Indian Startup Funding Of The Week [Funding Galore 5-10 June]

We bring to you the new edition Funding Galore: Indian Startup Funding of the week. This week 20 Indian startups raised $98 Mn in funding altogether and five startup acquisitions took place in the Indian startup ecosystem. (The startup funding calculations are based on the startups that disclosed their funding amounts).

Goomo and Riversand Technologies raised the highest amount of funding in the Indian startup ecosystem.

US-based venture capitalist Sequoia Capital raised $4 Bn funding, as per the latest SEC filings. The recently raised funds will be used for infusing capital into various funds. Apart from this, the filings also revealed that the second growth fund – Sequoia Capital Global Growth Fund II, L.P. has received about $2 Bn.

Indian Startup Fundings Of The Week

Stratfit: Indian startup Bodhtree Consulting Limited (BCL) invested $232K (INR 1.5 Cr) in Stratfit Technologies Pvt. Ltd – a New York-based fitness technology platform via FundPitch funding platform. The investment is done through convertible debentures at a valuation of $12.4 Mn (INR 80 Cr). With the raised funds, Stratfit plans to extend its presence in the US and other international markets.

Riversand Technologies: Master data management company Riversand Technologies raised $35 Mn Series A funding led by Crestline Investors. The company will use the recently raised funding to accelerate global expansion and, for further investment, in its disruptive MDM 2.0 (Master Data Management) platform. Apart from this, the funding will be utilised for strengthening its core verticals

Growfitter: Mumbai-based health and fitness discovery platform Growfitter raised $600K in a Pre-Series A round of funding from San Francisco-based VC SQue Capital. With this round, Karan Chellani, Partner SQue Capital will join the Board of the company and Mukesh Makhija, the Managing Partner of Grace Capital Venture, will join Growfitter as an Advisor. The Indian startup will deploy the raised funds towards enhancing its technology infrastructure.

GyanDhan: Chennai’s Sundaram Finance Group (SFG) made an equity investment in Indian startup GyanDhan, a Delhi-based overseas education loan disbursement platform. With the raised funds, GyanDhan aims to invest in building data science capabilities in the education loans market.

Spinny: Gurugram-based used car marketplace Spinny raised $1 Mn Seed funding led by Blume Ventures, Indian Angel Network, and FreeCharge co-founders Kunal Shah and Sandeep Tandon. The startup will use the funds to strengthen its technology platform and for the expansion of its hubs.

FtCash: Mumbai-based mobile payments platform for micro merchants, FTCash raised an undisclosed amount in startup funding in its Pre-Series A round, from 500 Startups. Existing investors IvyCap Ventures also participated in the round. The startup will deploy the raised funds for product development and merchant acquisition. It will also be used for acquiring new talent.

BHIVE: Bengaluru-based coworking space BHIVE Workspace raised $1.2 Mn in a fresh round of funding. This round of funding was led by Blume Ventures, along with investors including actor-director Ramesh Aravind, Meera Reddy (MD of SKCL), and other high-net-worth individuals. The recently raised funds will be used to fuel its pan-India and international expansion.

Goomo: Mumbai-based Goomo Holdings raised $50 Mn funding from PE firm Emerging India. With this move, Emerging India will pick up a majority stake in the Indian startup. Travel website Goomo.com was launched in March 2017. Goomo was formed by the merger of Orbit Corporate and Leisure Tours in November 2015.

Healthbuds: Kolkata-based healthtech startup Healthbuds raised an undisclosed startup funding. The round was led by angel investors Arun Patodia and Bharat Kedia. The Indian startup will use the funds to upgrade technology, make the platform more robust, and implement digital marketing strategies.

WayForward: Mental healthcare solutions provider wayForward raised close to $1 Mn in angel funding from a clutch of individual investors. Some of the investors who participated in the round include Harsh Mahajan, a radiologist; Farhan Naqvi, a technology investment banker with Deutsche Bank; and Sreepathy Viswanathan, senior vice president of M&A and partnerships at Hinduja Global Solutions Inc. The startup will use the funds to build its technology and the US sales team.

MaxMyWealth: London and India-based fintech platform MaxMyWealth raised an undisclosed amount of startup funding from the US-based Global Advisors (Jersey) Ltd and Horseferry. The raised funds will be used to build the team, enhance its offering and grow its customer base.

ZipLoan: Online lending platform ZipLoan, which is operated by Delhi-based Blue Jay Finlease Ltd. raised $650K (around INR 4.2 Cr) in its Pre-Series A funding round led by WaterBridge Ventures. The startup will use these funds to further develop its credit scoring capabilities, enhance automation in their sourcing/lending/monitoring processes, expand to new cities and strengthen their team.

Stockal: Bengaluru-based investment advisory provider Stockal raised $350K in second round of angel funding from Mohan Alexander, Vikrant Varshney of SucSEED Venture Partners and New York-based investment banker and portfolio manager Amit Sinha. The raised funds will be used to upgrade the product, penetrate the market further and expand its network of experts.

Guiddoo: Mumbai-based In-destination app brand Guiddoo raised funding of $300K in Pre-Series A round led by existing investors Pawan Borle and Nirmal Singh. New Investors including Manish Prasad, Vineet Varma, Nick Haulkoury, and Abhai S. Rao also participated in the round. Guiddoo will utilise the raised funds to support product and technology development through their newly opened Technology & Data Unit based in Pune as well as focus on building pan-India distribution for its tours & activities & holidays products.

