India & Israel Partner To Strengthen Startup Ecosystem

Two 2's make a 4. This is exactly what India and Israel are gearing up to do for their respective startup industries. Recently India's NASSCOM delegation paid a visit to Israel to discuss about the prospects about strengthening the existing alliances between the two countries and seeking new partnerships.

According to an official statement issued by R Chandrashekhar, NASSCOM President, the key area of discussion during the visit was about forming new partnerships in the sector of innovation, Internet of Things (IoT) and security solutions.

Chandrashekhar strongly believes that there is huge potential if Indian companies partner with their Israeli counterparts and establish an association that is mutually beneficial. "We are looking at collaborative opportunities with innovative companies based out of Israel and possible partnerships that can scale up operations for companies on both sides," he said in a statement.

The Israeli startup industry is known for its strong ecosystem. It has an impressively innovative environment, a unique cultural characteristic and a highly supportive government.

The startup industry in Israel is doing pretty well for itself and is only second to the United States startup industry. Seeing the huge potential that the industry holds, the country has spent 4.2 percent of its GDP on R&D, which is the highest. Further, the country's technology sector is also doing its bit for the country and is contributing a huge 26 percent to its overall GDP.

Israel is home to a wide variety of early-stage startups and established companies ranging from data centers, internet solutions to IT security etc.

The Israeli government is known to granting nearly 80% of its funds to startups which are in their early-stage phase. "The agency running its incubator – which is also assessed by the government – provides about 15 per cent…It will be interesting to know how this model can be incorporated into the Indian startup ecosystem," said Chandrashekhar.

Israel currently considers India as a long-term strategic partner that can enable its companies in having a global reputation.

Talking about the association between both the countries, Chandrashekhar said, “Small tech companies make up the startup landscape of Israel, whose primary model is to develop a niche product and eventually get acquired. Typically scaling up is a challenge for these companies, but we in India don’t have that problem. Thus, the potential both countries offer for each other is tremendous."

India, on the other hand, is also currently scouting for opportunity of a joint R&D project for commercial products in various sectors like healthcare, technology transfer, agriculture, cyber security and engineering solutions.

One Touch Response partners with PolicyBazaar.com to Launch New Safety Plans for Families along with Free Insurance

One Touch Response (OTR), India’s first technology-led on-demand safety and immediate assistance service company today announced a partnership with Policybazaar.com, India’s largest insurance web aggregator to introduce a new Safety Plan for customers, with FREE of cost insurance.

The economically priced Family Safety Plan is priced at just Rs. 2,999/- and includes a 12 month subcription of OTR’s 24X7 on-demand safety & assistance service, along with a personal accident insurance worth Rs. 100,000. In addition to this, the user can avail benefit of emergency services such as tow truck and ambulance worth Rs. 1500 FREE. The Family Safety Plan provides coverage to upto 4 members of a Family who can avail OTR’s on demand 24 X 7 Safety and Assistance services. This plan is available across Delhi NCR.

For a family of four, the annual subscription for the Family Safety Plan works out to just Rs. 2/- per day cheaper than a cup of tea or even the daily newspaper.

Delhi has repeatedly been cited as the most un-safe city for women. Further, when faced with an emergency, which could be a medical one or a breakdown on the road, users do not have a single number to call during their time of distress and can find themselves stressed and therefore able to effectively coordinate between response agencies such as fire services, police and medical services, depending on their emergency. This can result in critical time being lost that can further exaggerate the situation. While several mobile applications exist to deal with individual emergency challenges, they are limited in their applicability as they are not supported by quick action and immediate on-ground response, which differentiates OTR as the only and most comprehensive solution.

Manoj Chandra, CEO, One Touch Response says, “Every other day, citizens find themselves in various distress or emergency situations.During such situations, a quick and professional assistance makes all the difference. Our team at One Touch Response is committed to making cities and communities safe for everyone. Many of our citizens do not have access to personal security or help when they need it the most. Our vision is to help people in their hour of need and to help them coordinate with the police, fire brigade, ambulance or any other service that they require. With the launch of our Family Safety Plan, our aim is to democratise safety and provide on-demand assistance to as many people as possible.

With our partnership with Policybazaar.com, we now bring additional value of insurance from a trusted brand”.

Adding in, Mr.Yashish Dahiya, Co-founder & CEO, Policybazaar.com said, “India has the dubious distinction of leading the charts for road accidents. Such accidents more often than not have serious financial implications for the victim’s family. We are happy to partner with One Touch Response in their quest to bring safety with assurance to consumers. Our intent is to make consumers aware about the importance of financial safety through insurance.”

OTR’s safety and immediate assistance services is accessed via a touch of the button through its app (available on iOS, Microsoft and Windows) or on the phone.

Immediate on-call assistance is available within seconds of a user raising an alarm via the app. While the Incident Managers at the OTR Command & Control Centre are handholding the user during the crisis over the phone, OTR’s on ground physical support teams called Immediate Assistance Team (IATs) are alerted to reach the subscriber within minutes. IAT’s then remain with the user till the emergency is resolved. Depending on the nature of the emergency, OTR coordinates with external agencies such as the police, ambulance, medical services, fire, cab services, mechanics, handymen etc. on behalf of the subscriber. OTR’s extensive database of emergency service providers across locations enables it to address all kinds of emergencies in a swift and responsible manner.

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Silicon Valley Firm Omidyar Network Invests in Scripbox

Scripbox, one of India’s fastest growing investment services, announced today that it has closed a Series B round investment led by the philanthropic investment firm Omidyar Network. The announcement comes at a time when Scripbox is working towards establishing itself as the most trusted brand for savings and investments in mutual funds. Funds raised on this round are aimed to give thrust to Scripbox’s vision of empowering every salaried individual with actionable money skills.

This investment follows series A funding led by Accel Partners last year. Existing investors, including Accel Partners and some angels, have also made additional investments along with Omidyar Network.

Since inception in 2012, Scripbox–a friendly investment service—has been working towards changing the way Indians save and grow their wealth. It has recently been ranked as the second most influential financial services brand worldwide on LinkedIn. With its jargon free, simplified approach to growing wealth, Scripbox has grown its customer presence to 370 cities and towns, across all the states and union territories of India, and increased its customer base 10 fold over the last 18 months.

“As India moves from promoting adoption and usage of financial services to building consumers’ financial health, simplified offerings like Scripbox will become more strategic,” said Anuradha Ramachandran, director, Investments, Omidyar Network. “Scripbox is set to make a fundamental difference to the way Indians save and invest in their future, turning a deep understanding of consumers’ needs into an innovative technology-led platform.”

Commenting on the investment, E R Ashok Kumar, CEO of Scripbox, said, “While we are working on helping young earners on their path to wealth creation, having support from Omidyar Network is a tremendous boost for our efforts. This association also reflects our similar brand philosophies and vision.”

With 160cr in AUM and 70% of customers as first time investors, Scripbox’s goal is to encourage young Indians to develop a long term investing habit.  

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Paytm Spreads its O2O Reach with Same Day Delivery in 20 Cities

Taking its pioneering Online to Offline program steps ahead, Paytm, the mobile commerce and payment platform has announced to offer same day delivery on products in 20 cities. The company has begun with the deliveries with locally based commerce and will further add more categories to it. Currently, the same day delivery is available on large appliances, mobiles and is already active on the platform. Over INR 20 crore worth of orders in a month are shipped the same day to the customers.

Sellers themselves provide the delivery and installation service while Paytm enables them by training on how to manage online customer expectations and experience.

Paytm has over 1.2 lakh sellers on their platform out of which over 3000 are sellers who specialize in shipping large appliances locally. The company is aiming to add 10,000 more sellers in 50 top cities to spread the reach of O2O commerce further.

Sudhanshu Gupta, Vice President - Paytm, said, “Paytm is the pioneer of O2O and with same day delivery and installation managed by sellers being added to the arsenal we are able to cover a critical category of large appliances which cannot be shipped by traditional warehousing models.”

Paytm enables consumers to check whether products are available to from nearby sellers who can ship and service the orders. The consumers have to pay a nominal amount to avail the same day shipping and installation services.

Apaert from this, the company has tied up with Suzuki Motorcycle and will now host a virtual Suzuki Motorcycle showroom on its marketplace through which customers can book the two-wheeler maker’s bike and scooter models.

As part of the partnership between Paytm and Suzuki Motorcycle India, over 400 Suzuki dealers across the country have been on-boarded.

Once users have booked the bike of their choice, Paytm will then direct the users to the closest dealership for registration and collection. Paytm will also enable vehicle financing to provide higher degree of assistance to consumers while buying a Suzuki product.

With the alliance, Paytm expects to see more than 10,000 units sold on the platform within this calendar year.

With current user base of more than 125 million, Paytm is on mission to bring half a billion Indians to main stream of economy using mobile payments, commerce and soon to be launched payment banking services. Consumer brand of India’s leading mobile Internet Company One97 Communications, Paytm is headquartered in New Delhi NCR. The company’s investors include Ant Financials (AliPay), Alibaba Group and SAIF Partners.

Meru Cabs Raises $25M from Brand Capital

Brand Capital, the investment arm of Bennett, Coleman and Co. Ltd (BCCL), has invested $25 million in taxi operator Meru Cab Co. Pvt. Ltd.

The company plans to raise an additional $75 million as part of its $100 million fund-raising plan. In the last round, in March 2015, it raised $50 million from existing investor India Value Fund.

Sixty-seventy per cent of the money will be used for advertising and providing user incentives which would include discounts, loyalty schemes and providing quality service, as per LiveMint report. Also, the firm is looking to have 15-17% of the total market share that will make it a $1 billion company by 2022.

Meru Cabs which was launched in 2007 as an air-conditioned radio cab service, now competes with newer rivals such as Uber and Ola (ANI Technologies Pvt. Ltd) that are backed by deep-pocketed investors. Ola plans to raise $300-400 million and Uber raised a massive $5 billion, with its Indian arm expected to receive a significant part of the money. Uber had pledged to pump $1 billion into India in July last year.

