Funding Galore: Indian Startup Funding Of The Week [15-20 Apr]

We bring to you the latest edition of Funding Galore: Indian Startup Funding Of The Week!

This week one of the biggest funding came to Bengaluru-based wealth management startup Kuvera, which raised $4.5 Mn in Series A funding from UK-based venture capital company Eight Road Ventures. The funds will be utilised to build the startup’s team and expand its product portfolio.

In all this week, 10 startups raised $18.25 Mn funding and two startup acquisitions took place in the Indian startup ecosystem. (This funding report is based on startups that disclosed funding amount.)

Indian Startup Fundings Of The Week

MyHealthcare: Gurugram-based digital integrated healthcare technology platform MyHealthcare raised $3 Mn in Series A funding round from Sixth Sense Ventures. The startup will use the funds to expand its operations in Indonesia, Malaysia and Myanmar.

Increff: Bengaluru-based supply chain management startup Increff raised $3 Mn from Flipkart cofounder Binny Bansal and venture capital company 021 Capital. The fresh funds will be used to fuel its next phase of growth, which includes expansion of the customer pipeline, product enhancements and foray into international markets.

WhiteHat Jr: Mumbai-based AI-centric edtech startup WhiteHat Jr raised $1.3 Mn in a seed funding round from Nexus Venture Partners and Omidyar Network India. The fresh funding will  be used to manage operational efficiency.

Routematic: Bengaluru-based employee transportation startup Routematic raised $2.5 Mn in a Pre Series A round led by Naresh Malhotra, former CEO of Cafe Coffee Day and VAMM ventures. The fresh funds will be utilised towards building electric vehicle-based smart city transportation network.

Picture Time Digiplex: Mumbai-based mobile digital cinema theatre startup Picture Time Digiplex raised $3.6 Mn (INR 25 Cr) in pre-series A funding from Zenrock Comtrade. The funds will be used for the company’s expansion plans, particularly in Uttar Pradesh.

Rapawalk: Bengaluru based online footwear startup Rapawalk raised $350K in a seed funding round from angel investors including Raveen Sastry, cofounder, Myntra, Sanjay Ramakrishna,ex-CMO, Myntra, Ravi Garikipati,ex-CTO Flipkart and Ajith Pai, director,Green Earth, among others. The funds will primarily be used for team expansion and scaling business operations.

AtomX: Pune-based payments solution startup AtomX raised an undisclosed amount from BookMyShow. With this partnership, BookMyShow is looking to make use of AtomX’s NFC payments solution through accessories such as NFC cards, wristbands, key-chains and more.  Consumers can potentially use this for digital payments at music festivals, sporting events, food festivals and concerts and other on-ground activities.

CivilCops: New Delhi-based civic-tech products startup CivilCops raised an undisclosed amount of funds from Alfa Ventures. The startup plans to get more government authorities in India to adopt the product in the near future.

Swadha Energies: Chennai-based intelligent air-conditioning solutions provider Swadha Energies raised an undisclosed amount of funds from MVS Mani, cofounder and managing director of Future Focus Infotech Pvt Ltd and Nitin Zambre, Former MD, ICF India. The funds will be used to enhance its product, boost its sales and marketing, while spreading awareness about sustainable energy consumption.

Indian Startup Acquisitions Of The Week

• Bengaluru-based Business Services provider Quess Corp acquired Hyderabad based business process solutions provider Allsec Technologies. The transaction will be accretive to both Conneqt and Quess from margins, cash flow conversion as well as RoCE perspective thereby creating long term value for shareholders.
• Mumbai based logistics service provider Stellar Value Chain Solutions Pvt. Ltd acquired Mumbai based logistics company Patel Roadways. With this acquisition, Stellar intend to make deeper inroads in the Express and less-than-truck-load distribution space across the country.

Other Developments Of The Week

• Chinese social networking company ByteDance is planning to invest $1 Bn in its India operations, despite Supreme Court putting a halt to its app, TikTok in India. The TikTok app has been removed from the Play Store and Apple Store after the instructions from SC.
• Bengaluru-based credit card bill payment startup Cred is reportedly looking to raise $100 Mn (INR 692 Cr) from China-based venture capital firm Hillhouse Capital and its existing investors which include Sequoia Capital, Ribbit Capital, Apoletto Asia among others.
• Eight Indian startups have made it in the first cohort of 17 startups selected under Sequoia Capital’s startup accelerator and incubation programme Surge. As part of the programme, the Surge will pick up 10–20 early stage startups twice a year and invest $1.5 Mn (INR 10.6 Cr) in each of them at the start or very early stage of the programme.
• The Government of Maharashtra last year introduced Mumbai FinTech Hub to enable financial empowerment and technological advancement by nurturing start-ups with the potential to scale. The startups selected were, BON Fleet,  Paperking, HuePay, PhiCommerce, YAP, Jarvis, Finlok, News4Use, GoPlannr, Microchip Payments, Riscovry, Crelytics
• TalentSprint announced its Women Engineers Program supported by Google, to nurture 600 women software engineers from India over the coming three years. As a part of this initiative, young and talented college students from varied socioeconomic backgrounds will be identified via a detailed selection process and groomed through a rigorous multi-step training program, supported by 100% scholarships and annual stipends of INR 1 Lakh each.
• Railways-owned Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) and Indian Railway Finance Corporation (IRFC) are planning to raise INR 1500 Cr through initial public offerings (IPO) by September this year, PTI has reported. A final call will be taken on this after the elections.

Stay tuned for next week’s edition of Funding Galore: Indian Startup Funding Of The Week!