HRTech Startup Darwinbox Raises $4 Mn Funding From Lightspeed, Others

HRtech startup, Darwinbox, has secured $4 Mn in Series A funding round led by Lightspeed India Partners. Existing investors Endiya Partners, Mohandas Pai’s 3one4 Capital and Startupxseed Ventures in this round of funding in the Human Resource Management startup.

Darwinbox is a new-age cloud HR platform that takes care of all HR needs across the employee life cycle – the six HR modules – which include recruitment, core transactions (leave, attendance, directory), payroll, employee movement, employee engagement, talent management and people analytics.

Mohandas Pai investing via 3one4 Capital said, “At a time when the fundamental principles of human resource management are rapidly evolving in India, the team at Darwinbox has leveraged platform-scale technologies and latest compliance frameworks to help their customers become more people-centric. By reimagining multiple workflows across HR, Darwinbox has unlocked several new strategies for tangible productivity improvements”

The company was founded in August 2015 by Jayant Paleti, Rohit Chennamaneni, and Chaitanya Peddi. All the founders are IIT/IIM/XLRI alums and have worked across companies like Mckinsey, Google, E&Y and Deloitte before founding Darwinbox.

With the new capital raise, the company plans to expand its core technology, product, and go-to-market capability across India and internationally.

Darwinbox And The Six Intuitive Modules

As mentioned above, the HRtech startup helps companies manage the entire employee lifecycle, making it one stop solution for all the technical HR requirements. Darwinbox’s cloud-based end-to-end Human Resource Management (HRMS) platform automates HR processes across the entire employee lifecycle – managing recruitment, onboarding, core HR, time and attendance, expense management, payroll, employee engagement, performance management and people analytics.

The dashboard offers a two-way access to the company i.e. for the employees and administrators.

For employees, it provides features like – one can apply for leave, request for status updates, and subsequently follow up on instructions assigned to them, in addition to applying for everyday needs such as reimbursements, overtime, salary slips etc. While on the admin front, users can update leave cycles, holiday calendars, approve/negate applications, and handle update the employee performance appraisals as well –  within a single interface – to ensure a very transparent and objective process in the organisation.

Jayant Paleti, co-founder of Darwinbox says, “The world’s largest enterprises are increasingly thinking of HR platforms not just as systems of record but as systems of intelligence to propel their human resource agenda. There is a strong, ever increasing demand for a modern technology suite that will address these needs. With this capital raise, Darwinbox will continue to expand its core technology, product and go-to-market capability across India & Internationally”

Darwinbox: Key Stats

1. Darwinbox managed to add 50+ companies as its clientele in the last one year.
2. Over 100,000+ employees have used Darwinbox across verticals such as technology, pharma, healthcare and logistics in last one year.
3. Its clientele includes companies like Paytm, Nivea, Godrej CDPL, Delhivery, Sai Life Sciences, Swiggy and Hetero Pharma.
4. The company is further targeting to add 100 companies with an employee count of 200,000+ on the platform by the end of FY ’18.

Darwinbox operates on a SaaS model which allows companies to only pay as they use and its product is targeted at mid to large sized enterprises where it typically competes with the likes of SAP, SuccessFactors, and Oracle Fusion. As far as the point of differentiation is concerned in comparison to its competitor, the startup’s easy-to-use interface, functional depth, faster implementation cycles and unique new-age features (e-Onboarding, Merit Planning, Continuous Feedback, Performance Journals, insightful analytics) sets it apart, as per the company.  “We built the platform to reflect local enterprise context while still having global product standards,” added Jayant.

“At all sizes and in all industries, businesses succeed when their employees and managers are engaged for maximum productivity and potential. As a result, human capital management software is core to the success of every business,” said Dev Khare, Partner at Lightspeed India Partners Advisors. “Darwinbox is leading the charge in taking human capital management beyond the HR department to all employees with a highly user-friendly and configurable user experience. We are thrilled to partner with Rohit, Chaitanya, Jayant and their team,” he added.

As per an Inc42 DataLabs report, for the period between 2014 – 2016, HRTech sector saw around 33 deals grossing in $75.22 Mn. Other HRtech solutions available in the market are Greyhr, ZingHR, MindTickle and SumHR. Darwinbox had raised an undisclosed amount of funding in a Pre Series A round of funding led by Endiya Partners. TracxnLabs, Aaruha Technology, and Mohandas Pai via 3one4 capital, also participated in this round in July 2016.

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Darwinbox is part of Inc42’s 42Fellowship – a year-long fellowship programme for India’s top growing and upcoming startups with the aim to build a close-knit community who can help each other multiply their impact.