Startup news and updates: Daily roundup (July 24, 2024)

Funding news

UK Department of Health and Social Care’s GAMRIF commit up to £5.1M to C-CAMP 

Centre for Cellular and Molecular Platforms (C-CAMP) received a funding commitment from the UK’s Global AMR Innovation Fund (GAMRIF) of up to £5.1 million over three years. 

The partnership will foster the identification and development of world-class Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR)-focused innovative solutions, especially in low and middle-income countries (LMICs), with local contextual solutions.

“The partnership with GAMRIF provides 360-degree support across the whole value chain of solutions from idea identification to productisation, deployment, and integration of innovation,” said Taslimarif Saiyed, Director-CEO, C-CAMP. 

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Tech-first D2C insurer ACKO acquires health-tech company OneCare

Pneucons raises pre-series funding from Ather Energy’s Tarun Mehta, angel investors

B2B Industrial Marketplace Pneucons received an undisclosed pre-series funding, driven by social media engagement and from angel investors, including Tarun Mehta, Co-founder and CEO of Ather Energy. 

The company plans to use the funds to expand its team and focus on cross-border transactions across major engineering categories like fire safety, pneumatics and hydraulics, industrial automation, plastic and packaging, electric cables and products, and power tools.

"This funding round underscores the critical need for a transactional marketplace tailored for SMEs and MSMEs, particularly those struggling with Udhaari (credit terms) and opaque sourcing and pricing structures. Despite initial hesitations from VCs and investors regarding a cash-based, cross-border marketplace, Twitter played an instrumental role in providing us with market validation," said Co-founder and CEO Pritesh Lakhani. 

The marketplace facilitates transactions in maintenance, repairs, and operations tools in over 42 countries and has organically acquired 7,000 buyers and 70 sellers. 

FAAD Capital invests in agritech startups through AgriManch Accelerator

SEBI-registered Category 1 Angel Fund Faad on Wednesday announced pre-seed investments in Godaam Innovations, VedaFit Foods, Aqin Biotech, and Mkelly Biotech under its AgriManch Accelerator.

These four agritech startups together received $121K through the AgriManch Accelerator. Along with the funding, startups will also receive networking opportunities with stakeholders and expertise in building go-to-market strategies.

Godaam Innovations specialises in providing smart storage solutions, while Aqin Biotech has introduced patented formulations for aquaculture and livestock feed. Mkelly Biotech develops premix powder comprising millets and mushrooms to enrich the nutritional profile of flour and associated products and VedaFit Foods produces healthy and natural products to combat artificial food behaviour.

Other news

Captain Fresh acquires Polish Smoked Salmon Company Koral

Seafood supply chain company Captain Fresh has acquired Koral, a Poland-based salmon products producer and distributor, for an undisclosed amount. 

Captain Fresh signed an agreement with Abris Capital Partners and Boguslaw Kowalski for Koral, which has 26 production lines, processing 120 tonnes of fish daily.

Koral produces smoked salmon products sold in domestic and international markets under the brand name SuperFish. Post-acquisition, management board member Justyna Frankowska will take the role of CEO of Koral. 

"Koral augments our earlier acquisition of France-based Senecrus, adding marquee Polish and German retailer brands to our portfolio of offerings. Koral’s ‘smoked’ format capability complements Senecrus’ ‘cooking’ format capability. We are also thrilled to mark our foray into the salmon value chain, which is one of the largest segments within the seafood industry," said Utham Gowda, Group CEO of Captain Fresh.

Before this, Captain Fresh had acquired CenSea, one of the largest importers of frozen seafood in America, and France-based Senecrus, a company specialising in shrimp cooking and distribution.

The 2020-founded company expects to close the current financial year at a revenue run rate of $650 - $700 million. 

Castler bags in-principle approval from IFSCA for cross-border money transfer services 

Escrow infrastructure service provider Castler received in-principle approval from the International Financial Services Centres Authority (IFSCA) to offer global escrow and cross-border money transfer services.

Castler has established an escrow infrastructure that manages over Rs 10,000 crore in monthly transactions and has partnered with 12 banks to provide a comprehensive suite of services.

The company, founded by Vineet Singh, Ritesh Tiwari, Dinesh Kumar, and Kumar Amit, has raised around $7 million from marquee investors like Capital2B, IIFL, Rainmatter, Flipkart, and others. 

Myntra adds gifting category on the platform

Ecommerce platform Myntra on Wednesday added a gifting category to its marketplace, it said in a statement.  

Under these efforts, the company has onboarded gifting players like Ferns and Petals, IGP, Floweraura, Interflora, and Marriott. The category will feature a wide selection of products from 100+ brands across 50 categories, and aims to amp up its selection to one lakh products by the Rakhi season. Myntra said it witnessed a 1.6X spike in demand in the top gifting categories like watches, perfumes, and gift sets during Rakhi last year.

The company mentioned it will offer same-day and next-day delivery on a wide variety of gifts in 10

cities, with more names to be added soon. 

Gupshup appoints Lorrie Norrington to Board

Cloud-based conversation platform Gupshup on Wednesday appointed Lorrie Norrington to its Board in a bid to bring its experts with experience in scaling internet businesses to the company. 

Norrington is also on the Board of global multinational Colgate-Palmolive and SaaS companies like Hubspot and Asana, among others. 

Norrington currently serves as an Operating Partner at Lead Edge Capital and has previously worked at companies like eBay, Shopping.com, Intuit, and General Electric Company. She was at eBay for 3 years and departed as company’s President of eBay Marketplaces.

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