As the Indian startup ecosystem mourns the demise of Ratan Tata, chairman emeritus of Tata Sons, many of his angel investments and early bets have come into the limelight.

From backing Ola and Ola Electric in the early days to investing in listed giants such as Paytm, Tracxn, FirstCry and others — Tata was celebrated as a visionary investor.

With over 40 startups in his portfolio — personal as well as through his family office and venture fund — Tata influenced the course of startups across different sectors, from ecommerce to mobility to consumer services and fintech startups.

Calling himself an accidental investor, he once said, “If the founder has passion and innovation, he needs to be supported. I am more intuitive than a numbers person and I also recognise that not all investments are going to be positive, some may fail and some may have problems for different reasons, but that is life.”

Besides investing in new-age ventures over the past 12 years, Tata served as an advisor and mentor for numerous other startups and even funds such as Kalaari Capital.

With his support and guidance many of these startups have not just turned successful, but also gone through the trials and tribulations to reach unicorn status and the stock exchanges. Let’s dive into some of the prominent brands of the Indian startup ecosystem, backed by Ratan Naval Tata.

A Peek Into Ratan Tata’s Portfolio

The list below is not a ranking of any kind. The startups have been listed in alphabetical order.

Ampere 

Besides Ola Electric, Tata’s big bet in the EV sector was on Ampere, In fact, it was one of the first automobile startups to secure investment from Tata when he invested about INR 3 Cr in Ampere in his personal capacity in 2015. 

Later in 2018, the industrialist took an exit and is believed to have earned more than twice his investment. Tata’s nous in his investments is evident from the fact that he scored several such big exits across many of his portfolio companies. 

Atlan 

Tata was always early on the opportunity and has looked to back platforms and companies that have the potential to create long-term impact. And that’s the case with data collaboration platform Atlan 

Founded by Prukalpa Sankar and Varun Banka, Atlan allows data teams to work in collaborative workspaces to build applications and other internal products. 

In May this year, data democratisation platform raised $105 Mn in its Series C funding round, co-led by Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund GIC and Meritech Capital. The company is valued at close to $750 Mn in 2024 and is among the profitable startups in Tata’s portfolio. 

BlueStone

The ecommerce sector saw the most investments from Tata in a personal capacity and through his two investment vehicles. He backed omnichannel jewellery brand BlueStone in 2014, at a time when ecommerce was just taking roots in India.

From those early days, Tata saw the company reach the IPO stage in 2024. The company completed an INR 900 Cr funding round, pushing its valuation to $970 Mn. BlueStone’s operating revenue surpassed INR 1000 Cr mark in FY24 and it’s eyeing an IPO next year. 

CarDekho 

Auto marketplace CarDekho’s parent entity bagged an undisclosed amount of funding from Ratan Tata in 2015. This investment is said to be his fourth bet in the Indian startup space after Snapdeal, BlueStone and UrbanLadder.

Founded by Amit Jain and Anurag Jain in 2008, CarDekho is eyeing $500 Mn IPO next year. In 2021, the company entered the unicorn club after raising $200 Mn in an equity Series E round and $50 Mn in debt.

CashKaro

When it comes to the fintech sector, Paytm is the biggest name in Tata’s portfolio, but he also backed cashback and coupons platform CashKaro in 2016, at a time when no one was sure of where the business model would head. 

This was just three years after the startup’s inception and the beginning of the UPI revolution which has lifted all fintech boats. It is pertinent to note that Ratan Tata was also on the advisory board of Kalaari Capital, a key investor in CashKaro. 

Founded by Swati Bhargava and Rohan Bhargava, CashKaro’s consolidated operating revenue, is said to have jumped over 20% to cross the INR 300 Cr mark in FY24, thanks to its foray into aggregating and recommending credit cards and other financial products. 

Curefit

The healthtech unicorn secured an investment of $3 Mn from Ratan Tata’s RNT Capital in 2017, and a few years later, Curefit raised $75 Mn from Tata Digital. 

Founded by Mukesh Bansal and Ankit Nagori in 2016, CureFit runs physical fitness platform Cult.fit, mental health platform MindFit, primary care vertical Care.fit, among others. The company entered the unicorn club in 2021, after a $145 Mn funding round led by Zomato and South Park Commons.

FirstCry

FirstCry was one of the first vertical marketplaces to really take off in India. The company rightly identified that shopping for kids is much different than shopping for products on Amazon and Fipkart. 

In 2016, Tata acquired a 0.02% stake in FirstCry for INR 66 lakh in the company to buy 77,900 equity shares for INR 84.72 per share, as per disclosures in FirstCry’s IPO filings. 

Even though this was six years into the company’s journey, Tata came in at the right time. Incidentally, Tata sold these shares in the IPO for INR 5 Cr, netting a staggering 660% return on his investment. 

GOQii

Founded in 2014 by Abhishek Sharma, Champ Alreja, Sachin Janghel and Vishal Gondal, fitness startup GOQii was one of the pioneers in India’s healthtech ecosystem.

Tata invested in GOQii 2016, and saw the healthtech opportunity much earlier than many noted venture capital funds. Since then the company has raised multiple rounds and has created a hybrid fitness platform built around smartwatches and expert training. 

Innoviti

The digital payment solutions provider attracted Tata and Tata Sons attention thanks to its business model of empowering retailers. 

Titan Industries picked up a 5% stake in the Bengaluru-based startup in 2007. Then, in 2014, it raised INR 10 Cr funding from Tata Capital and others. 

The company was established by Amrita Malik and Rajeev Agrawal, and develops payments processing, credit distribution, and payments management software solutions. 

Moglix 

Along with ecommerce marketplaces, Tata also brought his mentorship and early stage advice to B2B marketplace Moglix in 2016, just a year after inception. The company went on to become a unicorn in 2021, at the peak of the Indian startup funding spree. 

The ecommerce platform caters to merchants and businesses looking to procure industrial tools and equipment. It pushes supply chain efficiencies in business purchasing.

Ola

In 2015, Ratan Tata invested an undisclosed amount of funding in ride railing startup Ola, picking up a minority stake in the company. Later in 2017, Tata’s VC firm RNT Capital participated in Ola’s Series I funding round, in which the company raised a total of $104.4 Mn (INR 670 Cr). 

