[Weekly funding roundup] Investments into startups decline by 57 pc, closes at $107 million

The investments into the Indian startup ecosystem declined by 57 percent in the third week of April when compared to the previous week, to reach $107 million, though it is creditable that funding remained above the $100 million mark in an environment completely subdued due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The funding raised during the week cut across 13 deals with the largest one being $30 million. In the second week of April, Indian startups had raised $248 million.

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During this week, early-stage deals accounted for $19 million cutting across eight deals while the growth stage stood at $50 million with two deals. In the late-stage deals, the total amount raised was $37 million with three deals.

Debt financing continued to remain steady at $50 million with a single deal. The quantum of funds across Series A, B, C, or D, remained almost at the similar level. Though, Series C showed the highest quantum at $30 million.

Highlights of the week

Bengaluru-based online real estate rental startup NoBroker raised $30 million as part of its Series D funding round led by Singapore-based private equity firm General Atlantic. General Atlantic had invested $51 million in NoBroker’s Series C in June 2019 and four months later it participated in another Series D funding round of $50 million led by Tiger Global in the startup.

FarEye, a SaaS-based logistics startup has raised a Series D investment of $25 million led by M12 (Microsoft’s venture fund) with participation from Eight Roads Ventures and Honeywell Ventures. Existing investor SAIF Partners also participated in the round. 

AI chatbot startup Yellow Messenger said it raised $20 million in Series B funding, led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Lightspeed India Partners. The company said it would use the funds to further enhance its product innovation roadmap by deepening multi-lingual voice bot capabilities, expanding enterprise integrations, launching a developer marketplace for virtual assistants, and fast-tracking its research and development operations to meet the surge in global demand for automation.

Other deals

On-demand logistics marketplace Porter has raised Rs 140 crore from Lightstone Global Fund. Founded in 2014 by Pranav Goel, Uttam Digga, and Vikas Choudhary, Mumbai-based Porter is an aggregator of light trucks, which allows businesses to book vehicles on demand to meet their intra-city logistics needs.

Bengaluru-based fintech startup Setu raised $15 million in a Series A financing round led by Falcon Edge and Lightspeed Venture Partners US, along with existing investors Lightspeed India Partners, and Bharat Inclusion Seed Fund. The funding will be used to continue strengthening the startup's team, roll out a suite of new products, and improve its technology infrastructure. Last April, it had raised $3.5 million in a seed round, which was led by Lightspeed India Partners with participation from Bharat Inclusion Seed Fund.

Bengaluru-based fintech lending startup Capital Float has raised $15 million funding from existing investors Ribbit Capital, Amazon, SAIF Partners, and Sequoia Capital India. This $15 million includes the $4.8 million it had raised as a top-up investment from existing investors Amazon Inc and Dinesh J Hinduja. The total equity raised by the fintech startup now stands at $125 million. It has also raised $300 million debt capital.

Wellthy Therapeutics, a digital therapeutics (DTx) company, has raised $4 million from Saama Capital, as part of its pre-Series A round for a 16 percent stake in the company. Apart from utilising the funding to deepen its product-suite and expand geographically, the company will accelerate the launch of its respiratory digital therapeutic portfolio among other new indications.

Chennai-based online financial services marketplace BankBazaar has raised Rs 29 crore as part of its ongoing Series D round from existing investors, including Amazon, Sequoia, and Walden SKT Venture Fund. The funding comes more than two and a half years after the global credit rating agency Experian had led a $30 million financing round into the startup. So far, it has raised a total funding of more than $110 million.

Aavenir, a SaaS-based source-to-pay solutions provider has raised $2 million in seed funding from global venture capital firm Accel. The San Francisco and Ahmedabad-based company plans to use this investment to accelerate the development of its products in the source-to-pay domain and expand the global reach by strengthening sales and marketing operations.

Vogueme Technologies Pvt. Ltd, which operates video meta-tagging platform Toch, has raised $400,000 from Inflection Point Ventures in a pre-Series A funding round. Toch will use the capital to build its technological infrastructure as well as add more people to its team.

Plunes Technologies Pvt. Ltd, a health-tech platform focussed on aggregating doctors and healthcare service providers, has raised $300,000 in a pre-Series A funding round. Gurugram-based Plunes raised the funding from existing and new investors from regions such as Europe and West Asia.

Undisclosed deals

Venture Catalysts, an integrated incubator and accelerator platform, has invested in Delhi-based health supplement startup Power Gummies. Power Gummies had previously raised an investment from DSG Consumer Partners and has now raised an undisclosed amount from Venture Catalysts in an extension of its pre-Series A round of funding. 

Bengaluru-based location analytics startup Locale.ai has raised an undisclosed round of funding led by Better Capital, with participation from notable angels such as Myntra and Nudgespot co-founder Raveen Sastry, and Fusion Charts co-founder Pallav Nadhani in a pre-seed round. 

Healthtech startup Esperer Onco Nutrition (EON) has raised funds from strategic investment and venture builder firm Zenfold Ventures. EON brings in a comprehensive nutritional portfolio to oncology. It plans to expand to the US and European markets and build its talent pool.

Electric vehicle tourism startup BLive has raised an undisclosed amount from Mumbai Angels Network in its Pre-Series A funding round. The startup had raised close to $1 million from a strategic investment by DNA Networks in September 2019, and a seed funding round earlier last year, led by Shrinivas V Dempo, Chairman of Goa’s business house Dempo Group, and Shivanand V Salgaocar, Chairman, Vimson Group.

Bigbasket has raised a debt funding of Rs 379.87 crore from its existing investor and shareholder Alibaba Group. A total of 4,62,500 Series F-2 compulsorily convertible debentures were allotted to Alibaba Group at a face value of Rs 8,213.51 per share.