TEAL Raises Funding To Transform Land And Property Records In India

Bengaluru-based proptech startup Terra Economics & Analytics Lab or TEAL has raised $2 Mn (INR 14.8 Cr) in a Pre-Series A round led by Omidyar Network India with participation from existing investor Info Edge.

With this fundraise, the startup will work on expanding its data engineering capabilities, increasing geographical footprints and providing more analytics-driven insights to its customers, according to a press statement.

Before this, the real estate intelligence startup secured its first round of funding totalling INR 5 Cr from Info Edge India Ltd in 2019. 

Founded in 2018 by Kshitij Batra and Rohan Shridhar, Terra Economics & Analytics Lab (TEAL) is a tech startup working on transforming land and property records in India utilising cutting-edge Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) algorithms. 

Its core product is a digital API service that provides data on individual properties to banks, housing finance companies and transacting parties in real-time. TEAL’s analytical tools organise and validate data from land records, property registrations, tax filings, court proceedings, land-use regulations, master plans, cadastral surveys, infrastructure plans, municipal by-laws, building codes and planning requirements. 

With more than 50 Mn properties covered across 52 cities and 12 states, TEAL uses ML algorithms to translate, clean and standardise property records that can facilitate decision making with regards to land-related transactions. 

“We are working on expanding our data coverage to additional Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities as those have been identified as future growth markets for affordable housing by several financial institutions. Additionally, we are expanding our analytics tools and features in our property profiles, such as geospatial mapping, detailed property price estimates and risk quantification,” Kshitij Batra, cofounder and CEO of TEAL, told Inc42. 

TEAL claims it is building a comprehensive digital data infrastructure layer for land and property records in India – to enable greater lending against property, refinance, securitisation, and title insurance. Its solution provides clean property-level data via APIs in real-time. 

“We are building India’s first digital title verification system, akin to a CIBIL for property. Just as CIBIL dramatically transformed the process of personal lending in India — simplifying a series of otherwise manual, messy procedures to do due diligence on an individual before giving a loan — we are aiming to do the same for property. We believe deeply in the mission of improving transparency and trust in real estate markets in India,” said Batra.

The startup’s existing clients include HDFC, Kotak Mahindra and HomeFirst, as well as retail users seeking reliable data on individual properties across the country. It has also published analytical insights on the Indian property market and housing finance. 

“We have built a digital platform to conduct property due diligence in real-time for banks, housing finance companies, and individual buyers and sellers. We collate land and property-related records from more than 900 different government agencies, courts, tribunals and other relevant sources, clean, translate and link this data using our proprietary AI/ML algorithms, and make them searchable and accessible in real-time,” added Batra. 

Meanwhile, property tech startups are booming and they are here to disrupt the real estate sector, which still follows the traditional and physical methods of solving problems. 

There are many proptech startups such as NestAway, NoBroker, PropTiger Realty, SmartOwner, GrabHouse, among others in India that are playing a crucial role in infusing technology into the sector’s everyday operations.

Some of them have performed very well in the past. For instance, Bengaluru-based NoBroker. It raised $210 Mn last year in its Series E round taking its total fundraising tally to $361 Mn. Led by existing investors General Atlantic and Tiger Global Management, the round also saw participation from US-based Moore Strategic Ventures. 

Gruhas Proptech plans to roll out a $150 Mn funding in the first quarter of 2022 that will invest in incubators and startups, as reported by Inc42.

Another proptech startup Method & Madness Technology raised $2 Mn in a seed funding round last year led by Tinder founder Justin Mateen and other undisclosed Silicon Valley-based investors.