Joining the league of venture capital firms raising funds to invest in startups, this week, Bangalore-based VC firm Kalaari Capital announced that it has raised $290 Mn India-centric fund. The fund was raised from the same set of institutional investors, who helped Kalaari raise its earlier funds. Besides, the firm has also been aggressively strengthening its advisory team.
Meanwhile, Japan’s Beenos Group announced an investment of $5 Mn into newly launched $60 Mn fund, BEENEXT, to invest in early stage startups across India, Southeast Asia, Japan and the US. The fund aims to back hand-picked entrepreneurs with capital, operational expertise and access to a global network.
Another VC firm, Sequoia Capital India, is in plans to raise about $800 Mn for its fifth India-centric fund. The $800 Mn fund would increase the firm’s asset under-management close to $3 Bn.
This week 15 startups raised about $90 Mn funding altogether. (The funding amount is based on the startups that disclosed their funding amounts).
Let’s have a look at the startups that raised funds this week:
FitMeIn: GHV Accelerator onboarded its fifth startup in the accelerator program. FitMeIn is an online platform that offers monthly multi-studio membership to premium fitness workout destinations in Delhi/NCR. The startup also grabbed seed funding of $100K from GHV.
OnlineTyari: The multilingual test preparation app OnlineTyari secured $753K (INR 5 Cr.) in an angel round of funding from 500 Startups, Tandem Capital, TV Mohandas Pai, Vikram Chachra and Aloke Bajpai. The startup plans to use the funds to strengthen its technology and expansion.
Industrybuying: Online B2B marketplace for industrial material, Industrybuying.com, raised $9 Mn (INR 60 Cr) in Series B round of funding which was led by Kalaari Capital and SAIF Partners. Singapore-based investor fund BEENEXT also participated in the round. The newly raised funds will be used by the company to establish more fulfilment centres for processing orders for its vendors.
Zomato: Online restaurant guide startup, Zomato, raised $60 Mn in a new round of funding led by Temasek Holdings, and existing investors Vy Capital. The funds raised will be used for investing in Zomato’s new businesses, such as online ordering, table reservations, cashless payments, point-of-sale, and the newly launched White-label platform.
YouthKiAwaaz: Community driven online news and views portal, YouthKiAwaaz, raised $599K (INR 4 Cr.) in an angel round from founders of Quintillion Media. The funds will be used to expand its team and business model, while also boosting its technology.
RoomCentral: Real-time hotel booking startup, RoomCentral, raised $2 Mn (INR 12 Cr.) from angel investor Karanpal Singh. The startup offers tools and solutions for seamless reservation and property management to the hotel owners to help them manage different functions.
MockBank: Online test preparation startup MockBank Learning Pvt. Ltd raised $400K seed funding led by Blume Ventures. Besides, Mercatus Capital, Amit Ranjan and Srivatsan Rajan also participated in the round. The funds will be used to strengthen its mobile technology and generate more content.
Report Bee: Dell Foundation backed India Educational Investment Fund (IEIF), invested an undisclosed amount in a cloud-based deep learning portal, Report Bee Edusys Pvt Ltd. The startup will use the funds to accelerate its product development and expand into domestic and international markets.
Guru-G Learning Labs: Dell Foundation backed India Educational Investment Fund (IEIF) invested an undisclosed amount in a gamified platform for teachers, Guru-G Learning Labs (India) Pvt Ltd. The startup will use the capital to expand business in the schools as well as in the publishers market.
Prozo: An online marketplace for buying and selling study material, Prozo, secured $205K (INR 1.37 Cr) seed funding from a group of angel investors including Nalin Jain of GE’s transportation businesses, Shomil Pant of Wockhardt Pharmaceuticals, Dinesh Kundu and other. The startup will use the money to hire talent and enhance marketing spend and mobile app development.
Zapyle: An Instagram like fashion marketplace to discover, sell and buy pre-owned fashion attire startup, Zapyle, raised $1 Mn funding. The startup will use the raised funds for hiring, acquiring users, and marketing. It also plans to partner with international brands, stylists and bloggers to provide more fashion options for its users.
Envoged: A social platform for buying and selling pre-used luxury fashion goods startup, Envoged, raised an undisclosed amount in a seed round from angel investors Ankush Nijhawan, Manish Dhingra and Gaurav Bhatnagar. The platform allows luxury goods owners to easily sell their items that they no longer need.
YatraGenie: Bus ticketing and cab booking platform, YatraGenie services Pvt Ltd, raised an undisclosed amount in Series A round of funding from Ash Bhardwaj, who will also join Yatragenie as a board member. The funds will be used in expanding and increasing market base in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh market.
SrJna: Edutech startup, SrJna, raised $65K from RAIN (Rajasthan Angel Network) and Individual Investors. The startup that uses innovative teaching aids and methodologies for Maths, Science and Social Science learning, is a part of Unitus StartEdu competition. With the newly raised funds the startup plans to bring Hybrid Labs in the classrooms.
CredR: The used vehicles marketplace startup, CredR, raised $15 Mn in Series A round of funding from Eight Roads Venture. The startup will use the funds to hire talent and scale up its marketing and product engineering efforts.
With this, a mobile marketplace for home décor and interior designs, Houzify, plans to raise an undisclosed amount in seed funding from former Infosys CFO TV Mohandas Pai and InMobi co-founder Naveen Tewari.
Rahul Yadav, ex-CEO of Housing, seems to be in the final stage of announcing about his startup. He has garnered funding from some of the top entrepreneurs including Vijay Shekhar Sharma, Flipkart founders Sachin and Binny Bansal and Micromax’s co-founder Rahul Sharma for his new data analytics and visualization startup, whose name is yet to be announced.
Acquisitions That Took Place This Week
- Bangalore-based home design & decor startup LivSpace acquired YoFloor, a mobile platform that offers a virtual trial for home design decisions, for an undisclosed amount. Marking it at its third acquisition of the year, Livspace aims at providing high quality productivity and 3D visualization tools to in-house designers and users.
- An on-demand logistics aggregator for relocation services, Turant Delivery, acquired Zippon for an undisclosed amount. With the acquisition Turant’s presence will be expanded to Bangalore, apart from Delhi and Mumbai.
- Education services company CL Educate acquired 51% stake in another educational startup, Accendere Knowledge Management Services. the acquisition will enable Accendere to tap into over 700 universities in India by leveraging CL Educate’s national reach across 100 cities in India.
Alongside, homegrown ecommerce marketplace, Flipkart is in talks to acquire MapmyIndia, a digital mapping company, to help the marketplace strengthen its logistics and customer analytics. The deal size is estimated to be somewhere between $60 Mn to $75 Mn.
Other Developments Of The Week
- Ratan Tata, Chairman Emeritus of Tata Sons, has joined the advisory board of IDG Ventures India as a Senior Advisor. In his new role he will be advising IDG Ventures India and portfolio entrepreneurs on its overall business strategy and strengthening the organizational leadership.
- Seedstars World crowned Bangalore-based startup, Strike, as a winner for Seedstars World India Challenge hosted in Bangalore last week. It will now compete for the final round at Switzerland in February 2016. Seedstars World is a global seed stage startup competition for emerging markets and fast-growing startup scenes.
- India’s largest mobile conference GMIC announced Silicon Valley and Chennai-based startup, HyperVerge, as the winner of G-Startup. HyperVerge uses deep learning to organize images.
- RIL backed GenNext Innovation Hub in association with Microsoft Ventures announced the list of 10 startups that will be incubated for its “Fall 2015” batch. The startups will explore development of new digital technology in areas such as instant financial transactions, advertising and audio video calls.
