Startup news and updates: Daily roundup (November 28, 2023)

Funding

HempStreet raises $1M in pre-Series A round

Ayurvedic cannabis startup HempStreet has raised $1 million in a pre-Series A funding round led by existing investor Carl Waahlin. Andre Rodrigues and a clutch of HNIs from Southeast Asia, along with Abhishek Mohan, Founder and CEO of HempStreet, also participated in the round.

"Having achieved remarkable revenue growth in the past, we anticipate a 100% revenue growth in the current fiscal year," said Mohan in a statement.

Other news

CIEL acquires Aagree Staffing

HRtech firm CIEL Group has entered a definitive agreement to acquire Aagree Staffing Services, marking this as the fourth acquisition the company has made in the last year. "The integration of Aargee Staffing with CIEL Group marks a significant step towards fortifying our Tech Staffing Services to the market and further our IPO plans," said K Pandiarajan, Executive Chairperson of CIEL Group in a statement.

CIEL's workforce is spread across 77 offices at 47 locations in India.

BIRA 91 inducts Manoj Kohli, Bharat Anand as independent board directors

B9 Beverages, the parent company of beer startup Bira91, has appointed two new independent directors to its board—Manoj Kohli and Bharat Anand.

"We are at an important inflection point as a business, and as we continue on our journey of high growth, we would want to ensure that we develop a business that has long-term sustainability, improved risk management and increased quality of corporate governance," said Ankur Jain, Founder and CEO of Bira 91.

Kohli was a former MD of Bharti Airtel and former country head at SoftBank India while Anand is a partner at at Khaitan & Co.

Electronics, lifestyle, beauty products emerge as top sell during festive sales: Study

Assidus Global Inc, an accelerator for D2C platforms, found that electronics, lifestyle, and beauty products emerged as the most sought-after segments during the recent festive shopping. Mobile phones, adaptors, and ear pods emerged as the top-selling products in electronics, while face and body creams emerged as top sellers in the beauty category.

The beauty category grew by 51.51% compared to last year. It was also the top category among young shoppers with a significant 47% sales contribution from the 18-24 years age group. Healthcare and nutrition also witnessed an 86% surge in new shoppers this year, compared to 2022, when it was 26%.

"We have also seen an exponential rise in sales from Tier II and III cities in India. The evolving scenario of ecommerce in India, as revealed by these statistics, presents a landscape teeming with promise and expansion," said Somdutta Singh, Founder and CEO, Assidus Global Inc.

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GoKwik to offer Flipkart's supercoins to shoppers

Ecommerce enablement platform GoKwik is collaborating with Flipkart to market the latter's supercoins to D2C brands on KwikCheckout (GoKwik’s checkout solution). The supercoins will be integrated within KwikCheckout.

"Our goal is to empower customers to derive maximum benefit from SuperCoins, not just within the realm of Flipkart but also in their transactions beyond, while simultaneously fostering growth for our brand and platform partners," said Prabh Singh, Senior Vice President, Customer Growth and Ads, Flipkart.

(This copy will be updated with the latest news throughout the day.)