Founded by Ankit Bhati, Bhavish Aggarwal and  Pranay Jivrajka in 2010, Ola offers a wide range of mobility solutions with vehicles across bikes, auto-rickshaws, metered taxis, and cabs. 

Ola Electric 

The story, as told by Bhavish Aggarwal on Twitter (X) after Tata’s passing, is that the Ola investor and mentor once invited Aggarwal to Chennai to demonstrate his personal electric vehicle project built on the Tata Nano platform. 

Aggarwal later claimed that this was one of the forces that compelled him to launch Ola Electric. He invested in the EV business in May 2019 as part of the company’s Series A round. 

Ola Electric is part of the cluster of startups in Tata’s portfolio that have hit the public markets, though. RNT Associates, Tata’s VC firm invested INR 14 Cr in Ola Electric soon after its inception. The firm sold its stake in the IPO and netted 10.2X returns on its initial investment.

Paytm 

Fintech major Paytm was one of the key startups in which Tata invested in the early days. It was a personal investment in 2015 where he picked up a small stake. Besides this, he took on the role of an advisor to Paytm at the same time. 

Founded by Vijay Shekhar Sharma in 2000, Paytm offers payment solutions to merchants and customers such as online payment gateway, QR payments, card payments. With its listing in 2021, Paytm grabbed the limelight as it was the first fintech major to hit the public markets. 

Snapdeal

Tata was a big believer in the ecommerce story of India. He backed some of the earliest vertical and horizontal marketplaces, and Snapdeal is counted as one of his first investments in the Indian startup ecosystem. 

In 2014, Tata invested an undisclosed amount of funding in the Gurugram-based ecommerce giant, which went on to become a unicorn and then saw a swing in fortunes. Nevertheless, the startup founded by Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal in 2010, has persevered. For instance, Snapdeal’s acquisition and scaling up of Unicommerce led to the company’s public listing in 2024. 

The company managed to narrow down its net loss by 44.7% to INR 282.2 Cr in FY23 from INR 510.3 Cr in the prior year.

Tracxn 

Another of the listed companies in Tata’s portfolio, Tracxn went to the public markets in 2022. Six years before this, Tata led a funding round for the Bengaluru-based market intelligence platform. Like many of his deals as an angel, the size of the deal and his stake were not disclosed at the time. 

Founded by Abhishek Goyal and Neha Singh in 2013, Tracxn is a market research and data platform that tracks company financials and captables of entities worldwide. The company posted an 84.6% jump in its profit after tax to INR 1.27 Cr in the June quarter (Q1) of FY25 from INR 68.93 Lakh in the year-ago quarter.

Upstox

Just days before his demise, reports indicated that Tata took a partial exit from discount broking platform Upstox with 10X returns after the startup concluded a buyback of 5% of equity. 

Tata registered a 23,000% return on the original investment made in 2016, based on the startup’s last valuation of $3.5 Bn, the startup said. Tata acquired a 1.33% stake in Upstox when he invested in the startup in 2016.

Urban Company 

It’s a testament to Tata’s vision that he identified many of the startups that have become the flag bearers of the Indian startup ecosystem. 

Take for instance, Urban Company, which was founded in 2014, by Abhiraj Bahl, Raghav Chandra and Varun Khaitan, where Tata invested after just one year of operations. At the time the company was called Urban Clap, and was also backed by Snapdeal founders Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal, two entrepreneurs who were also in Tata’s portfolio. 

Recounting his contribution to the startup, Urban Company said that it is “fortunate to have Mr. Ratan Naval Tata as one of our investors and backers”.

Urban Ladder

Way back in 2014, well before ecommerce had taken roots in India, Tata invested in furniture marketplace Urban Ladder. In 2020, Reliance Retail bought 96% stake in Urban Ladder in an INR 182.12 Cr deal.

Incidentally, Urban Ladder founder Rajiv Srivasta once said, “You can see that he [Ratan Tata] is very active in the ecommerce industry in India with multiple other investments and he follows our company even closer because he has a big passion for furniture being an architect himself.”

This quote is an indication of Tata’s penchant for backing startups in areas that he is personally invested in. Other examples that stand out are Ola Electric.

The post Ratan Tata’s Portfolio: 18 Startups That Highlight His Investment Acumen appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Gaming publisher Deftouch has secured an undisclosed amount of funding in a round co-led by KRAFTON, T-accelerate Capital and existing investor Lumikai. The round also saw participation from existing backers Visceral Capital and Play Venture. 

The Bengaluru-based startup plans to deploy the capital to scale up its existing portfolio of games (King Of Cricket), develop new games and hire new talent. 

Deftouch cofounder and CEO Ninad Bhagwat told Inc42 that the startup will also utilise the funds to experiment with new features and build “bold concepts” going forward. 

“We love to experiment with bold concepts. Even though we are building a cricket game right now, we like to experiment a lot with features that might unlock certain monetisation schemes and so on,” Bhagwat said.

Founded by Bhagwat and Keshav Sunder in 2017, Deftouch (previously All Star Games) is a mobile-game developer that primarily focusses on the sports category. It claims to have around 2 Lakh daily users. The startup claims that its ‘King of Cricket’ game racked up 10 Mn downloads in 2024.

Deftouch’s portfolio also includes games like Cricket Star, RCB Cricket and All Star Cricket.

It counts Kalaari Capital and angel investor Arun Venkatachalam among its early investors. In 2021, it bagged $1.5 Mn from Lumikai and Play Ventures.

On the latest funding round, Bhagwat said, “We are super excited to have on board KRAFTON India, T-Accelerate Capital and Visceral Capital. Their extensive industry knowledge and experience will help take us to our next milestones. We are also proud that Lumikai Fund and Play Ventures have shown continued support in this round, they have played an important role in our traction so far.” 

He added that the startup plans to raise its Series A round by the end of next year. 

The development comes close on the heels of KRAFTON India recently expanding the first cohort of its gaming incubator with the addition of two new startups – Dunali Games and Arjuna Studios. 

Last year, KRAFTON also committed to invest $150 Mn in Indian gaming and entertainment startups over the next two to three years. The South-Korean gaming major is also mulling establishing a research and development (R&D) facility in India by 2026.