Meru currently operates in 23 cities and has an operational fleet of 20,000 taxis, 5,000 of which are company-owned. And the firm is looking to increase the fleet by 15-20% over the next one year and will own 25% of the inventory. It wants to be present in 45 cities by end of 2018.

India’s organized taxi-hailing market, presently at $1.2 billion, is estimated to reach $15 billion by 2022, presenting an enormous opportunity for growth, According to company estimates. Meru is doing everything to tap into the potential of this large market.

It has launched the carpool and ride-share services last year, along with a cheaper taxi service, Meru Genie.

Meru has about 4.5 million users and are looking to clock Rs.850 crore in revenue in the current financial year. The company also launched a specialized service for differently abled and elderly commuters called Meru Enable, a booking system with Facebook’s Messenger Bot, and a taxi service only for women in Delhi.

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DCMN Buys Kochi’s 1SDK, Quess Corp Gets Rs 180 Cr and Virat Kohli Launches Fitness Startup Stepathlon

India and US-based startup 1SDK has acquired by Berlin-headquartered growth solutions provider DCMN; Quess Corp has raised about Rs 180 crore from 15 anchor Investors in a pre-initial public offer (IPO) share sale; and Cricketer Virat Kohli on Tuesday launched a new fitness venture in a joint venture with Stepathlon Lifestyle.

Berlin Based DCMN Buys Mobile Analytics & Engagement Firm 1SDK

India and US-based startup 1SDK, which offers a SAAS-based platform for advanced mobile attribution analytics capabilities to mobile app developers, has acquired by Berlin-headquartered growth solutions provider DCMN. The financial details of the deal are still undisclosed by both the companies.

Post acquisition, DCMN, which has so far focused on developing its TV attribution technology, to develop a proprietary mobile capability as well as launch new features leveraging the two platforms, as ETTech reported.

Founded by Anil Kutty, 1SDK was incorporated in the United States in 2013 with its team primarily based in Kochi. As part of the acquisition, Kutty will join DCMN as director of mobile products as will his team of developers.

The 1SDK tool works by measuring conversions from mobile advertising campaigns using metrics including retention, engagement and churn (or app uninstalls).

Quess Corp Gets Rs 180 Cr from 15 Anchor Investors

Quess Corp has raised about Rs 180 crore from 15 anchor Investors in a pre-initial public offer (IPO) share sale.

Some of the anchor Investors include Fidelity Investments, Kuwait Investment Authority, ICICI Prudential MF, HDFC MF, Nomura, Harvard Management Co, DSP BlackRock, Wasatch, Pictet, Grandeur Peak among others.

The Bengaluru-based staffing company has allocated 75% for QIBs, 15% for high networth individuals and 10% for retail investors in the IPO, as per ET report.

Virat Kohli Launches Stepathlon to Tackle Fitness Issues Affecting Kids

Cricketer Virat Kohli on Tuesday launched a new fitness venture in a joint venture with Stepathlon Lifestyle.

The venture, called Stepathlon Kids, seeks to tackle fitness issues affecting kids by taking them through to a 30-day pedometer-based virtual race that will help increase awareness on health issues.

The new venture looks to reach 50,000 children in the first year of operations. "We will generate revenues from a combination of sponsorships, partnerships, licensing and merchandising for the medium to long term," said Ravi Krishnan, CEO, Stepathlon Lifestyle.

Last year, Virat Kohli invested around Rs 90 crore in Chisel Fitness, a Bengaluru-based fitness centre which recently announced plans to introduce technology-enabled, gamified workout routines and add 100 more centres in the next two years.

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This Edtech Startup Could Be An 'IIM-For-Online-Education' In India

In the last 2 decades India Inc marched ahead to work with the world’s best, however, the education system in India did not keep pace to produce top quality manpower resources in large numbers. Millions of students joined the workforce but are hitting the glass ceiling for want of apt knowledge and competence. In the developed world working professionals take an academic sabbatical a few years into their working life, however in India because of various reasons at their personal front this is not an option. Distance education was also not an option because of both distance and poor quality.

With millions of working professionals aspiring to compete with their global counterparts, Avagmah was started to meet this opportunity by helping good universities in reaching quality contemporary

THE IDEA

Based out of Bangalore, this startup seems to have all the trademarks of success. Avagmah provides state-of-the-art intuitive Avagmah Technology Platform (ATP) to universities, which is an amalgamation of cloud-based SaaS technology. Avagmah’s technology platform is available on a managed services model, assisting universities with application-based and web technology solutions for delivery of courses. Avagmah offers end-to-end app and mobile app platforms, helping universities manage marketing, student counselling, virtual classroom, student engagement and retention.

They also have the Avagmah app. The app helps a student find his desired course from the desired university amongst the partnered universities, enroll themselves with the universities, get access to the course materials, lectures, recommended books and suggestions, everything on a single device. The application is made keeping the working professionals and their hectic work schedule in mind. Thus it is enabled with features like automated weekly study planner based on the time that the user can devote. The app keeps a track of the portions and assignments completed, and also sends alerts or reminders when a bulk is incomplete or the exams are approaching. The app helps create short notes for the ease of the working professionals as their last minute exam preparation guide. Study groups and discussion forums along with advanced case studies from reputed institutions like MIT facilitate the studies further are other key enablers in reaching quality contemporary education.

MEET THE MAKERS

Karthik is an NIT Kurukshetra alumnus and a serial entrepreneur (edupreneur) too. Karthik is the founder & CEO of Avagmah. Prior to founding Avagmah, he co-founded 24×7 Learning, India’s largest eLearning consulting, technology and implementation company. He also runs an NGO that helps educate and enroll underprivileged children into formal education. Karthik has over 23 years of industry experience and is deeply passionate about the education space.

 

Difference With The Competitors

Avagmah emulates a successful model in the US, leading amongst them being academicpartnerships.com. The only difference is they are operating in a much larger market with costs being dismally low.

In India there are many companies offering short courses catering to immediate enhancement in skills. Avagmah helps the pent up demand of quality education amongst working professionals by helping existing universities use technology to reach out to them. The pent-up hunger to complete a graduation or post graduation is what Avagmah meets.

TARGET MARKET

Avagmah has a two-way benefiting approach. while on one hand, Avagmah helps the universities with an end-to-end solutions with their online education programs, including enrollment, digital marketing, web delivery support through Avagmah Technology Platform (ATP), dissemination of course material, connecting students, etc. On the other hand, Avagmah helps thousands of students access to quality education and earn their graduate or post graduate degrees remotely.

FUNDING

Avagmah recently (March, 2016) received funding from Kris Gopalakrishnan, co-founder and former CEO & MD of Infosys and Atul Nishar, founder of Hexaware and Aptech Computer Education for an undisclosed amount. In the last 18months, Avagmah has raised $5million dollars in investment. Our existing investors also participated in the current round of funding. They include Singapore-based Lionrock Capital, serial entrepreneur and investor K Ganesh, founder and former CEO of TutorVista and Neeraj Bhargava, founder and CEO of Mumbai-based investment firm Zodius Capital.

PLAN OF ACTION

In the last 18 months, they have enrolled 3,651 students. Through our platform, Avagmah offers MBA, BBA courses and other post-graduate degrees like those in finance and human resources. About 52% of those enrolled on the Avagmah platform are from tier 2 & 3 cities.

They have also launched the Avagmah app for the ease of the working professionals to take their courses on the go, keeping the mobility factor in mind. They have around 3000 users of the app, given that it is paid for app, i.e. only students enrolled under Avagmah programs are the end users. They have received great responses from the users.
Avagmah plans to go pan India partnering with the top notch universities in the next 5 years. New courses are in the radar to be introduced in the app.

Samsung To Invest $1.2 Bn In 'Internet of Things' Startups

Samsung Electronics, crowned as the World’s largest manufacturer of consumer electronics, is determined to bring Internet of Things( IoT) to scale and play its part in improving the way people live their lives on Earth.

Showing its dedication towards this mission, Samsung Electronics Vice Chairman & CEO, Dr. Oh-Hyun Kwon, recently unveiled the company's vision for ‘Human-Centered IoT.' The vision charts out a strategy to invest a whopping $1.2 billion on United States based IoT R&D and investments over a period of four years.

The initiative will be spearheaded by Samsung Strategy and Innovation Center, Global Innovation Center and Samsung Research America, part of the company's United States footprint of more than fifteen thousand dedicated employees across the country.

The announcement about Samsung's plan for the IoT sector was made by Vice Chairman Kwon in his address at the Samsung-hosted Internet of Things: Transforming the Future event in Washington, D.C.

“I am excited to show how we are moving IoT to the center of our strategy and am delighted to announce that Samsung is planning to spend $1.2 Billion in U.S.-centered IoT investments and R&D over the next 4 years,” said Kwon in his speech.

He further added, "At Samsung, putting people at the center of everything we do is our highest value. The same must be true for IoT if we want to realize its full transformative power. Today, IoT is changing individual lives – helping people to age in their own homes. But tomorrow, using IoT, we can give the same independence to millions of Americans. We can keep people out of hospitals and nursing homes. As our populations live longer, these benefits and cost savings for society cannot be ignored."

With this investment, Samsung has moved IoT to the center of its strategy, and committed on using connected devices for the collective good of the society.

According to company sources, the company will use the money to focus its attention on IoT applications which have social benefits, such as autonomous vehicles, digital health and smart machines.

This is not Samsung's first foray into the IoT market. It was just last week that the company had acquired Joyent, a U.S. cloud firm, in order to strengthen its hold on its IoT-related software and services. In 2015, the company also unveiled Artik, which is a System on a Chip that connects objects and the computing power behind those objects.

According to Kwon, in order for the IoT market to grow and flourish, there is a dire need for the policy makers to be as open and collaborative as possible, as according to him, sector-specific regulations could inherently fragment the development of the Internet of Things market.