Market Pulse: Mumbai-based fintech startup Market Pulse raises an undisclosed amount of seed funding from Lead Angels Network and Chatur Ideas platform. The company plans to use the funding to expand its product coverage to other financial markets and build a strong tech team.

Tagos Design: Bengaluru-based video discovery portal Tagos design raised $2.5 Mn from Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd, against 12.5% stake. With this deal Zee anticipates that Tagos platform will help scale up revenues of its OTT business.

eSahai: Hyderabad-based ambulance aggregator and medical taxi provider eSahai.in raised $250K in a seed funding round. The investment came from Dr. Ramesh Ayyala, professor of ophthalmology and director of glaucoma residency and fellowship programmes at Tulane University in the US, and Satya Muthyala, senior director of enterprise apps, sales, and supply chain at US video game publisher Activision. The Indian startup will use the raised funds to increase its medical taxi fleet and add more ambulances onto its platform in addition to spending on marketing and technology.

Multiplier Solutions: Hyderabad-based healthtech startup Multiplier Solutions raised $1.5 Mn from Norwest Venture Partners. The startup works with hospitals diagnostics chains, clinics. It offers a product platform to integrate artificial intelligence and machine learning for improved diagnostics as well as predicting clinical outcomes.

ABI Health: Bengaluru-based healthtech startup ABI Health raised $1.5 Mn from Norwest Venture Partners.  It is an image management cloud software provider and works on a SaaS-based revenue model.

Loanmeet: Mumbai-based digital lending platform Loanmeet raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Chinese investors and entrepreneurs Cao Yibin and Huang Wei, and MadhuSudan, CEO of KrazyBee. plans to use the funds towards an aggressive expansion of its customer base.

Indian Startup Acquisitions Of The Week

• Gurugram-based real estate property and broker review platform Roofpik acquired personalised product delivery platform Shoppist. The acquisition aims to strengthen Roofpik’s core team and bring personalised property recommendations to its users. Post the acquisition, Divij Goyal founder of Shoppist, will join the Roofpik Board as Chief Marketing Officer.
• Mumbai-based online marketplace for recruitment Aasaanjobs acquired Noida-based mHire. The aim of the acquisition is to strengthen Aasaanjob’s position in North India and get mHire’s partners and clients on board.
• Alibaba Pictures, the entertainment unit of China’s ecommerce major Alibaba Group acquired a majority stake in Indian startup TicketNew for an undisclosed amount. Post-acquisition, Alibaba will have four representatives on TicketNew’s board and the firm’s promoters will have two of their representatives. TicketNew founder and CEO Ramkumar Nammalvar will continue to spearhead the business.
• Zee Entertainment Enterprises Ltd acquired the 49% remaining stake in India Webportal Pvt. Ltd for $30.7 Mn. The investment aims to consolidate the digital business of Zee Entertainment.
• JustCode, a New York-based interviewing platform announced the acquisition of Indian startup Jobspire. Jobspire is a Bengaluru-based online job recruitment platform. The deal aims to extend JustCode’s operations in the country and to further strengthen its core products for employers. Post-acquisition Jobspire’s core products will be integrated with JustCode.

Other Developments Of The Week

• The corporate venture fund of Wipro invested $24.5 Mn in nine startups between 2015 – 2017. The list of startups funded by the Wipro venture fund to date includes Vectra Networks, Emailage Corporation, Altizon Systems, Vicarious, Drivestream Inc, Avaamo, Intsights, Talena, and TradeShift.
• US-based data storage and management company NetApp launched its first startup accelerator-NetApp Excellerator- in Bengaluru. It’s open for Indian startups in Internet of Things, cloud, Big Data and analytics, machine learning, virtualisation, data security, data management, and storage. The selected startups will get an equity-free grant of $15K under the four-month programme, without reserving any of their intellectual property.
• Venture Catalysts extended its reach to global markets, beginning its journey from GCC countries, including Qatar. It further plans to expand to other countries in the region such as Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. It has also partnered with 360-nautica. Post amalgamation, the new entity will be known as 360-VCats and will be based out of Doha.
• 13 technology startups graduated from Bosch DNA accelerator programme for Indian startups. Bosch plans to collaborate with these technology startups that work in the areas of aerospace, mobility, social impact, healthcare, and agriculture, among others.
• 14 enterprise tech startups graduated from the 10th cohort of Microsoft Accelerator. Microsoft Accelerator began the cohort in March 2017. The startups were selected based on the recommendations of VC firms – including Inventus Capital Partners, Ideaspring Capital, Accel Partners, IDG Ventures, and pi Ventures.
• Online fashion marketplace Myntra launched an accelerator programme. As a part of this programme Myntra has partnered with Chemistry and AKS. With the newly launched accelerator programme Myntra is looking to partner with about 10-15 local fashion brands.
• Jindal Stainless Ltd. formed the collaboration with the Japanese company Future Venture Capital Company Ltd. (FVCCL) to launch an incubation centre for Indian startups in agritech. The deal agreement has already been signed and around 5-10 startups will be selected for incubation.
• IDG Ventures announced the launch of the 2017 Innovation Program (IDGVI) in partnership with Unilever Ventures and Amazon Internet Services Pvt. Ltd. With this programme, IDG Ventures aims to support tech startups belonging to sectors such as consumer tech, software, healthtech, and fintech. The programme will fund startups from Seed stage to Series A, between $0.5 Mn to $5 Mn.

Stay tuned for next edition of Funding Galore: Indian Startup Funding, next week.

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