The post Exclusive: Deftouch Bags Funding From KRAFTON, Others To Build Mobile Games appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Dental care startup Dezy (erstwhile Smiles.ai) has raised an additional $6 Mn (around INR 50.3 Cr) funding from existing investors, Alpha Wave and Chiratae Ventures, with Peak XV’s Surge joining the cap table.

As per the company, the fresh fundraise is a part of its ongoing $8 -$10 Mn round. 

It plans to deploy the fresh proceeds to expand its clinic network to cities like Bengaluru and Hyderabad.

Founded by Hitesh Kakrani and Jatin Kakrani in 2019, Dezy offers dental care products and services to its customers with its proprietary technology platform and onboarded healthcare professionals. 

It also facilitates patients with services like online consultation, dental walk-ins and dentist at-home options. 

Currently, the startup has around 22 offline clinics in seven cities, including Bengaluru, Delhi NCR, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Indore, Chennai and Pune. 

In 2022, Dezy raised $23 Mn (INR 171 Cr)  in a Series A funding round led by Alpha Wave Incubation, along with participation from Peak XV Partners, Chiratae Ventures, MBX Capital and Wami Capital. 

This development comes at a time when India’s healthtech sector has seen some key investments lately.

For instance, Delhi NCR-based Redcliffe Labs recently raised $42 Mn in its Series C funding round led by the Danish Investment Fund for Developing Countries (IFU). 

Healthtech startup 4baseCare also secured $6 Mn in its Series A funding round led by Yali Capital for ramping up its product offerings focused on building genomics and digital health solutions. 

During the same month, Online healthcare service provider Visit Health secured more than INR 250 Cr to expand its business operations, including partnership with technology service provider for healthcare professionals TatvaCare.

On the contrary, as per Inc42’s report, healthtech startups raised a little over $7 Bn between 2014 and H1 2024 in 886 deals. 

The sector saw a steep jump during the pandemic when fundings surged 4.8X from $456 Mn in 2020 to $2.19 Bn in 2021. Post the pandemic boom, funding numbers dipped by 19% CAGR every year between 2022-H1 2024.

However, with the rise in recent investments, the healthtech space might see a reboot. For context, cumulative funding secured by healthtech startups jumped 2.8X to $460 Mn in the first half (H1) of 2024 from $120 Mn raised in H1 2023. 

The post Dezy Nets Additional $6 Mn To Expand Its Dental Care Play appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Electric vehicle charging and critical power solutions provider Exicom has bought Murarrie-based DC fast charger maker Tritium for $37 Mn (around INR 310 Cr) to expand its global footprint and boost adoption of EV infrastructure.

Exicom said that the buyout will help fuel its research and development to drive innovation in the EV space and serve different use cases globally. 

It is pertinent to note that the acquisition includes Tritium’s manufacturing facility in Tennessee, US, as well as its engineering centre in Brisbane in Australia.

The company made this announcement in August without disclosing the deal size back then.

Currently, Exicom claims to offer EV charging and energy storage solutions across 15 countries, majorly in Africa, Middle East and Asia. 

“Exicom and Tritium have a complementary sales and product footprint and have each  established leadership in their respective regions. We look forward to working with Tritium’s  employees, customers, partners and other stakeholders to grow the business further and provide faster, more reliable charging experiences to EV users across the globe,” said Exicom’s chief executive officer Anant Nahata.

Founded in 2001, Tritium designs and manufactures patented hardware and software to create DC fast chargers for electric vehicles. The Australia-headquartered company claims to have sold more than 13,000 chargers across 47 countries. 

On the other hand, founded in 1994, Exicom is a Gurugram-based company offering solutions in critical power and EV charging along with providing sustainable energy storage solutions by leveraging advanced lithium-ion technology.

It is pertinent to note that, in March, Exicom turned into a publicly listed company on the National Stock Exchange (NSE).

The development comes at a time when the central government is actively working on expanding EV adoption in the country.

Last month, the Centre launched PM Electric Drive Revolution in Innovative Vehicle Enhancement (PM E-DRIVE) Scheme which will have an outlay of INR 10,900 Cr for a period of two years. The scheme will replace the FAME scheme.

Under this initiative, the government is looking to deploy 72,300 public charging stations via allocation of INR 2,000 Cr. Out of this, 48,400 charging stations will be devoted to two and three-wheelers and 18,000 for EV buses.

The post Exicom Buys Australia’s Fast Charger Maker Tritium For $37 Mn appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Days after announcing the INR 10,900 Cr PM E-DRIVE scheme to boost EV adoption, the Centre is reportedly mulling to provide subsidies for setting up two and three-wheeler charging stations.

Under this initiative, the government is looking to deploy 72,300 public charging stations via allocation of INR 2,000 Cr. Out of this, 48,400 charging stations will be devoted to two and three-wheelers and 18,000 for EV buses, ET reported, citing sources close to the matter.

The Centre claims that up to 80% of back-end infrastructure development cost will be subsidised under the PM E-DRIVE scheme. Besides the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), Indian Railways and state governments will also be involved in the scheme.

It is pertinent to note that currently, there are around 12,000 EV charging stations in the country, which are predominantly catering to cars.

The PM E-DRIVE scheme, which will effectively replace the FAME scheme, will have an outlay of INR 10,900 Cr for a period of two years, which is higher than the INR 10,000 Cr initial outlay of the FAME- II scheme.  

The scheme was implemented from October 1 till March 31, 2026. 

With respect to this, the government will provide subsidies and demand incentives worth INR 3,679 Cr for electric two-wheelers (E2Ws), three-wheelers (E3Ws), ambulances, trucks and other emerging EVs. With this, the government aims to support 24.79 Lakh E2Ws, 3.16 Lakh E3Ws, and 14,028 ebuses.

Under the scheme, the Ministry of Heavy Industries (MHI) will launch e-vouchers for EV buyers to avail demand incentives. 

On the manufacturing end, the Centre is likely to have a phased manufacturing programme (PMP) to support local manufacturing of EV components.

As per a public notification,  the PM E-DRIVE initiative will include the number of vehicles and the expenditure made under the erstwhile electric mobility promotion scheme (EMPS) 2024.