Hello Tax Gets Angel Funding, MySuperBrain Raises Funding from Soniks Consulting and FabHotels Bags $8M

Hello Tax, an app that helps users fill income tax returns easily, has raised an angel round of funding; MySuperBrain, an online talent discovery platform for students, has secured an undisclosed amount; and FabHotels, a tech-enabled hospitality startup formed by former Rocket Internet executives, has raised $8 million in a series A round of funding.

Hello Tax Gets $294k in Angel Funding from Amrapali Aadya MD Sanjeev Sinha

Hello Tax, an app that helps users fill income tax returns easily, has raised an angel round of funding from a high-profile investor. The startup will use this first round of external funding for marketing for the app.

The app, which is operated by Delhi-based iTechFlock Software Pvt Ltd, has raised Rs 2 crore ($294,000) from Sanjeev Sinha, chief managing director at brokerage firm Amrapali Aadya. Amrapali, which was launched in 2004, offers services such as online equity trading, mutual funds and insurance, among others.

Other firms operating in the space include ClearTax, TaxSmile, TaxSpanner and HRBlock. ClearTax has recently raised $12 million in Series-A investment round. The funding round, was led by Ravi Adusumalli of SAIF Partners, will be chiefly utilised by ClearTax to build and launch new products, hire 100+ engineers and build its executive leadership team.

Ed-tech Startup MySuperBrain Raises Angel Funding from Soniks Consulting

MySuperBrain, an online talent discovery platform for students operated by Hyderabad-based Bojja IT Solutions Pvt Ltd, has secured an undisclosed amount in angel funding from tech consultancy firm Soniks Consulting.

The newly raised funding will be used the startup for marketing initiatives and augmenting the technology vertical, as per VCCircle report.

MySuperBrain was founded in 2011 by IIM-Kozhikode alumni Bojja and Yuvaraju Atmakuri, it offers a platform for students to showcase their talent in academics and other activities such as music, dance and painting.

The startup offers students targeted content and interactive learning platforms in the form of games and videos. There is a social networking element, too, where visitors can give feedback on students’ activities. It also offers an activity-based monthly magazine called ‘Exalt’ to encourage students.

Budget Hotel Aggregator FabHotels Raises $8M from Accel Partners, RB Investments, Others

FabHotels, a tech-enabled hospitality startup formed by former Rocket Internet executives, has raised $8 million in a series A round of funding from Accel Partners and RB Investments with participation from Mohandas Pai’s Aarin Capital and Qualcomm Ventures. FabHotels is essentially a branded budget hotel aggregator, but one which claims to be going beyond aggregation and delivering a wholesome hospitality experience to hotel guests.

FabHotels was started in 2014 by Vaibhav Aggarwal and Adarsh Manpuria. In July 2015, the startup raised a seed round of $2.25 million from Accel Partners and Qualcomm Ventures. It plans to use the funds raised for brand building and to expand its network. FabHotels currently has about 65 hotels in its portfolio, spread across 15 plus cities, which translates to around 1,500 rooms. The budget hotel brand is looking to reach 100 hotels by September or about 2,500 rooms. Its hotels usually have a capacity of 25-30 rooms, as per DealStreetAsia report.

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Velvetcase Gets Up to $2M, SSV Invests in Paree and Sixth Sense Ventures Closes Debut Fund at $18M

Online jewellery site Velvetcase.com, has raised $1.5-2 million in a second round of funding; SSV has invested an undisclosed amount in Noida-based sanitary napkin making firm Paree; and Consumer-focused venture capital firm Sixth Sense Ventures has closed its debut fund at Rs 125 crore ($18.34 million).

Velvetcase Bags up to $2M from Uniqorn Ventures Fund, Others

Bodhi Brands Pvt. Ltd , the company that owns and operates online jewellery site Velvetcase.com, has raised $1.5-2 million in a second round of funding, led by Uniqorn Ventures Fund with participation from a group of angel investors like T.V. Mohandas Pai and S. Somasegar through Letsventure (a crowdsourcing platform). Existing investor The Chennai Angels also participated in the round.

The company raised Rs.6 crore in 2014. Mumbai-based Bodhi Brands, founded in 2012 by Kapil Hetamsaria and Runit Shah, aims to use the funds for marketing initiatives, strengthening technology and developing solutions that are seller-centric. “We are looking to acquire or develop technology that will help sellers set up their online stores, track and manage inventory among other things. We may look at other mediums such as print and television advertising as a means to build the brand,” told Hetamsaria to DealStreetAsia.

SSV Invests Undisclosed Amount in Noida-based Sanitary Napkin Firm Paree

SSV has invested an undisclosed amount in Noida-based sanitary napkin making firm Soothe Healthcare Pvt. Ltd which owns a brand called ‘Paree’, with participation from existing investor Saina Nehwal, who has been the brand ambassador for Paree since 2014. Last year in November, she invested an undisclosed amount in the company. According to a Times of India report, the fresh deal amount is around $2 million. SSV’s other five investments include in firms like ETHOS; CrossRoads; GRAB; Weddingz.in and JHS Svendgaard.

Founded in 2012, Soothe Healthcare offers women’s personal hygiene products such as sanitary napkins and diagnostic kits for oncology screening.

Sixth Sense Ventures Closes Debut Fund at $18M

Consumer-focused venture capital firm Sixth Sense Ventures – which has already backed five companies – has closed its debut fund at Rs 125 crore ($18.34 million). Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI), several domestic CEOs and high networth investors participated in the fund besides some limited partners (LPs).

Founded in 2014 by Nikhil Vora, Sixth Sense Ventures is planning to invest in 12 startups from this fund as per the new strategy. Vora has also been an individual investor in several startups. His investment portfolio includes companies like One97 Communications, Kangaroo Kids Education, Vini Cosmetics and Women’s Next Loungeries Ltd. Vora also joins several other top company executives who raised their own funds or are on the road to set up their fund. Last year, Gurpreet, ex-managing director of PE firm Chryscapital, had raised $100 million in his maiden fund, reported DealStreetAsia.

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BlogBeats Secures Pre­ Series A Round from Michigan-US Based Investor

BlogBeats, has launched the first Geo­-Time tagged blogging platform, that will allow users to exchange information about places and interests they encounter in their  daily lives and travels. The company also recently secured an undisclosed pre­-Series A investment from Michigan­-US  based investor.

Founded in late 2014 by Priyank Jain and Lokesh Jain, graduates of Indian Ivys –  ISB & BITS Pilani, and Masters in Technology Management from Indiana-US. The duo re­imagined blogging as a culture introducing the first ever Geo­Time­-tagged feature that will  facilitate writing across generations, time periods, languages, locations, neighbourhoods and  communities.

“At a time when startup funding is slightly on a dip, we are proud to successfully complete this  pre Series A round, which is also strong endorsement of the potential of BlogBeats to transform  how content will be consumed in the future.”  adds Priyank Jain, Founder, BlogBeats.

BlogBeats aims to be a comprehensive content creation and discovery platform that will  encourage the creation of blogs and other forms of content across 200+ categories, all tagged  with a geo­location and time­period to enable enhanced search & discovery and better  interactivity. It helps businesses with location targeting, thereby, reaching the right audience.  Support for multiple Indian languages to facilitate language­agnostic content as well as a B2B  solution to help organizations manage their digital content, is also on the cards, stirring a new  wave of innovation in the technology and digital media industry."

"We're excited to launch a completely new way of blogging and create content for publishers  and newbies alike that will disrupt the existing digital content paradigm ," says Lokesh Jain,  Co­founder, BlogBeats.  

How BlogBeats works:

• Users can create Beats as per their current location by keying in text, comments and  even multi­media content (including images and – shortly – audio and video files).   

• This information could be about restaurants, travel, beaches, the weather, sports,  recommendations, etc, in any particular place in the world.   

• Uniquely, blog entries on BlogBeats will appear based on specific geo­locations and  contextual time­periods.

"Our mission is to revolutionize the world of blogging by vastly improved discoverability combined with ease of creation, through its unique concept of Geo and Time tagged Beats, so that everyone can benefit from it. We want every town and city to come alive with real  expressions and information generated by residents, so that everyone can benefit from it.  ‘Beat' as your heart beats, tag with location and time period and your expressions become instantly discoverable in your neighbourhood," the startup mentioned in a press release.

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Lendingkart Group Raises $32M in Series B Funding from BII, Darrin Capital Management and Existing Investors

Lendingkart Group, India’s leading digital lending platform for SMEs has raised Rs. 205 crores ($32M) in new financing; out of which $ 20 million was raised as equity and $ 12 million as debt. This Series B round was led by Bertelsmann India Investments (BII), with participation from Darrin Capital Management and existing investors – Mayfield India, Saama Capital and India Quotient.

With this new round of funding, the company has raised Rs. 260 crore ($41M) till date. The latest infusion of growth capital will be used by the Lendingkart Group for strengthening its data science capabilities, enhancing its technology platform as well as infrastructure for improved mobile capabilities. Lendingkart Group aims to tap into India’s huge underserved lending market by expanding its footprint further across India. Over the past two years, Lendingkart Group has arranged loans to customers in 135 cities across 22 states, witnessing a 20% month-over-month growth in loan origination.

Founded in 2014, by ex-Banker, ISB Hyderabad alumnus, Harshvardhan Lunia and ex-ISRO scientist, IIM Bangalore alumnus, Mukul Sachan, Lendingkart Group has built a technology platform to service the working capital financing needs of SMEs in India. The company has partnered with leading online marketplaces and various Industry and Trade associations to service the financing needs of both online and offline SMEs.

