[Weekly Funding Roundup] Indian startups raise $318M this week; equity increases by 230 pc

After hitting a bottom low, the second week of February witnessed a pickup in startup funding value.

Indian startups raised more than $318 million in funding across 18 equity deals, up by over 230 percent since last week, when equity funding dropped to $96.8 million.

This week, two startups raised debt funding – Bengaluru-based digital payments solutions company Innoviti secured $5 million from FMO, the Dutch development bank, and New Delhi-based tea cafe chain Chaayos raised $3 million from Innoven Capital. 

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Further, two late-stage deals secured the highest amount of funding at $240 million. However, four growth-stage deals raised only $52.7 million. 

In stage-wise funding, transactions were almost equal with Series A, B, and C accounting for two deals each. Five Pre-Series A deals, one Series F deal, and six other deals cornered undisclosed funding.

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[Weekly Funding Roundup] Investments into startups remains steady at $96.8 million

Deals of the week

Edtech major BYJU'S raised an undisclosed amount of funding from General Atlantic. While the startup did not disclose the quantum of investment, sources said General Atlantic pumped in $200 million (about Rs 1,420 crore) into the unicorn.

Mumbai-based online home furniture marketplace Pepperfry raised $40 million in Series F funding led by Indian adhesives manufacturing company Pidilite Industries.

Growth-stage deals

Tea cafe chain Chaayos raised $18.5 million led by San Francisco-based Think Investment and also got participation from existing investors including Tiger Global, SAIF Partners, Integrated Capital, and Neeraj Arora, Ex-CBO of Whatsapp.

Furniture rental startup Furlenco raised Rs 16 crore ($2.24 million) in its ongoing Series C round from existing investor Saket Burman, Director of Dabur, via a New Delhi-based family office Chowdry Associates.

Vedantu, one of the leading edtech startups in India, raised $24 million as part of its Series C extension round led by global venture capital firm GGV Capital, along with existing investors.

Delhi-based vernacular social commerce startup Simsim raised $16 million in funding in three rounds within six months of its launch. These rounds have happened in quick succession over the last seven months led by Accel Partners, Shunwei Capital, and Good Capital. 

Early-stage deals

B2B ecommerce platform Udaan made its first investment by infusing Rs 14 crore (or approximately $2 million) in point-of-sale and restaurant management software provider Petpooja.

Bengaluru-based agritech platform Clover raised $5.5 million in Series A funding round from venture capital firms Omnivore, Accel Partners, and Mayfield. 

Brick&Bolt raised $1.5 million in Pre-Series A funding, led by Sequoia India’s rapid scale-up programme Surge, with participation from angel investors like Livspace founders, Aakash Goel of Trifecta Capital, Meghna Agarwal of Indiqube, and Navin Dhanuka of Piramal Fund Management.

Edtech startup Classplus raised $2.5 million in Pre-Series A round of funding from Blume Ventures and Sequoia Capital India’s rapid scale-up programme Surge.

Financial API infrastructure startup M2P Solutions, which owns API platform YAP, raised Rs 10 crore ($1.4 million) as part of its seed funding led by former PayU India CEO Amrish Rau.

HempStreet Medicare Pvt Ltd, which runs a cannabis research-to-retail venture, raised $1 million (about Rs 7.12 crore) in its Pre-Series A funding round.

Triton Investment Advisors, a Mumbai-based venture capital firm, invested in CamCom, an artificial intelligence and deep learning-based startup that is focussed on quality assessment, defect, and damage detection.

Incubator and accelerator Venture Catalysts invested in smart helmet startup, Altor.

Blue-collar recruitment platform WorkIndia raised Rs 42 crore from Chinese tech major Xiaomi.

Info Edge (India) Ltd said it would invest about Rs 37.10 crore in Sunrise Mentors Pvt Ltd, which operates e-learning platform Coding Ninjas.

New Delhi-based student co-living startup, HooLiv raised an undisclosed amount from Kolte-Patil Family Office (KPFO).

Bengaluru-based fitness startup Oga raised $330,000 from Inflection Point Ventures (IP Ventures).

Other deals

San Francisco and Bengaluru-based MoEngage, a B2B startup focussed on the customer engagement space, raised $25 million in Series C round led by Eight Roads Ventures, along with participation from its US-based sister fund F-Prime Capital.

Seattle and Bengaluru-based cloud platform Esper raised $7.6 million in its Series A round led by US-based venture capital firm Madrona Venture Group, which had earlier invested in ecommerce giant Amazon.

US-based Iora Health, a startup focussed on providing primary health care, raised $126 million (nearly Rs 900 crore) in its Series F funding round led by PremjiInvest, the family office of Wipro Ltd Founder-Chairman Azim Premji.

Singapore-based cybersecurity firm CYFIRMA, which has offices in Bengaluru and Tokyo, raised Series A round of funding from Z3Partners, an early-growth private equity fund. 

US and India-based healthtech startup Innovaccer raised $70 million in a Series C funding round from Steadview Capital, Tiger Global, Dragoneer, Westbridge Capital, Mubadala, and M12 (Microsoft’s venture fund), bringing the total capital raised by the firm to $120 million.

(Edited by Suman Singh)