[Funding alert] Student housing company Your-Space raises $10M in Series A

Student housing company Your-Space has raised $10 million in Series-A funding. The round, a combination of pure equity and convertible debentures, was led by Shantanu Rastogi of General Atlantic, Ajay Gupta’s (Capital Foods) family office AJAX Capital and Holy Basil Consultancy Private Ltd. Manish Choksi’s (Vice Chairman at Asian Paints) family office, Sunidhi Group’s family office, Sanjaya Gupta (former MD & CEO of PNBHFL), amongst others also participated in the round. 

Your-Space was founded in 2016 by Shubha Lal and Nidhi Kumra. The company is currently operational across locations in Delhi, Noida, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Indore, Jalandhar, Bangalore, Gurgaon, Pune, Dehradun, and Jaipur with operations in Hyderabad and Kolkata underway. 

“The funds will help us deepen our presence in a competitive crowded market. It gives us the fire power to continue delivering global service standards at scale," said Co-founder and Chief Operating Officer, Shubha Lal. 

It has more than 7000 operational beds and aims to have more than 20,000 beds by July 2022 for the coming 2022-2023 academic year.

Your-Space will use these funds for growth, focusing on metros and Tier I cities, and to spearhead its operations using a scalable, modular technology platform to improve user experience and assist in building a large student community, it said in a release. 

The company uses technology-based approach for a student-based environment, and has more than 60 smart spaces which have tech-enabled safety features such as facial recognition, biometrics, digital locks. 

The company had recently added CMO, Head of Community and Head - Legal and Compliance to its team.  “Part of the funds will also be used to further strengthen and retain the core team,” Your-Space said in the statement. 

“Our strategy for expansion is to remain focused on being the most preferred student housing brand in India,” added  Nidhi Kumra, Co-founder and CEO. 

The company said the space is  projected to continue to grow to a $25+ billion per annum by 2025.

“This segment is growing and has demonstrated growth every year even during economic downturn,” said Ajay Gupta of Capital Foods. “The Indian student population base is growing consistently. The future of student housing is going to be driven by technology and building a strong community and Your-Space is at the cusp of bringing about this change.”

Shantanu Rastogi, said “There is a significant unmet need for safe, comfortable, convenient and affordable lodging & community spaces for 30M+ migrant undergrad and post-grad students in India. India needs high quality student housing operators to address this large and growing demand alongside high quality universities and institutions.”