Boon Nets $5 Mn To Offer AI And IoT-Based Drinking Water Solutions

Gurugram-based watertech startup Boon (erstwhile Swajal) has secured Series A funding of $5 Mn(around INR 41 Cr) in a mix of debt and equity infusion led by Spanish Roca Group Ventures.

The round also saw participation from a host of undisclosed investors.

“We are planning to deploy the fresh capital to enhance our technology and expand services globally with a major focus on North America and South East Asia markets. This infusion will also help us develop platforms for water purification management,” cofounder Advait Kumar told Inc42.

In February 2021, Boon raised $1.6 Mn (around INR 13.3 Cr) in its Pre-Series A funding round from Rajasthan Venture Capital Fund (RVCF) and others to enhance its research and development capabilities.

The company claims to have raised around INR 60 Cr (around $7.1 Mn) till now.

Founded by Kumar and Vibha Tripathi in 2015, Boon offers water purifiers and dispensers with AI technology which assess equipment health and suggest maintenance measures like alerting the user about purifier servicing. With its IoT- technology, Boon claims to offer real-time quality and quantity assessment of drinking water.

As per company’s website, other than purifiers, it offers products like AI-based Boon Stick, a plug and play device which offers water quality monitoring via phone app. Other than this, it also claims to offers a water circular system for organisations to purify and package drinking water in glass bottles.

With this system, the company claims to have partnered with hotel giants like Grand Hyatt, Shangri-La Group and JW Marriott among others.

The development comes at a time when India’s cleantech space is gaining a lot of traction from the investors.

For instance, AI and Machine learning-based startup EcoRatings recently raised $1 Mn to acquire paid data sources, increase the number of tokens and introduce multi-modal capabilities.

Similarly, AI-based cleantech platform Sprih secured seed funding of $3 Mn to hire talent for creation of AI models to offer climate solutions.

In January 2024, water treatment focused cleantech startup INDRA bagged $4 Mn to treat water which is polluted by the industrial and sewage segment.

As per Inc42 report, in February 2024, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman made a number of announcements for the cleantech sector in her speech for interim Budget 2024-25. According to her speech, the centre will provide viability gap funding for harnessing offshore wind energy potential for an initial capacity of 1 GWh. 

Additionally, the government will also launch a new scheme for biomanufacturing and bio-foundry to provide environmentally friendly alternatives such as biodegradable polymers, bioplastics, biopharmaceuticals and bio agri inputs. 

As per Inc42 report, certain segments in India’s cleantech space like sustainable aviation fuel, water conservation and low-carbon cement are expected to gain more momentum in 2024.