Apna Success Story: Turning Dreams into Reality

Here is the successful story of a platform where you can apply for the job and post your jobs. Yes, I am talking about the Apna success story, which has revolutionized the modern unemployment scenario by helping companies and aspirants.

Searching for a job on the Internet is very easy, as many platforms work as a bridge to give you a good job. However, there are only a few platforms where you can get the full security of your career with zero fraud and miscommunication.

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It is the pioneer in the changing world of professional networking and job platforms, where Apna connects skill holders with companies that require experienced, fresh, and skilled human resources.

The coronavirus pandemic brought millions of job losses to India as most businesses shut shop and sent their workers home. According to news reports in 2022, this country reportedly has about 500 million blue-collar and grey-collar workers; the pertinent issue for the country will be providing substantial job opportunities to such an enormous workforce.

About Apna

Born in the year 2019, Apna has, within almost 21 months after its founding and 15 months after beginning its operations on a full footing, become a unicorn. Founded by erstwhile Apple executive Nirmit Parikh, the valuation has reached $1.1 billion, making it a unicorn after an investment round by Tiger Global Management in 2021.

Apna is a digital hiring platform in India that connects organizations with masses of blue, grey, and entry-level white workers. Job seekers can create a profile on the site to include all their skills, education, and experience to search for jobs, contact the organization, schedule interviews, and get hired.

Employers have access to the platform to post their jobs, interact with specific prospects, arrange interviews, and achieve the successful objective of hiring an employee. Apna has some of the very renowned clientele, which includes BYJU’S, Swiggy, Paytm, Flipkart, Delhivery, Zomato, Licious, and more. The Apna App also has its application feature in Android as well as in iOS.

This is the crowd of 5 crore job seekers that made the Apna platform completely trustworthy in India, using Apna as the preferred site to find promising job opportunities. Spanning over 74 cities and counting on expansion, Apna lives up to the growing job demand as India gears up to work.

Apna Success Story: Founders and Team

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Nirmit Parikh is the founder and the CEO of the company “Apna,” which is known for connecting millions of people to step into the next stage of their careers. The biggest recruiting and vertical professional network for working people in India is Apna. After being a member of Apple’s iPhone product operations team and then becoming Director of New Products/Data Analytics at Intel Corporation, Nirmit established Cruxbot (which was acquired by Kno, Intel Corporation).

Nirmit got his MBA from Stanford University and his bachelor’s from Nirma Institute of Technology in Instrumentation and Control Engineering.

Story of the Apna Startup

Apna was founded by Parikh, who quickly realized a serious misalignment in India’s labour market. Millions had come seeking jobs, but going looking for these unemployed people, employers were left frustrated because of the inability to find ideal candidates due to the extremely poor scaling-up networking infrastructure. To understand the challenges from firsthand experience, Parikh worked undercover in roles like electrician and floor manager. His experience gave him key insights into the issues workers are facing, which led to the creation of Apna.

The goal of Apna is to create a bridge between talent and opportunities. With the help of a multilingual Android application, more than 70 job categories—from carpenters to field sales representatives—are at the user’s disposal to connect, share job leads, and access career resources. The aforementioned categories allow users to connect, share, and access career resources. Besides, the organization offers tools to equip and practice interview techniques for job enhancement as well as plans to develop more specialized courses for peer-taught courses.

Apna has grown rapidly since its launch and conducted more than 20 million interviews for jobs during 2022. The company is creating a user-friendly job market through an increasing understanding of user needs and data resources that can empower employees and direct them to potential employers.

Apna Success Story: Mission and Vision

A mission-centric organization propelling India’s growth: Apna’s aspirations are strong, and it seeks to empower the workforce to enable better professional opportunities between them and the workers. It connects people with employers from different industries and enhances its users’ career prospects.

Business Model of Apna

From the beginning, Apna’s business model has been meant for a mission-supported employee from the formal and informal sectors of India’s economy. Although the venture initially focused on blue-collar jobs, it has been on the course to broaden its services into white-collar domains. Apna simplifies the workers’ job searching process through free professional tools, job leads, and resources that will further enhance their career opportunities.