Furthermore, the notification stated that INR 1,772 Cr, including EMPS 2024 outlay, will be utilised to subsidise electric two-wheelers between FY25 and FY26. It also noted financial incentives for electric two-wheelers will be capped at INR 10,000 per vehicle in FY25 and would then be halved to INR 5,000 per vehicle from 2025-26.

Another INR 902 Cr under the scheme will go towards offering sops for electric three-wheelers (including e-rickshaws, e-carts and L5 vehicles). Besides, INR 500 Cr each has been earmarked for electric ambulances as well as etrucks and other emerging categories.

The post PM E-DRIVE Push: Centre Mulls New Chart To Subsidise Charging Units For Two & Three Wheelers appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Fintech startup RING (erstwhile Kissht) has elevated its data and analytics head Neha Shivran to the position of cofounder as well as chief data and growth officer.

Shivran took to her LinkedIn post to make the announcement. “I’m happy to share that I’m starting a new position as cofounder and chief  data and growth officer at Kissht!” she said.

Shivran joined the company as the head of data science in 2019. Prior to this, she served as the director of risk and analytics at Singapore-based fintech company LenddoEFL. Besides, she also worked as an associate vice president at TransUnion CIBIL Limited.

Founded by Krishnan Vishwanathan and Ranvir Singh in 2015, RING enables credit for consumers to make purchases at digital points of sale (both online and offline). Its plug and play gateway APIs are integrated into any merchant checkout page or retail point of sale to provide quick loans.

The company also leverages machine learning and artificial intelligence to evaluate customer’s credit worthiness, calculate credit score and offer pre approved loans.

This appointment comes months after RING raised a debt funding of INR 100 Cr (about $12 Mn) from venture financing platform Trifecta Capital, to expand its loan book.

However, this is not the first time that Trifecta Capital is placing its bets on RING.

Back in 2022, the VC firm co-led an INR 100 Cr funding round along with Northern Arc in the company. This round was intended to help RING in expanding its scale of operations, enhancing its product offerings including credit cards for small businesses/shops and to leverage AI and ML in its operations.

Later that year, the startup also raised $80 Mn in a funding round led by Vertex Growth and Brunei Investment Agency to enter the buy now, pay later (BNPL) card segment. At that time, the startup was valued at $500 Mn.

Today, the company claims to have assets under management (AUM) of INR 3,000 Cr and served 1 Cr borrowers in FY24.

The post Trifecta-Backed RING Elevates Neha Shivran To Cofounder appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Seed stage-focused VC firm Titan Capital has rolled out Indicorns, a new index to track leading Indian startups which achieved profitability and crossed INR 100 Cr revenue mark within 15 years of its inception.  

Unlike “unicorns” which focus on the valuation of a company, this index focuses on long-term sustainability, profitability and startup’s contributions to India’s innovation landscape, said the VC firm in a statement.

“This list goes beyond valuations and highlights what truly matters—building enduring businesses that can stand the test of time,” said Titan Capital’s cofounder Kunal Bahl.

As of FY23, the VC firm has recognised 186 Indian startups, including OfBusiness, Zerodha and Mamaearth among others as Indicorns. These Indicorns have generated a cumulative revenue of INR 1.06 Lakh Cr and a collective profits of INR 8.6K Cr.

Bengaluru takes a lead in this index with 48 Indicorns, followed by Delhi and Mumbai with 46 and 45 startups, respectively. 

It is pertinent to note that Titan Capital sourced all the data from Tracxn, a market intelligence platform offering data and insights about several organisations.

Founded by Snapdeal cofounders Bahl and Rohit Bansal in 2015, Titan Capital counts Mamaearth, Ola, Razorpay, Urban Company, Shadowfax, OfBusiness, Credgenics, Giva, Invideo among its key portfolio companies.

The VC firm claims to have backed more than 250 startups based in India and the US across sectors including consumer internet, AI, SaaS, fintech and logistics.

The development comes at a time when last month, Titan Capital raised INR 200 Cr as a part of its Titan Capital Winners Fund to exclusively invest in follow-on rounds of breakout startups from its seed portfolio. 

Along with its investments, Titan Capital is known for its bumper returns when exiting from any startup.

For instance, the VC firm recently exited hyper local service startup Urban Company with INR 111 Cr, 195X of their INR 57 Lakh investment in 2015. 

Last year, when Mamaearth’s parent company Honasa Consumers made its public market debut, Titan saw returns of nearly 101X on their initial investment in the startup.

The post Titan Capital Unveils Index To Track Indian Firms Hitting Profitability Within 15 Years Of Starting Up appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Continuing its spree of new launches, SaaS unicorn Zoho has launched two new offerings – Vikra and Zoho IoT.

While Vikra is a seller app that will facilitate onboarding of businesses on the state-backed Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC), Zoho IoT is a low-code platform that will allow companies to build and deploy custom IoT (Internet of Things) solutions.

In a statement on Wednesday (September 25), the company said that Vikra will offer a seller app on the government-backed ONDC and facilitate businesses with easy onboarding, setting up stores and making product catalogues on the network. 

Besides, it will also offer personalised solutions for managing operations, reconciling payment settlement from the ONDC network, and resolving customer disputes.

Built on Zoho’s finance and operations platform, the company said that Vikra can also be integrated with its other applications such as Zoho Books, Zoho Inventory and Zoho Commerce. The Chennai-based SaaS major said that users will be charged a seller app fee of 1% of the total transaction amount on every sale as part of its introductory offer.

“Vikra represents the kind of innovation that supports ONDC’s mission to make ecommerce accessible to all. By integrating such advanced solutions from Zoho, we are not just simplifying technology for businesses, we are also opening doors to a vast, inclusive digital economy,” said ONDC’s managing director and chief CEO T Koshy.

Meanwhile, the second new product Zoho IoT will allow customers to collect and manage IoT device data in real time, and leverage this information to gather insights and streamline operational analysis. 

“The platform’s (Zoho IoT’s) AI capabilities transform data into actionable insights, predict system outages, identify anomalies or forecast trends, optimise operations, and enhance customer experiences,” said a statement from Zoho. 

