,” that ambition matters.

Lenskart is expanding with its eyes wide open. The IPO may grab the headlines, but the real story is unfolding quietly — in shopping malls in Tokyo, optometry clinics in Singapore, and soon, perhaps, boutique stores in New York. If it succeeds, Lenskart won’t just be another Indian unicorn. It could become India’s first true global retail giant.

Interested in learning more about Indian brands? Check out our previous coverage here:

• The Reverse Flip: Why Indian Startups Are Coming Home from Silicon Valley

• PopVax And The Case For Indian Biotech

• Can India Have Its Own Zillow?

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Peeyush and Mohit

Disclaimer: The views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in the text belong solely to the author, and not necessarily to the author's employer, organization, committee or other group or individual.