Harshvardhan Lunia, Co-Founder and CEO, Lendingkart Group said, “Our investors share our vision and have been instrumental in our growth journey. With Bertelsmann onboard, we look forward to leveraging its deep understanding of global financial products as well as Internet Businesses. With Financial Services leaders such as Arvato Financial Solutions as a part of the Group, Bertelsmann has strategic insights of the Fintech space with end to end process knowledge and expertise in digital origination. Bertelsmann brings a fresh perspective on digital distribution and data driven risk assessment which will help us in becoming the leading lending platform for SMEs in India.”

“Customer is at the core of what we do. We believe in providing simple, instant and flexible financing solutions to our borrowers. Using web and smartphones, customers can apply for a loan at their convenience. Our proprietary algorithms use over 2200 variables to assess the applicant’s credit worthiness. With funds being transferred in as less as 24 hours, credit on demand is becoming a reality”, said Lendingkart Group Co-Founder & COO, Mukul Sachan.

Bertelsmann Indian Investments, Managing Director, Pankaj Makkar said, “We are excited to partner with Lendingkart Group to build the next generation lending company in India and we believe lending is a large market which will see a lot of innovation. Lendingkart is a strong example of such innovation where technology and data can provide monetary access to the remote corners of India”

"Lendingkart Group has been very successful in proving that the underbanked SME space is as credit worthy as the over banked enterprise space.” Mayfield Managing Partner, Vikram Godse said.

Ash Lilani, Managing Partner, Saama Capital said, “We have been investors in Lendingkart Group since the seed round and have been extremely pleased at the pace of growth and how quickly it has established itself as the leader in B2B lending to SMEs. The fact that it is one of the few companies that leverages technology to be the true driver for its business has us very excited about the scale and efficiency as it goes to the next phase of growth.”

Avendus Capital was the exclusive financial advisor to this transaction.

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Voler Cars Raises Undisclosed Round of Funding

Voler Cars, one of the leading mobility solutions and fastest growing self-drive car rental companies in the country has raised an undisclosed round for a minority stake in the company led by prominent investors such as the Kanodias, having interests in consumer tech companies & playing an active role as investors in the startup ecosystem along with Amit Banka, leading Investor and entrepreneur.

Voler Cars presently operates its self-drive rentals in New Delhi & Bangalore and is planning to reach 1000 car fleet operations within 12 months. Current fleet includes a range of aspirational cars from mini-hatchback to SUVs to luxury sedans. The company plans to use the money raised in this round for expansion of fleet across multiple cities such as Hyderabad, Mumbai, Pune etc. over the next few months.

Speaking on the announcement, Vikas Parasrampuria, CEO & Founder, Voler Cars said “ W e are pleased to announce funding round and partner with some of the leading business names in the market. At Voler, we believe in steady growth of business by providing it a strong foundation. In the last 7 months of self-drive operations, we have invested significantly in establishing an efficient operating model with a sound technology intervention. This capital funding will enable us in offering more superior yet convenient and safer interface to our consumers."

Punam Kanodia on participation in this funding round said “We are happy to partner with Vikas in his journey to take Voler and the self - drive rental business to newer heights. We are excited about the way the self - drive rental business has shaped up in the last few years. We look forward to growing this sector in India.”

Voler’s unique model of unlimited kilometers and fixed / transparent pricing is widely accepted by the users in Delhi NCR, making the user base in Delhi jump to 15000+ consumers with 50% traffic coming from its new-age android application and iOS applications.

The company has designed its operating model keeping in mind consumers experience and safety. Voler uses world-class technology and safety controls that keeps consumer always connected through real time inputs about the car, speed, location, and several other important parameters.

Voler Cars has emerged as a leading player in the Urban mobility space that includes self-drive business operations. It reaches over 1mn+ people annually across the country and manages over 2,000 vehicles at any given point supported by a trained team of more than 250 people across India. It has synergized its strength in the Indian employee transportation arena by providing solutions to India’s leading multinational IT & ITeS companies with a commitment to become the largest in the sector by 2020. With its Self-drive car rental model it aims so be largest urban mobility solutions provider by 2020.

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Hyderabad Startup Cygni Energy is First To Benefit From 'Start-Up India' Initiative

Narendra Modi and his government have been quite vocal about their support and the potential they see in India's startup industry. This is the reason that the government unveiled its ambitious Start-up India Action Plan in January this year so as to give that desired push to the Indian entrepreneurs and startups.

While many programs and initiatives are launched by the government, it is seldom that we, the public, get to know who were the beneficiaries and to what extent they befitted from the initiative. But, finally, in the case of the Start-up India Action Plan, that's not the case. Cygni Energy, a Hyderabad-based renewable energy has made the cut and emerged as the first startup that will avail the benefits offered by the Modi's government Start-up India Action Plan.

Founded in the year 2015, the startup is currently in the midst of filling a patent under the fast-track mode for its inverter-less solar energy technology invention.

According to information available, about 30 applications were filtered in May from a grand total of 200 applications for consideration by the inter-ministerial board for tax and intellectual property rights related benefits. After a long selection process, Cygni was the one that was able to meet all the required criteria of the board and was selected as the beneficiary.

Venkat Rajaraman, a Stanford graduate, is the brains behind Cygni. It was at IIT, Madras that Rajaraman conceived the idea for the startup. Prior to starting Cygnj, he has worked at Sun Microsystems, US and Portal Player, the company credited with developing the iPod's chip. After having a successful abroad stint, he came back to India in the year 2007 and started working at Su-Kam Power Systems.

According to Rajaraman, Cygni's inverter-less solar power backup will deliver 40 percent savings in energy. While currently the product is catering to the Indian market, it has still managed to create waves in the international market as well. The startup plans to expand its market to North Africa and Southeast Asia by the end of this year.

Answering questions on what differentiates his startup from others, Rajaraman believes that it his company's intellectual property that gives it an upper hand over others.

The startup recently received a private equity investment from Sasken worth Rs. 10 crore . The company plans to utilize the funds in expanding its manufacturing capacity from 36,000 units a year to 1 lakh units by 2016.

Digital Gifting Startup Bouxtie Plans To Enter India

Renato Libric, the genius behind the much famous digital gifting startup Bouxtie, is currently on a 40-day India tour for a mission to narrow down some strategic investors for its star startup and make it reach even greater heights.

Touring some 12 cities across 3 continents in the 40 day period, the San Francisco based startup's founder is looking forward to exploring the thriving markets in the cities and pick up some investors for his startup in the process. Interestingly, two Indian cities, Chennai and Bangalore, have also found a place in Libric's itinerary as he is quite confident that Indian investors will like Bouxtie's concept and see the potential that the digital world holds.

Founded in the year 2013, Bouxtie allows instant delivery of personalised gift cards from a mobile device. According to Libric, through Bouxtie his aim is to send and share love one person, one gift card at a time. According to rumours doing round in the industry, Bouxtie could be launching its services to the Indian market by the end of this year.

[caption id="attachment_106948" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Renato Libric[/caption]

Libric believes that the startup has a golden chance of disrupting a huge $400 billion global market. According to statistics available, the plastic gift card industry is worth a whopping $175 billion as of last year in the US only. The startup has already been successful in fuelling the interest of some of the plastic card companies which are ready to offer them anything in the range of between $75-$120 million. It is also in the midst of talks with Mastercard and VISA.

Consumers can make use of the Bouxtie app for sending thoughtful and meaningful videos and personalised gift cards instantly to their loved ones with the touch of a button. These can then also be shared on various social media platforms. The receiver also has an option of forwarding the gift voucher further to about person. Not only the consumers, the app has been a real boon for the retailers as well as once the fees paid to the middlemen is eliminated, they get real time payment and can easily monetise social media. The retailers are also provided with a platform to market and advertise themselves.

With over 120 international retailers on board, Bouxtie is currently on its way to become the number one global digital gift card solution by spreading to new markets like India, UK, Australia, Hong Kong, Turkey and Singapore by the end of the year.

NASSCOM 10,000 Startups Collaborates With IVYCamp to Build an IoT Centered Entrepreneurship Ecosystem

NASSCOM 10000 StartUps along with IvyCamp, an initiative of IvyCap Ventures has announced a strategic alliance to connect startups, investors, mentors and industry bodies to converge and explore ways of working together to make the right kind of impact and come up with solutions that change the way people live and industries work. The alliance will look at developing strategies and initiatives to bolster the IOT movement in Indian StartUp Ecosystem.

NASSCOM 10000 StartUps has revolutionized the startup ecosystem by bringing together valuable insights from Industry leaders, best in class StartUps providing a window of opportunity to explore what the investors are looking at in a startup before funding. The IvyCamp Platform will connect the industry participants to entrepreneurs for providing guidance on formulating & driving the IOT business. Activities through the year will focus on seeking out, supporting and growing IOT innovations and ventures.

Speaking on the collaboration, Rajat Tandon, Vice President, NASSCOM 10,000 startups said, “India’s digital revolution is at the tip of transformation right now. NASSCOM 10000 has been consistent in creating a sustainable ecosystem for the technology led products. The potential scope of disruptive technologies in India is vast, as they can have a massive economic impact. IOT is one such sector which is gradually gaining popularity. With this collaboration with IvyCamp, we aim to promote an IOT ecosystem, which is vibrant & at the same time innovative, which will help our country attain a leadership role in this field.”

One of the key activities under this partnership will be to host an annual event R-IOT, Rendezvous for the IOT Ecosystem. The first event will be held in Mumbai on the 1^st of July 2016 at the NASSCOM 10K StartUp Warehouse, Navi Mumbai to bring together innovators, mentors, investors and corporates in the IOT space to educate the community on the latest innovations in IOT, challenges that the innovators face today and what is needed from the mentor and investor community. The event will provide an opportunity to the IOT StartUps to demo their products to investors, mentors and corporate partners. Ivycamp will also be hosting an investor education program on financing IOT startups.

Speaking on this occasion, Mr. Vikram Gupta, CEO & Managing Partner - IvyCap Ventures said, “This being an age of Internet Of Things (IOT), the startups today define the momentum of our economy. We are excited to announce the collaboration between NASSCOM 10000 StartUps and IvyCamp.Through this association, we will provide a platform to the budding entrepreneurs to connect with the industry veterans to seek guidance for formulating and driving the IOT innovations and help the ventures grow.”