Zoho IoT will be chargeable at plans starting INR 2,940 for up to 25 devices and INR 29,940 for up to 500 devices. 

The launches come at a time when the Chennai-based company has been on a launch spree lately. Earlier in the day, CEO and founder Sridhar Vembu said that Zoho has applied for permissions to launch a semiconductor venture, adding that the matter was currently being evaluated by the authorities. 

Work on multiple aspects, like finalising the technology and various partners, is currently underway, he told reporters, adding that it is “too premature” to talk about details including the final location for the project.

Earlier this year, Zoho also rolled out a host of product offerings for its global enterprise customers, including revamped ‘Zoho CRM for Everyone’ to boost customer growth and improve their experience.

In February, the company rolled out Zakya, a new business division for retail business in India to offer a point-of-sale (PoS) solution for retail stores to streamline their day-to-day operations.

Zoho reported a 30% jump in its operating revenue to INR 8,703.6 Cr in the financial year 2022-23 (FY23) from INR 6,710.7 Cr in FY22. Meanwhile, net profit rose 3% to INR 2,836 Cr during the year under review as against INR 2,749 Cr in the previous fiscal year.

The post Zoho Joins ONDC With Seller App Vikra, Launches Low-Code Platform Zoho IoT appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Fintech startup Cashfree Payments has roped in former PhonePe executive Nitin Pulyani as its product head and senior vice president (SVP).

In his new role, Pulyani will be responsible for product development and innovation along with developing strategic growth initiatives for Cashfree, the company said in a statement. 

Prior to that, Pulyani served as the product leader at Mumbai-based fintech startup Jupiter. He also worked as the director of product management at PhonePe from 2018-2022.

Pulyani brings over two decades of experience in product development and management. His portfolio also includes companies like NeoGrowth and Ola.

“As the Indian digital economy continues to expand, I see tremendous potential to leverage Cashfree’s years of research and innovation in the fintech space to drive growth and scalability for businesses,” said Pulyani.

The development comes at the heart of Cashfree appointing former Razorpay’s SVP Harsh Gupta as the chief revenue officer (CRO).

As per the release, these appointments align with Cashfree’s market expansion strategy.

Founded by Akash Sinha and Reeju Datta in 2015, Cashfree operates a full-stack digital payments solution platform. It claims to assist more than 6 Lakh businesses with payment collections, vendor payouts, instant loan disbursements and e-commerce refunds.

Cashfree counts companies like Cred, BigBasket, Zomato, Ixigo, Acko, Zoomcar, and Delhivery among its key customers.

In July, the Bengaluru-based company became the first entity to receive the Payment Aggregator Cross Border (PA-CB) licence, after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) released guidelines to regulate entities facilitating cross-border payments.

This licence enables the startup to process cross-border online transactions for the import and export of goods and services. 

In March, Cashfree rolled out ‘Embedded Payments’, a payment solution enabling software platforms to facilitate direct payments between their businesses and users.

The company saw its net loss widen by 46X to INR 133.1 Cr in FY23 from INR 2.9 Cr in the previous year, hurt by a sharp jump in its employee costs.

The post Cashfree Ropes In Former PhonePe Executive Nitin Pulyani As Product Head & SVP appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Days after rebranding its Postpe app to BharatPe, the fintech giant has onboarded government-backed Open Network For Digital Commerce (ONDC) to facilitate food ordering and delivery to its customers via its app.

As per BharatPe’s statement, the customers will have access to more than 1.4 Lakh restaurants across more than 400 cities listed on ONDC on the BharatPe app. The customers will also have an option to track their orders on a real-time basis.

The company also added that the integration will help around 15 Mn of its customers by eliminating the need to keep multiple apps on their phones. 

“We are excited to participate in the ONDC ecosystem to offer a relevant use case to our users, who can now order and get food delivered via our BharatPe app. Also, this resonates well with our mission to empower the growth of local businesses,” said BharatPe’s chief executive officer Nalin Negi.

It is pertinent to note that this development aligns with BharatPe’s vision to become a one-stop shop for all services.

For instance, a few days back, BharatPe, in partnership with Unity Bank, ventured into consumer payment space with the roll out of its UPI third party application provider (TPAP) service.

Post the rebranding of its PostPe BNPL (Buy now pay later) app to BharatPe, the company also introduced UPI Lite, which allows customers to preload an online wallet and make transactions up to INR 500 for both P2P and P2M payments without needing a UPI PIN. 

Talking about BharatPe’s ecommerce play, besides UPI payments, the company also added an ecommerce section where it’s currently selling vouchers for Amazon, HealthifyMe, ixigo, Nykaa, Zomato as well as several modern retail and D2C brands.

Now, with this food ordering and delivery offering, BharatPe adds another feather to its Super App cap.

While BharatPe continues to roll out various services on its app, last month, it also increased stake in its non banking financial (NBFC) arm Trillion Loans with an infusion of $8-9 Mn. The company plans to fully acquire 

This investment came at the heart of BharatPe securing a debt funding of INR 85 Cr (around $10.1 Mn) from Trifecta Venture and InnoVen Capital through issuance of non-convertible debentures (NCDs).

BharatPe widened its net loss to INR 926.9 Cr in FY23, up 12% from INR 828.6 Cr in FY21. However, Revenue from operations jumped 125% to INR 1,028.9 Cr in FY23 from INR 456.8 Cr in the preceding fiscal.

The post BharatPe Onboards ONDC To Facilitate Food Ordering And Delivery Amid Super App Wave appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Amid plans on the pipeline to grow its digital personal loans business and expand operations, fintech unicorn Navi has strengthened its lending play, becoming India’s sixth largest company on the Unified Payment Interface (UPI), with its customer-initiated transactions surging to 88.71 Mn in August from 68.47 Mn in the preceding month.

As per National Payment Corporation of India’s (NPCI) data, the value of Navi’s UPI transactions stood at INR 4,651.32 Cr.

With this, the fintech unicorn has surpassed digital payment platform Amazon Pay UPI, which posted 70.72 Mn transactions in August. 

It is pertinent to note that Amazon Pay UPI recently crossed the 100 Mn user mark in the country.

Besides, Walmart-owned PhonePe continues to lead the UPI race with 7.2 Bn transactions and Google Pay securing second position with 5.5 Bn transactions.

