Zerodha, Zoho founders' wealth soars while BYJU's, Paytm's ranking take a hit: Hurun India Rich List
The wealth of Zerodha's Kamath Family increased by 51 percent and Zoho's Radha Vembu saw a rise of 93 percent. While Byju Raveendran's wealth is up by 19 percent, the family's ranking took a 15 percent hit.
According to Hurun India Rich List 2021 released today, 's Radha Vembu saw her wealth soar by 93 percent to reach Rs 23,100 crore, beating Rakesh Jhunjhunwala and family, as well as Anand Mahindra. This coincides with the growth in the SaaS ecosystem, with Chennai becoming the sector's hub.
Bootstrapped fintech platform 's Kamath Family's wealth increased by 51 percent to reach Rs 25,600 crore.
The pandemic has been a major accelerator for both Zerodha and Zoho as at-home consumers started exploring the stock markets to grow their wealth. Many companies, which were not technologically enabled, also rushed to digitise themselves.
Zerodha, run by , reached $1 billion valuation, attaining the coveted unicorn status, and Chennai-founded SaaS player Freshworks got listed on NASDAQ only about a week ago.
"Indian startup ecosystem is on a wealth creation spree. India added three unicorns a month over the last year, to take the total number of billion-dollar startups to 53 and 82. Crucially, investor exit paths for successful Indian startups are maturing, through both the public markets (eg Zomato) and private sales (eg Flipkart and media.net)," said Anas Rahman Junaid, MD and Chief Researcher, Hurun India, said in a statement.
While startups are seeing a major funding boom when it comes to wealth creation, the sector did not top the list, unlike last year.
Pharmaceuticals ruled when it came to creating wealth, featuring 130 individuals on the list, followed by 98 from the chemical and petrochemical sector, and 81 entrepreneurs from software as a service (SaaS) sector.
The edtech sector also had a pretty tremendous year, with Gaurav Munjal's , Ronnie Screwvala-led , and Mumbai-based Eruditas entering the unicorn club. Byju Raveendran and family's wealth also increased by 19 percent to reach Rs 24,300 crore. The family witnessed a 15 percent drop in their ranking standing at 67.
's Vijay Shekhar Sharma's ranking saw a 43 percent drop, reaching the rank of 87, and the founder's wealth also took a 18 percent hit, reaching Rs 18,900 crore.
However, the list indicated that the Indian startup ecosystem is at its peak. The kind of investments happening in startups operating in fintech, business-to-business, edtech, healthtech, and direct-to-consumer sectors is extremely high.
“If you have an idea that genuinely addresses an Indian problem and are willing to hustle, this is the time to start-up. If you have idle money in your bank accounts, this is the time to allocate a proportion of it to Indian startups! Indian startup ecosystem is on a wealth creation spree," Anas adds.
Edited by Kanishk Singh