This week, startup funding in India saw a dramatic spike to 31 startups raising around $490.32 million. Of the total deals this week, seven were growth-stage deals, and 19 early-stage, while five startups remain undisclosed on the transaction details. This is against the previous week when 21 startups had raised $144.46 million.
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Growth-Stage Highlights
Of the seven growth-stage, startups secured a total of $443.8 million. Quick commerce brand Zepto led the table with a raise of $340 million in a Series F round. Specialty coffee retailer Blue Tokai Coffee raised $35 million; lending firm Yubi, $30 million; agri-inputs platform AGRIM, $17.3 million; post-sales service firm Servify, $10 million; beauty and personal care D2C firm Pilgrim, $9 million; and robotics startup Miko, $2.5 million. Swiggy also raised undisclosed funding from Amitabh Bachchan’s Family Office.
Early-Stage Developments
In the early-stage segment, 19 startups raised $46.52 mn. HouseEazy, a full-stack marketplace for resale homes led the list, followed by conversation intelligence platform Convin, energy storage solutions startup Clean Electric, fintech firm Finarkein Analytics and edtech startup Kreedo. Four startups, including Metaman, Better Nutrition Greenday, BiUP Technologies, and OneMoney did not disclose funding amounts.
City and Segment Insights
Benglauru-based startups dominated the city-wise funding deals with eight transactions, followed by Mumbai, Delhi-NCR, Pune, Hyderabad, Chennai, Dehradun, Jodhpur, and Lucknow. E-commerce and fintech startups topped the segment-wise deals with six each, followed by SaaS, edtech, foodtech, healthtech, proptech, and agritech.
Series-Wise Breakdown
Seed funding deals dominated the series-wise break-up with 11 deals, followed by six Series A, four pre-Series A, three Series C, two Series B, two pre-Seed and one Series F deal.
New Fund Launches
This week, two new funds were announced to back Indian startups. Velocity launched a Rs 400 crore fund to help D2C and e-commerce brands with their festive season requirements, while Whiteboard Capital closed its second fund at Rs 300 crore.
Top Hires
Key recruitments include Sumer Juneja at OYO as non-executive director; Amitesh Jha at Swiggy Instamart as CEO; Dinesh Lodha as Group CEO, Medikabazaar; Dr. Vipul Rastogi at Sukoon Health as Clinical Regional Head; Raj Ahuja as CEO of 3i Infotech among others. Evera and Zalon too hired people at strategic positions.
Mergers and Acquisitions
Large acquisitions included VerSe Innovation acquiring Valueleaf Group, Browserstack acquiring Bird Eats Bug for $20 million, and ANSR acquiring hrEntries. Yudiz Solutions acquired a majority stake in ABCM App Private Limited, and GRM Overseas acquired a 44% stake in Rage Coffee.
Shutdowns
Two major shutdowns included spiritual tech startup My Tirth India that went out of business due to funding issues, while Bharti Airtel shut down its music streaming app Wynk Music.
New Launch and Partnerships
OPEN launched Bharat Billpay for business, Zoho entered the payment space by launching a payment gateway, BharatPe ventured into consumer payments, and CarDekho Group tied up with BiUP Technologies.
In conclusion, Funding to startups saw an increase of 239.42% this week, on the back of two new funds for the ecosystem. Ola Electric announced its products on ONDC, and Zappfresh filed an IPO, hence scaling up the dynamic evolving Indian startup ecosystem.
