Online Asian Grocery Specialist Weee Names First CFO

Sacramento-based online grocer Weee, which specializes in offering not-widely-available Asian ingredients and products, has named Ankur Shah its first CFO and chief strategy officer.

Shah, who has a bachelor's degree in architecture from Cornell and a master's in international development from Harvard, is tasked with managing Weee's financial infrastructure as it looks to build out its U.S. presence, expand into Canada and eventually launch an initial public offering.

Weee currently operates in nine states—California, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas and Virginia—as well as Washington, D.C. In August, the company reported that it had achieved profitability and was growing 600% year over year. 

The company was founded in 2015 and fulfills more than 7,000 orders a day, according to its website (which is also available in traditional and simplified Chinese-language versions). 

Shah joins Weee after serving for five years as chief finance and strategy officer at Dubai-based ride-sharing and delivery app Careem, which was purchased by Uber for $3.1 billion in 2020. Shah's previous roles include tenures as an acting director at not-for-profit global investment firm Acumen and a business analyst at McKinsey & Co.

Prior to Shah's arrival, Weee's finances were managed by company founder and CEO Larry Liu, The Wall Street Journal reported. Shah noted in an interview with the newspaper that the company aims to broaden its appeal to more Hispanic consumers in the U.S. as it adds ingredients frequently used in Latin American cooking. Weee's website lists La Costena brand canned goods as well as Maseca corn flour and La Lachera sweetened condensed milk as recently added products.

In a LinkedIn post about his new role at Weee, Shah wrote, "We have an enormous opportunity to delight and serve ethnic communities in North America, create jobs and build a world-class organization with amazing colleagues." 

In August 2020, Weee raised $35 million in a financing round led by DST Global, bringing its total funding to more than $100 million. Additional investors include Goodwater Capital, iFly.vc, Lightspeed Ventures and Silicon Valley Bank.

"Weee aims to serve as the primary source of groceries for Asian Americans and underserved communities across North America," the company stated in a news release at the time. Recent best-selling items include Prime beef rib-eye for shabu shabu, snow peas, frozen garlic butter clams, and an assortment of bean pastes and rice noodles.