Navi, cofounded by Sachin Bansal and Ankit Agarwal, focuses on loan products such as personal, vehicle, and home loans. Founded in 2012, the subsidiary holds an NBFC license and offers digital lending products for personal and housing finance.

It was converted to a public company in March 2022.

The development comes days after Navi  roped in former Reserve Bank of India (RBI) official Anil Kumar Misra as the non-executive chairman of the company’s board.

Not just this, the company recently marked close of $38 Mn (around INR 318.2 Cr) personal loans securitisation deal with financial and investment banking firm JP Morgan to expand its operations and grow its digital personal loans business.

Along with chasing the higher UPI transaction mark, the company has also raised funds this year.

In July, Navi raised INR 150 Cr via bond issuance from six individual investors including Dadachanji Group chairman Kairus Shavak Dadachanji, Pervin Kairus Dadachanji, and Rishad Kairus Dadachanji among others.

The fundraise came months after the startup announced that it was planning to raise up to INR 600 Cr via issuance of Non-Convertible Debentures (NCDs) to fuel its business growth.

Navi  clocked a net profit of INR 172 Cr in FY23 compared to a loss of INR 67 Cr in FY22. Meanwhile, its operating revenue jumped 2.8X year-on-year (YoY) to INR 1,283 Cr in the fiscal ended March 2023.

The post Sachin Bansal’s Navi Overtakes Amazon Pay To Become Sixth Largest UPI Player appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Days after allotting 38,946 equity shares under its employee stock option plans (ESOP) 2018, drone manufacturing startup ideaForge has now allotted additional equity shares under the same plan.

As per the company’s statement, ideaForge has now approved the allotment of 3,936 equity shares for the exercise of vested options under its ESOP 2018.

“… the executive committee of the board of the ideaForge Technology Limited (Company) on September 16, 2024 has approved the allotment of 3,936 equity shares having face value of INR 10/- each towards the exercise of vested stock options,” the statement added.

The startup has set the exercise price at INR 10 per share.

Based on ideaForge’s closing price on Friday (September 13) trading session, these allotted stocks are valued at INR 27.41 Lakh.

Following the allotment of these shares, the startup’s paid-up capital saw a marginal increase to INR 43,02,88,360 from INR 43,02,49,000.

At 2:06 PM, ideaForge shares were trading up 2.14% at INR 711.45 on BSE today (September 16).

This comes back of JM Financial initiating coverage on the startup with a ‘buy’ rating. The brokerage firm also said that  the startup is set to benefit from the government’s “positive” policy push and increase in drone adoption across sectors in the country.

Few months earlier, under its ESOP 2018 pool expansion, the company allocated 1,678 equity shares to its employees. 

Founded by Ankit Mehta, Ashish Bhat, Rahul Singh, and Vipul Joshi in 2007,ideaForge is a drone manufacturing startup that makes unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) systems for inspection, surveillance and mapping. Its offerings span across sectors such as defence, construction, mining and agriculture.

The company recently bought an undisclosed stake in Bengaluru-based spacetech startup GalaxEye Space for INR 8.28 Cr. With this acquisition, the company looks forward to developing drone-based sensors for fog and foliage penetrations, the company added.

On the contrary, ideaForge posted an almost 94% decline in its profit after tax (PAT) to INR 1.2 Cr in FY25 from INR 18.9 Cr in the previous year’s quarter, hurt by lower revenue and surging in spending towards cost of materials.

On a quarter-on-quarter (QoQ) basis, the company’s PAT declined 87% from INR 10.3 Cr in Q4 FY24. 

The post ideaForge Allots Additional Equity Shares Under ESOP 2018 appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Multi-stage venture capital firm Accel, which counts Moneyview, Flipkart, Swiggy and Moglix among its unicorns portfolio, has announced the fourth cohort of its flagship pre-seed investment programme Atoms.

The programme will target startups operating in artificial intelligence as well as ‘Bharat’-focused startups working in sectors including ecommerce, financial services, healthcare and edtech among others.

Accel said that it will be investing up to $1 Mn in the selected startups, along with perks worth $5 Mn.

According to the VC, ‘Bharat’ is defined as the middle-income households spread across Tier II, III and rural India.

Applications for the Accel Atoms 4.0 opens next Monday (September 16) and will close on November 17.

The investment firm further said in its blog post that for the fourth programme it is targeting innovative founders, who are creating scalable, economically feasible solutions tailored to the needs of ‘Bharat’ consumers.

For the uninitiated, the VC firm will be launching its ‘Bharat’ cohort for the first time in partnership with SaaS-based consultancy startup xto10x. The 12-week programme will be spearheaded by Accel’s partner Anand Daniel. 

Meanwhile, for its AI cohort, Accel is looking to onboard India-born founders’ floated startups which are tapping AI tools for business operations. It is also looking to diversify its AI stack, involving small language models, testing tools and core AI models.

It is pertinent to note that this will be Accel’s second AI cohort to be led by Accel’s partner Prayank Swaroop.

Accel also claims that 70% of its portfolio comprises founders building their startups in AI. 

In March, the VC firm selected eight startups, including Spintly, Asets and Tune AI, among others, for its six-month pre-seed accelerator programme Atoms 3.0. The programme focused on startups building in AI and Industry 5.0 domains.

As per the company, in the first three Accel Atoms cohorts, over 32 startups have collectively raised over $200M from global investors so far.

Yesterday, Accel-backed lending tech startup Moneyview entered the unicorn club after raising INR 38.6 Cr (about $4.6 Mn) in an equity funding round, escalating the company’s valuation to $1.2 Bn.

The post Accel Unveils Fourth Cohort Of Its Atoms Programme With Eye On AI, Bharat-Focused Startups appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Listed logistics unicorn Delhivery has approved the allotment of 6.15 Lakh equity shares for the exercise of vested options under its employee stock option plans.

“…the stakeholders’ relationship committee of delhivery limited (‘company’) on Monday, September 09, 2024, approved the allotment of a total of 6,15,930 equity shares of face value Re. 1/‐ each fully paid up against the exercise of vested options,” Delhivery said in an exchange filing.