It is, on the one hand, a model of charges to employers, keeping them in touch with the job openings posted by companies, as well as the possible applicants from an innovative pool at Apna. Thus it is a stepping stone to establish Apna as a very vital bridge end for recruitment but generally promoting much professional and social growth for both companies and seekers.

Revenue Model of Apna

Apna generates revenue through multiple channels within its business model. A key source of income comes from providing technical support services to its holding company, which, in turn, offers platform services to recruiters and job seekers. This mutually beneficial setup allows Apna to earn revenue while ensuring the platform operates smoothly and effectively.

Apna also generates revenue by recruiting applicants through its online web portal and mobile app for job seekers. Apna created an environment where employers can meet qualified candidates and skilled personnel can receive jobs as a result of the most relevant services it provides to both candidates and employers.

Along with this, the organization also varies its revenue by adding interest earned on fixed deposits, active investments, and other supplementary earnings. All these extra sources tend to add towards time-to-time financial stability and growth in Apna.

Funding and Investors of Apna

This company has collected around $193.5 million as funds after completing the five rounds as of November 2023.

Find below the funding details of the Apna company.

Shareholders of Apna

Growth and Revenue of Apna

Apna, an online employment platform for blue-collar, grey-collar, and entry-level white-collar employees, within two years of its launch, achieved a valuation of $1.1 billion. Ironically, it did so while in its pre-revenue stage, or without generating any revenue at that moment.

Find the highlights of the Apna’s growth.

• Almost 5 lakhs of job seekers are in the community.
• The company is accessible from almost 74+ of the countries.
• Apna platform has more than 50 lakhs of jobs as per the website.
• The company has around 500 to 1000 employees, as per the LinkedIn platform.

More than threefold operating income: Rs 180.2 cr in FY23 vs. Rs 63.9 cr in FY22 However, increasing revenues went hand-in-glove with losses that jumped for the startup, reaching Rs 120.3 crore, or 7 percent more than last year’s Rs 112.5 crore. Total expenses increased 73%, from Rs 178.3 crore in FY22 to Rs 308.4 crore in FY23.

Partnerships With Other Companies

The partnership has been made by Apna with some of India’s giants—government and private, such as the Ministry of Minority Affairs, the National Skill Development Corporation, and UNICEF YuWaah—to better the skilling and employment avenues for job seekers.

India’s recruiting platform Apna has now served over 100,000 recruitment officers from esteemed organizations such as BYJU’s, Flipkart, Zomato, Licious, Burger King, Zepto, Rapido, and PharmEasy. The entire job posting in less than five minutes makes connection with potential candidates out there easier for recruiters, which guarantees two-day access to qualified, hyperlocal candidates.

Swiggy

For example, they will announce in April 2023 that Swiggy is going to partner with Apna. This is a collaborative initiative between the two brands to create about 10,000 near opportunities exclusively available under the Instamart quick-commerce grocery delivery service. This is a strategic joint initiative between the two, primarily to augment Swiggy’s work and reinforce the delivery staff in Tier 2 and 3 Indian cities.

Competitors of Apna

Here are some of the top competitors, which are listed below:

• Monster/ Foundit
• Hired
• Indeed
• Naukri
• Zippia
• ZipRecruiter

Future Plans of Apna

It is an online professional networking site with a purpose and mission to level the playing field in the jobs market and to help people connect with the right opportunities. Launching Apna Ascend, their most recent project, the goal is to make these job seekers future-ready in skill development through upskilling 1 million job seekers by the end of 2024. This will incorporate high-quality training with coaching and industry expert sessions to fill up skill gaps for these job seekers to thrive today in this highly competitive job market.

Conclusion

Apna is that platform which rides on its mission of having the largest Indian professional networking site, propounding access to jobs and connecting people to the right opportunities. They have a new initiative called Apna Ascend, which, in fact, aims to create 1 million upskilled job seekers by 2024. It provides excellent courses, guidance, and sessions by industry experts to fill the gap in their skill sets so that they can compete in the job market of today.