Egreens sets up Rs 15Cr fund for early-stage agritech startups

Delhi-based agritech-focussed investment firm Egreens on Wednesday announced that it has set up a Rs 15 crore agritech fund for early-stage startups in India.

 Egreens will focus on those agritech startups, which use innovative technologies and disruptive business models across the entire value chain of food production, storage, and transportation, the company said in a statement.

Egreens aims to focus on startups with innovative market linkages, the use of AI and machine learning (ML) in farming practices, and IoT (Internet of Things) implementation across the supply chain, the statement added.

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The company has already invested Rs 15 crore in its own venture — VegEase — which sells fruits and vegetables with its cart-at-home model.

Since its inception in January 2021, VegEase has achieved a turnover of Rs 70 lakh, with a customer base of over 15,000 in the Delhi-NCR region. In fact, the venture onboarded 5,000 customers in April 2021 alone.

The company also claims to have achieved a return rate of 0.25 percent of unwanted produce as against the industry average of 2-3 percent. VegEase will use the fresh infusion of funds to diversify into the B2B space.

Mayank Chaurasia, Founder and CEO, Egreens, said, “The agricultural supply chain in India is very fragmented, with last-mile delivery being almost missing. Therefore, it offers a tremendous opportunity to identify and invest in the right startup, which is trying to solve this problem."

 Egreens is looking to invest in startups that will eventually create forward and backward integration with VegEase.

"While VegEase is present in the B2C segment, we want to increase our footing in the B2B and B2B2C segments in diverse markets," he added.

CFO Arpit Katta said, "For Egreens, investment-driven on consumer insights is a process of keeping growth on the track effectively and surely."