About IvyCap Ventures

IvyCamp is India’s first unified technology based platform for innovation and entrepreneurship. Its parent – IvyCap Ventures is raising its second fund of Rs 600 crs. IvyCap has raised and deployed Rs 250 crore in its maiden fund last year. Ivycamp has facilitated investments in early stage startups like FT cash, Grabon rent and has connected various startups to industry mentors.

About NASSCOM 10,000 Startups

10,000 Start-ups is an ambitious attempt by NASSCOM to scale up the start-up ecosystem in India by 10x. 10,000 Start-ups aims to enable incubation, funding and support for 10,000 technology start-ups in India over the next ten years. The program’s vision is to foster entrepreneurship, build entrepreneurial capabilities at scale and strengthen early stage support for tech start-ups. The initiative brings together key stakeholders of the ecosystem including start-up incubators, accelerators, angel investors, venture capitalists, start-up support groups, mentors, and technology corporations. Since its launch in April 2013, we’ve done about 600 events in 25 cities of the country which were attended by a whopping 30,000 attendees and received 11,000 Applicants, 1100 Start-ups Shortlists, and 150 Impacts. The program is supported by Google for Entrepreneurs, Microsoft Ventures, Kotak, Amazon Web Services and IBM.

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Wellness Startup Gomalon Bags Undisclosed Amount in Second Round of Seed Funding

Gomalon announced the launch of the most exceptional experience of a Spa at very affordable prices withGoSpa. GoSpa services are available on the Android’s Gomalon App and the website. GoSpa services are available at some of the distinguished locations in Bangalore; GoSpa provides spa services at a pocket friendly price without compromising the luxurious experience of the customer. This is very different from existing aggregator in this space.

Gomalon mobile App is Salons & Spas at your fingertips. From offers to suggestions and beyond, the app is designed to enhance salon and spa experiences. With mobile-exclusive deals, they let customers stay one step ahead with deal alerts and view and manage bookings anytime, anywhere.

GoSpa, an on-demand spa booking service also includes Real Time Slot Management System technology allowing the user to confirm appointment slots in real time. It provides standardized services of a spa at a nominal price of just Rs. 999. The simple three step booking lets the customer get an appointment in less than 30 seconds through web and mobile app. Apart from this, major wallet integrations such as credit card, net banking, PayU, Mobikwik, and PayZapp assist in making hassle free and cashless payments. Convenient rescheduling options and guaranteed refund on misconduct make the service stand out. Through the GoSpa service, the user can also gift a spa to their friends and family. It also provides a rejuvenating experience with hygienic disposables, personal kit of products, toiletries and a farewell kit to bid goodbye that is provided by Gomalon. Set in a perfect ambience, the customer enters into a world of scented bliss and musical trance.

Gomalon had raised 200K in angel investment from few angels so far and the recent round of undisclosed funding is a strategic partnership done by a company which produces essential oils, natural food colours and spice extracts and has their business presence in Asia and Europe. The new investment will be utilized to increase traction via marketing, advancing in technology & acquiring talent.

Anil Kumar, Founder, Gomalon said, “The investment was very important because the company being the pioneer in essential oils will be helping us in providing Oil blends that can give our GoSpa customers a great feel of relaxation and rejuvenation and also will be helping us in developing proprietary products in beauty space which we are working on simultaneously. It will also help us standardize the quality of oils currently being used for spa therapies. In November 2015 Gomalon acquired bookmyspa and we launched our own version of “Deals” for spa/salons in 2016 and grew very rapidly from there.” He further added, “For Gomalon, the biggest opportunity lies in standardising 80% of standalone beauty parlours and spas through their technology, helping maintain brand individuality and giving standardised products to work with our customers through Gomalon Platform. Since our technology and robust business model is in place, we are now aiming to have our presence in 5 countries and 50 cities in the next 3 years and looking for further rounds of investments in the firm.”

GoSpa services are currently operational in 20 areas in Bangalore which includes; Domlur, Cunningham Road, Koramangala 4^th Block, Marathahalli, Koramangala 80ft Road, Banaswadi, Indiranagar, Hebbal, Sanjaynagar, Marathahalli Outer Ring Road, Domlur – Amarjyothi Layout, Kalyan Nagar, Koramangala 6^th Block, Whitefield, Rajajinagar, Jayanagar and Bannerghatta Road. Other locations in the pipeline are Malleswaram & JP Nagar.

GoSpa provides carefully hand-picked Spa partners to ensure quality and hygiene standards. As an online platform & App, that enables booking for consumers, GoSpa clearly ensures that every spa partner they on-board provide a uniform service to all with rigorous training and enhancement. GoSpa endeavour is to tie up with as many spas and salons possible in every area that are strategically spread across the city and maintains good hygiene – this is to ensure that GoSpa is able to direct consumer traffic to their nearest location.

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TapChief Named India's Best Startup at Seedstars Banaglore

Seedstars World, the global seed-stage startup competition for emerging markets and fast-growing startup scenes brought its India round to a successful close during Seedstars Bangalore. The event took place this Saturday in Tech Hub, and 9 selected startups were invited to present their ideas in front of the local jury panel.

The local winner, TapChief, a platform to seek advice from industry experts via phone calls, was selected the best startup in India for its user-friendly solution that has generated a lot of early traction. As a part of the prize, TapChief will be participating at Seedstars Summit, taking place in Switzerland in March 2017, a weeklong training program with the opportunity to meet the other 60 winners, as well as investors and mentors from around the world. Traditionally, the final day of the Summit will be dedicated to pitching in front of audience of 1000 attendees, with the possibility of winning up to the USD 1 million equity investment.

Playlyfe, with its hub of employee engagement products, came second, and Fullonwedding, an end-to-end solution that enables couples to do their wedding planning online, grabbed the last spot in the top 3. The other startups invited to pitch were Cirtru, HipShip, Sportzify, Piki Poll, Trukky and neoEYED.

Seedstars Bangalore also featured an exciting panel, focusing on “Going global - how Indian startups can succeed on the international stage” and discussing the Indian ecosystem and startups from a global perspective. The local Ambassador of Seedstars World, Prateek Khare, from swissnex India organized the event with Seedstars World’s local partner Google. Further support was provided by NUMA, Excubator, Jaaga, BHive, Young Indians and Tech Hub. The event attracted interest from over 130 startups and over 100 attendees.

Continuing on its world tour of startup scenes in emerging markets and fast-growing startup scenes, Seedstars World’s next stop is Sri Lanka at Colombo’s TRACE, to select the best startup in Sri Lanka. Seedstars World is looking for smart startups that solve regional issues and/or develop profitable products for the global market.

Seedstars is a global organisation based in Switzerland with activities in more than 50 countries around the world. Its mission is to impact people's lives in emerging markets through entrepreneurship and technology. The company's goal is to develop and foster startup ecosystems by connecting, building and investing in driven entrepreneurs. Seedstars connects the best entrepreneurs with investors, corporates and media, and helps them to scale to new markets. They build companies by bringing together resources, talents and growth techniques, and eventually, invest in the most promising entrepreneurs. Sharing the values of trust, efficiency and diversity, Seedstars aims to support the whole entrepreneurial ecosystem from entrepreneurs to investors passing through governments and corporates.

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SAIF Partners Invests $1M in Online Emotional Wellness & Counselling Platform YourDOST in Pre-series A Round

SAIF Partners, a leading venture capital firm with over $4B under management, has announced a pre-series A funding deal with YourDOST.  SAIF Partners has invested $1 million into the Bangalore-based venture which offers online counselling and emotional wellness support to users to bolster their mental health. YourDOST has raised a total of $1.2 million in the round with the repeat participation of seven angel investors- Venk Krishnan (NuVentures), Subba rao Telidevara (NuVentures), Phanindra Sama (Redbus), Aprameya (Taxi4Sure), Paula Mariwala (Seedfund), Vibhu Garg (Unicommerce), Gaurav Bhalotia (Flipkart). YourDOST will strategically allocate the funds raised to rope in senior professionals from the industry in key leadership positions, to expand the scope of its operations and to reach out to more people.

Dealing with societal pressure, compulsion to perform and excel at work, family and marital issues, stress of studies, constant lifestyle comparison with the peer group due to over exposure to social media and several other factors have led to severe disturbances in our emotional stability. While the stress is on a constant rise, discussing it openly or dealing with it medically remains a taboo in our country.

This huge need gap and Richa Singh’s personal experience of a friend losing her life at IIT due to placement pressure led to birth of YourDOST to provide people with convenient yet anonymous access to experts consisting of life coaches, psychologists and other experienced individuals. Through this online platform which is available as a free service both through web portal and mobile app, users can choose to get into a live chat, find answers over email or book an appointment with the expert of their choice. It has over 300 experts on its platforms who conduct roughly 800 one-on-one sessions every day. Approximately 4,00,000 people pan-India have already sought guidance and emotional counselling on YourDOST since it went live in 2014.

Mridul Arora, Principal, SAIF Partners, said, “We are impressed by the refreshing approach YourDOST team has adopted to address an increasingly relevant issue of emotional & mental wellbeing. While still in early stages, we believe YourDOST is at the forefront of creating a new space in India which has extremely strong latent demand. With it’s strong focus on quality supply and maintaining user anonymity, YourDOST presents a unique proposition for consumers to overcome the prevailing hesitation associated with openly talking about mental issues. With this investment SAIF continues to identify and nurture businesses, right from seed stage/pre-Series A to beyond ."

Commenting on the partnership with SAIF Partners, Richa Singh, CEO, YourDOST said, “We have spent the last 1.5 years strengthening our product, creating awareness and understanding the needs of users. The entire team is now excited to enter into the next level of our evolution with support from a valuable partner like SAIF which has believed in our work and has invested in us. With the experience of SAIF Partners backing us and the funds we have raised, we are ready to accelerate our growth, expand the team and operations and reach out to more and more people with their emotional wellness coach - YourDOST.”