Of these, 1.94 Lakh shares were allotted under ESOP 2012 and the remaining 4.21 Lakh shares were issued under ESOP 2020. 

Under the ESOP 2012, the startup has set the exercise price at INR 1 for 67,377 stock options, INR 16.28 for 7,909 stock options and INR 29.85 for 1,19,344 stock options. While the exercise price for 4,21,300 Options under ESOP III 2020 was at INR 0.10. 

Based on Delhivery’s closing prices of Monday trading session, these allotted stocks are valued at INR 25.18 Cr.

Following the allotment of these shares, the startup’s paid-up capital has increased to INR 74 Cr from INR 73.94 Cr.  

Shares of Delhivery were trading up 1.80% at INR 416.30 at 10:50 AM on the BSE.

It is pertinent to note that, a few days back, the company expanded its ESOP pool by allocating 63,538 stock options to the eligible employees under ESOP 2012.

Founded by Sahil Barua, Mohit Tandon, Bhavesh Manglani, Suraj Saharan and Kapil Bharati in 2011, Delhivery is a transportation, supply chain and logistics company. It competes with the likes of Xpressbees, Blue Dart, Flipkart’s Ekart Logistics and Amazon Shipping. 

In July, the company also got approval from the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) to incorporate its drone subsidiary, Delhivery Robotics India Private Limited. The new entity is likely to offer Drone as a Service (DaaS) for shipment movement and remote sensing.

The startup reported a net profit of INR 54.3 Cr in FY25 Q1, against the net loss of INR 89.4 Cr in Q1 FY24. Its revenue from services grew 13% year-on-year to INR 2,172 Cr in Q1 FY25 from INR 1,930 Cr in Q1 FY24.

The post Delhivery Allots 6.15 Lakh Equity Shares Under ESOP Plans appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Flipkart-owned travel platform Cleartrip’s chief business officer Prahlad Krishnamurthi has stepped down from his role to join as a chief executive officer in Bizongo’s procurement platform NextBuy.

After nine-year of his stint at the Flipkart Group, Krishnamurthi took to his LinkedIn profile to announce the resignation.

“Leading NextBuy is going to be a new kind of journey, and I can’t wait to dive in with the team to solve for B2B e-commerce in India,” Krishnamurthi said in his post.

Krishnamurthi joined Flipkart in 2015 as the director for category marketing (electronics). Later, he served at various leadership positions at the company, including senior director for marketing in several verticals like fashion, electronics and home. 

In 2021, he was elevated to the position of CBO at Cleartrip. 

Prior to Flipkart, Krishnamurthi played several key roles, including at ITC Limited for seven years. 

Founded by Hrush Bhatt, Matthew Spacie and Stuart Crighton in 2006, Cleartrip is an online travel aggregator that allows users to book flight tickets and hotels. It was acquired by Walmart-owned Flipkart in 2021 for $40 Mn in a distressed sale. 

It is pertinent to note that Cleartrip has seen some key onboardings as well as resignations lately.

For instance, a few months back, the company onboarded Anuj Rathi as its chief business and growth officer.

In April, the startup announced that its chief financial officer, Aditya Agarwal stepped down from his position. After his resignation, the role was taken over by former finance executive Akshat Mishra.

In February, Cleartrip’s chief executive officer Ayyappan Rajagopal stepped down from his position after serving the Flipkart Group for eleven years. As per the company, the position has not been filled by anyone yet.

Cleartrip’s net loss surged 90% to INR 676.5 Cr in FY23 from INR 356.5 Cr in the previous fiscal year, marking a nearly 2X jump.

The post Cleartrip’s CBO Prahlad Krishnamurthi Quits To Join Bizongo’s NextBuy As CEO appeared first on Inc42 Media.

SaaS cybersecurity startup TAC Infosec has elevated its head for AppSec and InfoSec, Saransh Rawat, to the position of chief technology officer (CTO).

Besides, the company also announced its chief financial officer (CFO) Vishal Jain stepping down from his role due to personal reasons. 

Shares of TAC Infosec saw a marginal rise on the NSE today (September 9), reaching an intraday high of INR 830.50. 

At 02:07 PM, the stock was trading at INR 784.55 on the NSE, marking a 5% fall from the Friday’s (September 6) closing session.

In 2021, Rawat joined TAC Infosec as the information security analyst and later served as the manager for application security.

Prior to that, from 2020 to 2021, he worked as information security analyst for information and cyber security company Paralok Information Security.

As per the company’s filing, Rawat has over 4 years of experience in digital footprinting, external threat management and performing cyber threat intelligence operations. He holds expertise in penetration testing and vulnerability assessment activities of complex applications, including operating systems and mobile devices. 

Along with this, the company has also onboarded American lawyer and former prosecutor Hector Hugo Balderas Jr as the additional director in its US subsidiary TAC Security Inc.

The development comes days afterTAC Infosec signed a share purchase agreement to acquire US-based cybersecurity firm Cyber Sandia for $25,000 to bolster its presence in the US public sector market.

Just days after this acquisition, on August 27, shares of the listed startup jumped 5% during intraday trading to reach an all-time high of INR 853.15 apiece on the BSE.

Founded by Trishneet Arora in 2016, TAC Infosec offers risk-based vulnerability management and assessment solutions, and other SaaS cybersecurity solutions to enterprises and small businesses. 

The company reported a 23% jump in its net profit in FY24 to  INR 6.33 Cr from INR 5.12 Cr in the previous fiscal.

After being listed on NSE in April, the company also saw its operating revenue zoom 17% to INR 11.84 Cr during the year under review from INR 10.09 Cr in FY23.

The post TAC Infosec Elevates Saransh Rawat to CTO; Vishal Jain Quits As CFO appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Community and security management startup Mygate has ventured into the consumer devices market with the launch of a range of digital smart lock doors.

Mygate Locks will enable users to manage access to their homes remotely via its app. The lock will also facilitate remote unlocking via OTP, end-to-end data encryption, easy user management and real-time notifications, the company said in a statement.

The product is launched in three variants –Lock SE, Lock Plus and Lock Pro. 

This comes on the back of the Bengaluru-based startup looking to expand into the smart home appliances segment.

