Funding Galore: Indian Startup Funding Of The Week [December 21-26]

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

This week two Indian startups entered the unicorn club — adtech unicorn InMobi’s content subsidiary Glance as well as vernacular-focussed news and content aggregator Dailyhunt.

Glance raised $145 Mn funding from Google and existing investor Mithril Capital to deepen its AI capabilities across Roposo and its own platform. The company will also expand its technology team, launch new services on the platform and further strengthen the brand, while driving expansion in global markets.

Google also invested in Dailyhunt’s $100 Mn round along with Microsoft, Alpha Wave Incubation. Existing investors Sofina Group and Lupa Systems also participated in this round. It will use this funding to scale up its recently launched short video app Josh, further develop its content creator ecosystem and double down on its artificial intelligence and machine learning push for content discovery and recommendations.

Meanwhile, fintech unicorn Pine Labs raised an undisclosed amount from Lone Pine Capital at a valuation of over $2 Bn.

This week, over $385 Mn was invested across 20 Indian startups with one acquisition. Last week, $980.6 Mn was invested across 22 deals.

Note: This funding report is based on startups that disclosed funding amounts

Top Indian Startup Funding Deals Of The Week

• Glance: $145 Mn from Google and Mithril Capital

• Dailyhunt: $100 Mn from Google, Microsoft, Alpha Wave Incubation, Sofina Group, Lupa Systems

• RapiPay: $9 Mn in Series A Dabur, Havells promoter Sheela Foam, noted surgeon Naresh Trehan, Dalmia Bharat Group’s Puneet Dalmia, ORG Investments and energy company ACME

• Skuad: $4 Mn in seed round from BEENEXT, Anthemis Group, Alto Partners Multi-Family Office, Zenius Education CEO Rohan Monga

• Slurrp Farm: $2 Mn in Series A from Fireside Ventures

• CoinDCX: $1.8 Mn in Series B from Block.one,  DG, Jump Capital, Uncorrelated Ventures, Coinbase Ventures, Polychain Capital, Mehta Ventures, Alex Pack

• Lido Learning: $1.3 Mn in seed round from Oracle Insurance Services, Mackler Gmbh’s Felix Jahn, GoStudent’s founder Felix Ohswald, Arrive Advisors, DN Capital’s Nenad Marovac

• Moneyboxx Finance: $1.3 Mn in debt from BlackSoil Capital, Caspian Impact Investment, Ashv Finance 
  

• TaxBuddy.com: $1 Mn from Zenith Global

• Awign Enterprises: $543K in debt from BlackSoil

• Pyotam: $543K in seed round from series of individual and institutional investors

• OurEye.ai: $120K from 100x.vc and Amara Ventures

• Pine Labs: Undisclosed amount in Series B round from Lone Pine Capital

• Medfin: Undisclosed amount in Series A from HealthXCapital, Blume Ventures, Dream Incubator, Axilor Ventures

• EWar Games: Undisclosed amount in Pre-Series A from Inflection Point Ventures (IPV), JITO Angel Network, Hyderabad Angels and Eximius Ventures’ founder Peart Agarwal

• Stargate: Undisclosed amount from SucSEED Indovation

• Auris: Undisclosed amount from SucSEED Indovation

• Freestand: Undisclosed amount from SucSEED Indovation

• YPay: Undisclosed amount in seed round from Venture Catalysts

• Master G: Undisclosed amount from Acumen Fund’s angel programme

Acquisitions Of The Week

• Business process management service Firstsource Solutions acquired US-based PatientMatters for $13 Mn to strengthen its healthcare services portfolio and expand its footprint in the US.

Other Developments Of The Week

• Bengaluru-based early-stage seed fund and startup accelerator Axilor Ventures announced the first cohort of a new pre-seed investment programme for startups with investments of up to $200K in each company. The company has specified that the startups will also have access to upto $1 Mn of follow-up capital.

• Pharma retailer Medplus is reportedly in talks with private equity firm Warburg Pincus to raise $203 Mn (INR 1,500 Cr) funding in a mix of debt and equity for a minority stake.

• The wealth management arm of financial services company India Infoline, IIFL Wealth, will launch a $101 Mn (INR 750 Cr) fund-of-funds to partner with tech-focused venture capital funds. Through this partnership, IIFL Wealth will invest in its partner VC firms’ best performing digital companies.

• Hyderabad-headquartered alternative investment fund and venture capital firm SucSEED Indovation has marked the first close of its $13.5 Mn (INR 100 Cr) fund, having raised $5.4 Mn (INR 40 Cr) from its limited partners and investors.

• Sachin Bansal-led financial service company Navi Technologies is reportedly in talks to acquire Aviva Life Insurance Company, a joint venture between UK-based insurer Aviva and Indian consumer goods company’s investment arm Dabur Invest Corp.

• B2B fintech startup BharatPe and financial services company Centrum Group have reportedly submitted an expression of interest (EoI) to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to jointly acquire the troubled Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative (PMC) Bank.

• Gurugram-based Circle of Angels (CoA) announced its first round of fundraising of $3.3 Mn (INR 25 Cr), which will be used to fund startups across sectors. The platform connects startups, mentors, and investors with each other.

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