Incepted in December 2014, YourDOST raised close to $400,000 in seed funding round from a group of well known angel investors. YourDOST was founded in December 2014 by IIT-Guwahati alumnus Richa Singh, along with IIM-Bangalore’s Puneet Manuja, Northeastern University alumnus Satyajeet Nandekar and Prakhar Verma, a computer science graduate from BMSCE, Bengaluru.

YourDOST – addressing the need gap:

Access and awareness towards mental and emotional wellbeing is very restricted in India and comes with several taboos associated with it. Here are some facts highlighting this challenge:

• According to government estimates, 1 in 5 people in India need counselling, either psychological or psychiatric


• For an estimated 70 million+ people living with psychosocial problems and disabilities, there are less than 50 government mental health establishments.


• According to a report by WHO in 2011, 1 out of 7 people in India i.e. 15% of Indian population was suffering from depression in 2015, this has seen an alarming rise with 20% of Indian population being depressed today.


• 50% of corporate India is suffering from chronic stress. In fact as per a survey by ASSOCHAM earlier this year, highlights that the rate of emotional problems such as anxiety and depression has increased by 45-50% among corporate employees in the last eight years.


• According to medical experts, 4 in 5 people suffering from severe mental ailment in India choose not to treat it which causes early death by at least 15-20 years as compared to mentally healthy people

YourDOST is one of its kind online emotional wellness platform to get support from experts consisting of life coaches, psychologists and other experienced individuals. It is available to people via its web platform and also on mobile through its recently launched mobile app on android platform and IOS platform. The startup allows instant access to users to a team of 300+ experts and share their problems through an online interface, be it a live chat or email query or even book one on one interaction with the expert of their choice. The key aspect of this venture is that people are kept completely anonymous throughout the platform.

YourDOST aims to reduce the stigma attached to seeking help for mental wellness in our country and with the use of technology wants to make expert help widely and instantly available to people looking for emotional and mental wellbeing.

Pocket Money, Pokkt's Reward Based App, Gets Acquired by Japanese Mobile Marketing Firm Adways Inc

POKKT, India and South East Asia’s leading rewarded video advertising platform today announced that their incentivized Android app, Pocket Money, has been acquired by Adways Inc, Japan and South East Asia’s leading mobile marketing company. The landmark acquisition follows the launch of the Adways Indian subsidiary - Adways Innovations India Pvt Ltd with Yu Ishida as their Country Manager.

Currently installed by over 6 million users in India, Pocket Money is a reward-based ad platform, which helps app developers to acquire and engage customers in a targeted way. It brings together a colossal rewards-for-engagement platform with the best in-line offers and value exchange in return for a multitude of redemption options. Pocket Money banks on its state of the art a serving platform, steadfast attribution tie-ups, big data and analytics infrastructures to not just ensure a high rate of successful transactions, but also thrives on the grounds of bringing direct and qualitative success to it’s advertisers.

Rohit Sharma, Founder & CEO, POKKT said, “Pocket Money today is amongst the top 5 Apps in the category with huge traction. We have built Pocket Money as a successful and profitable business in less than 18 months. However we want to focus on our core business “POKKT Video Ads”, which is the leading Mobile Video Ad Platform for Games in India & SEA. Adways is a large Global performance Ad Company and the right partner to scale the Pocket Money Business significantly in India.”

Speaking about the acquisition and the establishment of Adways India, Yu Ishida, Country Manager, Adways India, “India is one of the largest smart phone using markets in the world. With more number of smart phone owners, the advertising is also moving from passive attention seeking to engagement driven exercise. Pocket Money is one of India’s leading incentivizing app.  We are excited to enter the country with such a dynamic and young team as Pocket Money. Launching Adways India and acquiring Pocket Money is another step towards consolidating our foothold in the Asian market.”

The latest Adways acquisition and launch of their Indian subsidiary follows India’s incredible growth potential to accelerate the adoption of mobile business. According to a report by Counterpoint Research, India has become the second-largest smartphone market in terms of active unique smartphone users with 220 million users, surpassing the US market, followed by China and expected to reach 700 million by 2020*. Mobile advertising market has also grown by 200% every year since 2013 in proportion to the growth of smartphone penetration.

Adways Innovation India will be committed to help domestic and overseas app developers and publishers expand their business in the best way possible by developing its own media platform and enhancing advertising agency business. Adways Inc is a listed company in Japan.

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Private Equity Veteran Manish Kheterpal Launches $15M Fund to Focus on the Pre-Series A to Series-A Space

Private equity veteran Manish Kheterpal has floated a $15-million early-stage fund, WaterBridge Ventures that will focus on the pre-Series A to Series-A space. The fund is looking to bet on startups utilising technology at their core, and spread across sectors, including consumer focused mobile apps in media and telecom, ed-tech, health tech and fin-tech.

The Sebi-registered, India-domiciled fund, will primarily look to invest between Rs 75 lakh and Rs 3.5 crore in 12-15 ventures, and has a fund life cycle of 5-7 years. While taking about his plans to launch this fund, Manish said, "This is the best time to launch a new fund because the entrepreneurial activity has not come down as the ecosystem is maturing more now, and some froth is coming out."

The fund amount has been largely backed by a number of family offices, high net-worth individuals and companies, however, their names are still undisclosed.

WaterBridge Ventures, which has made its first close at $5 million, is the latest VC fund to be launched in 2016. "It helps that VCs have tightened the tap for later stages of funding, as those help with entrepreneurs driving sharper business plans in earlier stages, valuations are more realistic and conversations are more sensible," Kheterpal added.

Just today, early stage investment firm Blume Ventures has also hit a third close of its second venture capital and expects to complete the fund raising process in July. The firm has made more than 20 investments from the new fund in the last 13 months.

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Blume Ventures’ New Fund Hits 3rd Close and IIFL Looks to Raise $110.5M Realty Debt Fund

Early stage investment firm Blume Ventures has hit a third close of its second venture capital while IIFL AMC Ltd is raising a Rs.750 crore debt fund.

Early Stage Investment Firm Blume Ventures’ New Fund Hits 3rd Close

Early stage investment firm Blume Ventures has hit a third close of its second venture capital and expects to complete the fund raising process in July. The firm has made more than 20 investments from the new fund in the last 13 months. It has invested in startups like RoadRunnr, test prep platform MockBank, IoT-based energy data analytics provider Zenatix Solutions, peer-to-peer money transfer and payments app Chillr, Bangalore-based edtech startup FlipClass, and contacts management app InTouchApp.

Blume made first close in December, when it raised $30 million in a round led by Silicon Valley-based ICONIQ Capital with participation from other investors included IIFL Wealth, the Government’s India Aspiration Fund, administered through SIDBI, Infosys co-founder N R Narayana Murthy’s private investment arm Catamaran, Morgan Creek and Recruit Holdings. The firm hit second close in January, when it raised $10 million from limited partners Kaiser Foundation and Dream Incubator. The third close has come after three months. The firm raised a similar amount as the second close from Unilever Ventures and others. That brings its total corpus to more than $50 million. Blume is targeting $60 million for the second fund.

Founded in 2011, Blume Ventures has invested in over 75 companies. Four of its portfolio companies viz., TaxiForSure, ZipDial, Promptec and 1Click.io were acquired by Ola, Havells, Twitter and FreshDesk, respectively.

IIFL Plans to Raise $110.5M Realty Debt Fund

IIFL AMC Ltd is raising a Rs.750 crore debt fund, which will be India’s first Category III AIF (alternative investment fund) real estate fund to lend Rs.80-100 crore each to selected builders in key property markets developing homes costing Rs.35 lakh to Rs.1 crore.

Category III AIFs are described as those “including hedge funds which trade with a view to make short term returns; which employs diverse or complex trading strategies and may employ leverage including through investment in listed or unlisted derivatives. These funds can be open ended or close ended.”

The fund will lend to both early and late stage projects. However, in an early-stage investment, the fund will mitigate risk through cash flows from developer’s other projects as security or collateral.

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Wings Travels Close to an Acquisition; Also Plans to Raise $15M

After acquiring Bookmycab in March, Pune-based travel and transport firm Wings Travels is now close to acquiring another startup in the staff transportation technology space.

“Discussions and negotiations are already in progress and we should be able to close the same within 60 days as the trials are on,” the company’s Founder Director, Arun Kharat said. The company is also in the process of raising $15 million from global venture capital funds, however, the acquisition will be paid for through its internal accruals.

Wings Travels has appointed BDO India LLP as a consultant to help raise the funds, which will be through promoter stake dilution. The funding deal is likely to be closed in the next few weeks. The amount will be used within 90 days for its overseas setup, advertising, promotion and marketing.

The company has already started operating its rent-a-cab app in Thailand and Myanmar and soon plans to launch its services in Vietnam, Hong Kong, Sri Lanka and Mauritius, where it has acquired regulatory approvals.

Founded in 2001, Wings Travels currently operates in Mumbai, Pune, Gurgaon, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Nagpur, Chandigarh and Ahmedabad, among others. It primarily offered staff transport services to business process outsourcing firms. In March this year, Wings Travels acquired taxi aggregator Bookmycab for an undisclosed amount to help its expand into the radio taxi segment and strengthen its technological capabilities. The combined entity has now been rebranded as Wings Bookmycab, run by Bookmycab's parent Mumbai­-based LiveMinds Technologies Pvt Ltd.

Wings Travels competes with the likes of Meru and Carzonrent. It has several brands including Wings Radio Cabs, Wings Premium and Ultra (luxury cars), Economy, Sakhi (driven by women, for women passengers), Ekab rentals, Bus Pool, Talk of the town, a quarterly magazine, Lanna Wellness, a spa in Pune, Bangalore and Hyderabad and Wings Rainbow, a radio taxi service for the Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender (LGBT) community in Mumbai, which will start operations next year.

