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Mattress wars: Battle heats up as Simba Sleep gets big City backers

London-based Simba Sleep has closed a £9m funding round as it looks to take the fight to its rivals in the increasingly competitive battle for mattress innovation.

The funding, which brings total investment in the business to £17.5m, has come from a club of City of London investment firms, including Henderson Global Investors, Numis Securities and Superdrug founder, Richard Goldstein.

Others joining the round include a raft of big-name financiers such as Citibanks’ Michel de Carvalho, Oblix Capital’s Rishi Passi and former hedge fund manager Julian Barnett.

Founder James Cox, who launched the business just over a year ago, said in comments reported by City AM: “We’ve always wanted to innovate rather than replicate. We strove for customer satisfaction but to achieve this and stand out from the crowd, required us to really prioritise innovation.

“Our expansion may seem fast, but we’re doing things in a very measured way. The retail deals in Europe are replicating the successful model we executed with John Lewis in the UK.”

The startup is competing against the likes of US-based Casper and the UK’s eve Sleep, which also has some high-profile backers to its name, to offer hassle-free mattress ordering through its mattress in a box concept.

With the latest round of funding, the business is looking to embark upon aggressive expansion abroad over the next 18 months, eyeing £40m sales for this year alone along fuelled by moves into two new markets a month.

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