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Online Ticket Booking Platform Travelyaari Gets $3M Led By Existing Investor GVFL Ltd

Bangalore-headquartered online ticket booking platform Travelyaari which is owned and operated by Mantis Technologies Pvt Ltd, has raised $3 million in a bridge round of funding led by existing investor GVFL Ltd with participation from some other undisclosed investors. The deal got closed in March, as per DealStreetAsia report.

The company will use the money for its expansion and marketing plans. Around five years ago, GVFL had invested in Travelyaari through its SME Technology Venture Fund.

Travelyaari’s backend system, which is used by more than 1,600 operators for their day-to-day operations, supports annual transaction volume of more than Rs 3,000 crore. Apart from providing online ticketing facility, Mantis Technologies, founded by IIM-Ahmedabad graduates Aurvind Lama and Partha Sinha, also provides technology platforms for bus operators for ticket bookings.

Till date, Travelyaari has raised around Rs 20 crore from Bennett & Coleman and Company Ltd, GVFL and IIM Ahmedabad’s incubator, Centre for Innovation Incubation and Entrepreneurship (CIIE). Founded in 2007, Travelyaari started commercial operations in 2008, provides services through its online products like BusCRS, IamGDS, BusTicketBooking API besides Travelyaari. The firm, which has 200 employees, is looking to triple its headcount. As of December 2015, it had a network of more than 2,100 bus service providers with over 1,43,000 bus options per day on 45,000 routes. Travelyaari is also planning to launch cabs and automobile bookings service.

The company competes with the likes of redBus.in, Paytm and Abhibus.com.

GVFL Ltd, earlier Gujarat Venture Finance Ltd, is also plans to raise its eighth fund of Rs 250 crore. It had received market regulator Securities and Exchange Board of India‘s (SEBI) approval for the new fund in December last tear. GVFL has managed seven venture capital funds since its inception in 1990. It has backed 83 technology and growth stage companies, according to its website. Till date, the VC firm had made around 60 exits.

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Kabadiexpress Gets $148K in Seed Funding and Drivify Secured $50K from Citrus Pay Founder

Delhi-based company, Kabadiexpress which collects waste from door to door, has raised Rs 1 crore ($148k) in seed funding while On-demand driver app Drivify, backed by Mumbai-based startup DR Mobility Solutions Pvt. Ltd, has raised $50,000 (Rs 33.75 lakh) in seed round.

Kabadiexpress Raises $148k in Seed Round of Funding

Delhi-based company, Kabadiexpress which collects waste from door to door, has raised Rs 1 crore ($148k) in seed funding from an affluent individual in the real estate segment. The company which is owned and operated by Green Warriors Pvt. Ltd, will use the money for expanding its presence to Noida, Ghaziabad and other NCR areas (national capital region). Founded in May last year by Kapil Bajaj and Sandeep Sethi, Kabadiexpress collects waste items like old newspapers, magazines, furniture, electronic products and metal objects and sells these to recycling plants and mills. It competes with players like EnCashea, Karma Recycling, Pom Pom and Attero Recycling.

“Passing through a revolutionary phase of new era, we are stepping ahead to save our environment and lead to a healthy and happy living. we help you to manage your waste paper and other scrap effectively and at same time use it for serving a better purpose rather then throwing it away to cause pollution,” the startup mentioned on its website.

On Demand Driver App Drivify Bags $50k in Seed Funding from Citrus Pay Founder

On-demand driver app Drivify, backed by Mumbai-based startup DR Mobility Solutions Pvt. Ltd, has raised $50,000 (Rs 33.75 lakh) in seed funding from Citrus Pay founder Jitendra Gupta and a HNI Pankaj Tripathi. The startup will use the funds to improve and expand the platform, acquire customers and give incentives to drivers, as per VCCircle report.

Drivify was founded in May 2015 by Prasad Shriyan and Jatin Kamdar, lets car owners search and book drivers instantly. The app scans for a driver within a 10 km radius of the user. Users get drivers’ details on the app and can also track the selected driver on a map within the app. They can also pay through the app.

The startup claims to have about 700 registered drivers, out of which 70 drivers are actively involved. The company is currently operational in Mumbai and plans to expand to Delhi, Pune, Bangalore and Hyderabad by the end of this year. It competes with DriveU, DriversKart, Zimmber, Zuver and Driver Bulao, among others.

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Supreme Court To Hear Plea To Ban WhatsApp Next Wednesday

Is WhatsApp the glue holding your conversations with your loved ones far away together? Is it the place where you have managed to keep in touch with your long-last school, college buddies? Well, if that's the case. Then, here's a heartbreaking news for you.

Next Wednesday i.e. 29th June would see the Indian Supreme Court hearing a petition seeking a ban on the popular messaging app, WhatsApp.

Sudhir Yadav, a 27 years old Haryana-based right-to-information (RTI) activist, has filed a petition seeking a ban on the messaging app on the argument that the platform's end-to-end encryption is providing terrorists an easy way of communication that is impossible for the government agencies to intercept. Thus, posing a massive threat to India's and the world's safety on the whole.

The petition filed states that from April this year, WhatsApp has started enabling every message sent and received on its platform with 256-bit encryption that is impossible for even the government security agencies to break into. Adding to this is the woe that even if under some special circumstances the government asks WhatsApp to break through an individual's message on the platform and hand over its contents to the government, it won't be able to produce the same as even it does not have the decryption keys.

According to Sudhir, this gives a leverage to the terrorists to use the popular messaging platform to plan and plot their inhuman and unlawful activities secretly, without coming under the government's scanner.

The petition filed also carries the name of some other popular messaging platforms such as Viber, Hike, Secure Chat and a few others, who also according to Sudhir are making use of high encryption and possess a threat to the country's security.

Yadav's PIL also mentions that in order to decrypt a WhatsApp message one needs a 115,792,089,237,316,195,423,570,985,008,687,907,853,269,984,665,640,564,039,457,584,007,913,129,639,935 key combinations, which becomes a far-fetched task for even a super computer. According to him, a single 256-bit encrypted message would end up taking hundreds of years to decrypt because of WhatsApp encryption policy.

What is going to be WhatsApp's fate is something we will have to wait and watch till next Wednesday. Keep watching this space for more updates on the issue.

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TA Associates in Talks to Buy Stake in Fashion Brand W

Private equity investor TA Associates Management Lp is in talks to acquire a minority stake of about 30-35% in TCNS Clothing Co. Pvt. Ltd, which owns the ‘W’ brand of clothing for women. Existing investor Matrix Partners India selling its almost 20% stake and promoters 10-15% to raise fresh capital for funding expansion as well as four-five other private equity investors are also in the running to purchase the stake, as per LiveMint report.

TCNS is seeking a valuation of Rs.3,000 crore. The company is in talks to raise around $100 million to fund its growth plans and provide an exit to Matrix. Matrix has invested about Rs.100 crore in TCNS since 2011.

Besides W, sold by around 200 exclusive brand outlets, TCNS Clothing sells other brands such as Aurelia, through 90 stores, and Wishful, across the country. W contributes about 70% of the company’s revenue while ethnic brand Aurelia and premium brand Wishful contribute the rest. W competes with brands such as Chemistry and Biba.

The new funding will be used by the company to expand into new markets and increase the number of outlets in India, said the first person.

Founded in 1968, TA Associates has invested about $17 billion in 460 companies across the globe. In India, it has invested in payment platform BillDesk, diagnostic chain Dr Lal PathLabs Ltd, mobile handset-maker Micromax Informatics Ltd and RateGain IT Solutions Pvt. Ltd, a price recommendation engine for hotels.

TCNS Clothing was founded by Onkar Singh Pasricha and Arvinder Singh Pasricha, who have been in the textiles and clothing business since 1972. As per a report published by consulting firm Technopak Advisors, the size of the Indian apparel market stood at $41 billion in 2014 and is expected to grow at an annual rate of 9% over the coming decade. Womenswear is a $15.5 billion category and accounts for 38% of the overall apparel and textile market in India.

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Kstart Invests in Cloud Security Startup ParaBlu

Kstart, a unique seed program by India’s leading VC firm Kalaari Capital, has invested $500,000 in ParaBlu, a cloud security startup.

ParaBlu, founded by Anand Prahlad and Ananda Rao Ladi, provides intelligent Cloud Access Security Broker (CASB) enabled Cloud Security solutions for Enterprises enabling them to store business assets safely on the cloud.

Focused on preserving privacy, security and confidentiality of data, ParaBlu’s technology is pre-integrated with a range of cloud data management applications they’ve developed, which are designed to protect data that flows out of a company’s networks into the public cloud, thereby enabling easy adoption for enterprises.

“We’re very pleased to be a part of Kstart”, said Anand Prahlad, President & CEO, ParaBlu. “ParaBlu was founded with the singular vision of being the security vendor of choice for all enterprise data outside the firewall.  The promise of that is already evident in our customer wins so far, and the investment from Kstart will help accelerate the realization of that vision.  The experience and mentorship the Kstart team brings with them are without doubt among the best in the industry, and we’re excited to be able to take advantage of it,” added Prahlad who previously was MD & Head of McAfee’s India Center.

“Our solutions enable enterprises to become less dependent on in-house storage and adopt cloud with confidence. The association with Kstart will help us in expanding our product portfolio for global markets and I feel very excited about it” says Ananda Rao Ladi, EVP of Engineering and Support and ParaBlu.

“ParaBlu has a very strong team with deep understanding of the cloud security space. As cloud usage continues to increase within enterprises, there is tremendous opportunity ahead for ParaBlu’s unique product” says Vani Kola, MD, Kalaari Capital.

Kstart, a Kalaari Capital initiative, is a unique seed program designed to empower next generation startups and accelerate disruptive ideas to become market-leading companies. Its singular focus is to enable visionary founders to build game-changing businesses by combining all key factors necessary for startup success.

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After More Than 2 Yrs of Announcement Centre Finally Okays Rs 10K Cr Fund for Startups

In the 2014 Union Budget of India, finance minister Arun Jaitley announced Rs 10,000 crore startup fund for new businesses and startups in India however since then whole of the startup industry was puzzled that where exactly does this money go and how can Indian entrepreneurs benefit from it?, and after more than two years of the announcement nobody even know where and how this fund has been utilized so far.

Surprisingly, Modi government on Wednesday filled the Indian startup industry with cheer as it sanctioned the much awaited Rs 10,000 crore 'Fund of Funds for Startups'. The fund is one of the steps taken by the Central government towards boosting self-employment in the country — a move that is part of a larger initiative, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pet project ‘Startup India Action Plan’, which he unveiled himself in the month of January this year.

Still a riddle, question arise as how come a fund announced in 2014 took more than two years of time to get sanctioned and now as a next step how much time would it take to get implemented on grass root level as its sanctioning itself took more than a couple of years.

According to an official statement issued by the government, the fund sanctioned is expected to generate employment opportunities for 18 lakh Indians and that too on full deployment. Further, the government is quite hopeful that this dedicated corpus of Rs 10,000 crore could potentially be the nucleus for catalysing Rs 60,000 crore of equity investment and twice as much debt investment.

The fund was given a green flag after a decision was made for the same in a recent Union Cabinet meeting which was chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself.

"The Cabinet has approved the establishment of 'Fund of Funds for Startups' (FFS) at Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI) for contribution to various Alternative Investment Funds (AIF), registered with SEBI which would extend funding support to startups," said the official statement.

The statement issued also mentioned that the Fund has been built up over the 14th and 15th cycles of the Finance Commission. This has been done in order to provide startup enterprises with a funding source that is much for stable, reliable and predictable.

According to information available with us, the Modi government is committed to its this mission and has already approved and sanctioned a sum of Rs 500 crore for the project in the financial year 2015-16 and earmarked Rs 600 crore for the current financial year i.e. 2016-17.

In order to keep a check on the project's progress, the government is also making provisions to grant assistance through gross budgetary Support by Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP), which will then review and monitor the project's performance in alignment with the central government's 'Start up India Action Plan'.

According to initial reactions of industry experts, this move by the central government can be of much help to Indian startups which have to face several hardships such as limitations of the conventional bank finance, information asymmetry, lack of hand holding support from agencies that are credible and limited availability of domestic risk capital.

India Funding : Uolo Gets Seed Funding; Drishti Bags Funding from Nandan Nilekani; Schedulers Logistics Closes Series B Round & More

Student education tracking app Uolo has raised $210,000 (around Rs 1.4 crore) in seed funding; Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani has invested an undisclosed amount in Bangalore-based Drishti; micro finance company Annapurna has raised Rs 35 crore equity infusion; education and skill development firm, Rise India has acquired a majority stake in tutor aggregator Padhopadhao.com; Gujarat-based venture fund, GVFL Ltd has invested Rs 40 crore in Schedulers Logistics India Pvt Ltd. and Mobikon has acquired MassBlurb, an automated online marketing platform for restaurants.

Student Education Tracking App Uolo Raises Seed Funding from Purvi Ventures

Uolo Technology Pvt. Ltd. backed student education tracking app Uolo has raised $210,000 (around Rs 1.4 crore) in seed funding. The funding was led by Purvi Ventures, Sunstone Business School director Rajul Garg and Vipin Arora, compensation director-Asia Pacific of Honeywell India.

Other investors who participated in this round include Exponentially I Mobility LLP and Artieca Family Trust. Six individuals also participated in the funding round. The deal was closed in February this year, as reported by VCCircle.

The funds will be used by the firm to upgrade the tech infrastructure, and on-board more schools.

Drishti Secures Funding from Billionaire Nandan Nilekani

Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani has invested an undisclosed amount in Bangalore-based Drishti, an eye care chain focused on providing affordable treatment in underserved markets.

With this new funding, Drishti will expand its reach to six more districts in Karnataka in the next phase of expansion, as per ETTech report. The latest funding in Drishti will mark the ninth venture that has been backed by Nilekani, who has actively invested in early-stage startups in the recent months.

Micro Finance Company Annapurna Raises Rs 35 Cr from Oikocredit

Bhuvaneshwar based micro finance company Annapurna has raised Rs 35 crore equity infusion from Netherlands based equity financing company Oikocredit, as per ET report.

Annapurna operates across 10 states in India and provides financial support to low income groups to help improve their standard of living. Its client base comprises more than 0.7 million borrowers with assets under management of approximately Rs 950 crore as on March 2016.

Gurgaon Based Rise India Buys Majority Stake in Padhopadhao.com

Gurgaon-based an education and skill development firm, Rise India has acquired a majority stake in tutor aggregator Padhopadhao.com as it aims to establish its presence in the online tuition market.

Rise India has acquired 60% stake in Padhopadhao.com, as per VCCircle report.

Financial details of the deal are still undisclosed by both the companies.

The acquisition will help the portal expand operations to cities such as Mumbai, Jaipur, Chennai, Chandigarh, Bangalore and Hyderabad.

Schedulers Logistics Raises Series B Round from Gujrat Venture Fund GVFL

Gujarat-based venture fund, GVFL Ltd has invested Rs 40 crore in Mumbai based integrated cold chain operator Schedulers Logistics India Pvt Ltd. Schedulers operates a fleet of reefer vehicles and temperature controlled warehouses across India. The transaction marks the second round of growth financing for GVFL's first exposure in the logistics sector.

"The funding will help Schedulers to get on an exponential growth curve by getting aggressive in capacity additions and furthering pan India presence including Gujarat by augmenting reefer fleet as well as cold storage capacity" said Arvind Gangoly, Co-founder & CEO, Schedulers.

Mobikon Acquires Automated Online Marketing Platform MassBlurb

Marketing Platform for the F&B industry, Mobikon, has acquired MassBlurb, an automated online marketing platform for restaurants.

As part of the acquisition, founders of Mumbai-based MassBlurb, Sanket Shah and Pankit Chheda will be taking up key roles at Mobikon. While Sanket will be managing the key accounts and partnerships across the company, Pankit will work closely with Mobikon’s CTO for new product initiatives. MassBlurb’s team will also join Mobikon as a result of this acquisition.

Mumbai-based MassBlurb is currently working with 200+ premium restaurant brands across India, automates everything a restaurant needs in the social space. It is present in 6 other cities across India.

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FarEye Raises $3.5M in Series A Funding Round from Saif Partners

FarEye, India’s leading Logistics Management Software, today announced it has just completed its Series A round of funding and has raised $3.5 million (20 crores INR) as growth funds from Saif Partners known for supporting visionary entrepreneurs across the globe.

The funds raised are purely growth funds and this amount will be used for business expansion to other territories. FarEye wants to capitalize on their logistics management expertise and help enterprises across the globe streamline their logistics. FarEye is  a productivity tool for enterprises as well as the workforce - FarEye has a strong road-map of product enhancement for next 12 months and adding new features regularly. They plan to integrate with IoT platforms & drones to enable automated delivery.

Commenting on the company’s vision, Mr. Kushal Nahata, Co-founder said “We are profitable B2B startup and believe in organic growth. Our vision is to create a global technology company which stays for decades. We might take time to understand but would like to build things to last long. We are in the path of  revolutionizing the entire delivery mechanism by creating the largest virtual network of delivery workforce across regions. Plagued by operational inefficiencies and high costs, the $60,000 billion logistics industry provides a huge opportunity to FarEye. We are here to streamline logistics in all the industry verticals.”

Established in 2013 by Kushal Nahata, Gaurav Srivastava and Gautam Kumar, FarEye was launched with an aim to solve the complicated last mile delivery issues on a mobile platform. The aim of FarEye was to solve the critical problems faced by any business - real time coordination between employees on the go, job execution and customer requests; by moving operations on a mobile. Through FarEye’s automation software companies can schedule & dispatch jobs, monitor execution and analyze performance; all in real time – making enterprises more effective and streamlined. With this FarEye helps companies in selling the experience and not just the product.

With successful use cases for Warehousing, First Mile Pick-Up, Milk Runs, On-demand/Hyperlocal solution, Last Mile Delivery and Reverse pick-ups (90-min & non-time bound) FarEye has become the trusted end-to-end mobility solution for logistics & supply chain leaders. On an average FarEye has been able to increase first time successful job attempts by 22% and save 2.3 man –hours per employee per day.

Mr. Gautam Kumar, Co-Founder, FarEye further adds "We don’t believe ‘one solution fits all’ mantra – we believe that each client has unique requirements and should be provided with a tailor – made solution to address critical operational challenges. In today’s digital age where brand loyalty is redundant, we ensure that our customers deliver on-time commitment and provide exemplary services to their end customer.”

According to the Mr. Gaurav Srivastava, CTO & Co-Founder “It is a known fact that logistics is both- the key to success and cause for failure. We understood that logistics segment required streamlining and restructuring to cater to the ever-growing e-commerce segment in India. Having foresight at that time, we decided to focus on logistics management with technology rather than logistics infrastructure. Business growth in the logistics sector would directly relate to improved service delivery and customer satisfaction across businesses.”

FarEye is headquartered in New Delhi and is trusted by over 75 clients ranging from the exclusive e-commerce solution providers like Ecom express, Gojavas, Holisol etc to the traditional behemoths like DTDC, Blue Dart, Safe Express, Bajaj Capital, Hitachi etc.  Globally FarEye has been able to leave its mark by optimizing and automating logistics operations for companies like Zalora, ACommerce, Sephora, MarkaVIP etc in South East Asia and Middle East. Currently, it has a team of 30 and they plan to expand the team for sales, delivery & product and would reach a number of 60 in next few months.

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