“Mygate Locks is the very beginning of this journey and delivers a smart security solution that is both revolutionary and user-friendly, making it an ideal choice for every home,” said Mygate’s cofounder and chief technology officer Shreyans Daga.

Founded by Daga, Vijay Arisetty and Abhishek Kumar in 2016, Mygate offers security solutions for apartment complexes at entry and exit gates. The company also claims to be a replacement for other security-related systems such as RFID cards, biometrics and vehicle stickers.

Mygate posted a 35.3% rise in operating revenue to INR 96.2 Cr in the financial year 2023-24 (FY24) from INR 71.1 Cr in the previous fiscal, helped by growth in its key revenue streams of advertising and software-as-a-service (SaaS) subscriptions. 

The startup earned INR 85.4 Cr as enterprise revenue, which increased 35.1% year-on-year (YoY), as per the startup’s business summary. This includes income from enterprise sources, including resident welfare associations, security agencies, and builders.

On the other hand, revenue from consumer services, which includes utility bill payments, maintenance bills, and home services, also grew almost 38% YoY to INR 10.9 Cr in FY24.

Mygate said its total revenue stood at INR 109.1 Cr in FY24, an increase of 41% from INR 77.2 Cr the previous year.

Meanwhile, the startup claimed to have reduced its cash burn by 85% during FY24, with zero cash burn recorded in the March quarter (Q4).

The post Mygate Enters Consumer Electronics Space With Launch Of Smart Door Locks appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Days after WazirX experienced $230 Mn crypto heist, cryptocurrency platform CoinSwitch said that it will be initiating a legal action against the crypto exchange to recover 2% of its trapped funds.

CoinSwitch said in a blogpost on Wednesday (August 28) that it cumulatively held INR 12.4 Cr and INR 28.7 Cr in ERC20 tokens, and INR 39.9 Cr in other tokens on WazirX.

“This amounts to about 2% of all funds of CoinSwitch. According to the WazirX claim, only ERC20 tokens were impacted in the alleged cyber attack. That translates to less than 1% of total CoinSwitch funds,” the blog post added.

WazirX experienced a major security breach on July 18, resulting in withdrawals of approximately $234.9 Mn during the early European hours.

The security breach impacted one of its wallets Safe Multisig on the Ethereum network, resulting in the loss of user funds.

CoinSwitch further said that WazirX failed to respond to its queries regarding the recovery of the funds that prompted them to pursue legal action.

“We have attempted to be in regular touch with WazirX since the day of the incident but have not been able to reach a solution to recover the funds that are stuck on their platform,” the blog post further said.

Inc42 has reached out to WazirX for comments on the development. The story will be updated based on the response.

It is pertinent to note that the development came on the same day (August 28) when WazirX claimed to have filed an application with a Singapore court seeking moratorium to provide necessary “breathing space” while company’s parent entity, Zettai facilitates restructuring of liabilities under a scheme of arrangement.

The company filed the application days after revoking the suspension on withdrawals and allowing INR balance withdrawals in a staggered manner. 

However, the company also said that users could only access 66% of the funds in their wallet due to some funds being frozen amid Zettai’s ongoing disputes and investigations by law enforcement agencies.  

Earlier this month, WazirX also terminated its arrangement with wallet infrastructure provider Liminal in the process of migrating its remaining assets to new multisig wallets. 

As per its X post, the exchange platform attributed the move to the need to ensure maximum security of its crypto assets in “light of recent events”, hinting at the crypto hack.

Few days after the cyber attack, WazirX also pitched a socialised loss strategy that proposed making customers absorb 45% of the losses caused by the hack. However, the plan was put off later following backlash from users.

The post CoinSwitch To File Lawsuit Against WazirX To Recover Stuck Funds appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Bharat Bill Payment System’s (BBPS) technology service provider plutos One has secured $2 Mn (around INR 16.8 Cr) in a seed funding round led by StartupXseed.

The round also saw participation from Genesia Ventures, Auxano Capital and Raghuvanshi Investments among others.

The Delhi-based company plans to deploy the fresh capital to onboard banks as biller operating units as well as agent institutions on the BBPS network, said the company in a release.

Biller operating units are RBI-authorised entities, acting as a payment collector on the BBPS network. 

Managed by the National Payments Corporation of India, BBPS is an integrated bill payment infrastructure that enables customers to make recurring online bill payments via physical payment collection outlets (bank branches, agent collection stores etc) and digital channels (apps, websites etc) across India.

“As licensed and empaneled technical service providers to the Bharat Bill Payments System, we are uniquely positioned to help banks connect their business and individual customers to digital bill payments,” said plutos One’s cofounder and chief executive officer Rajjat Gulati.

Founded by Gulati and Rohit Mahajan in 2022, plutos One offers a suite of products and services for banks to facilitate efficient bill payment solutions to their customers. The startup also claims to offer biller solutions, including BBPS onboarding process, settlements, refund and support.

Additionally, it also offers vouchers across more than 400 online brands on its platform.

Along with NPCI, the startup claims to have partnered with banks, including HDFC, BOBCard, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Bandhan Bank, Loylty Rewardz, IDFC First Bank and  IDBI Bank.

This comes close on the heels of the Reserve Bank of India reportedly mandating all credit card bill payments made via third party apps such as CRED, PhonePe, Amazon Pay and Paytm be routed through BBPS.

For instance, last week fintech unicorn CRED joined BBPS as a customer operating unit to facilitate its users with instant credit card bill payments. 

Currently BBPS claims to have 22,000 active billers on its platform across 30 categories including electricity, water, loan repayments, credit card bills, rent payments, education fees, donations to charitable institutions, metro card recharges, FASTag and more.

The post plutos One Bags $2 Mn To Facilitate Banks With Digital Bill Payments appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Workforce management platform Rippling has roped in engineering industry veteran Mrinal Chatterjee as senior vice president of engineering and head of its Indian arm.

In his new role, Chatterjee will head Rippling’s team in Bengaluru and will be responsible for driving regional growth and product expansion, the company said in a statement.

With over 30 years of experience, Chatterjee has worked with several companies, including Walmart, Amazon, ShopClues, Contenix and RowNine among others.

Before joining Rippling, he was the vice president for engineering, global marketplace and fulfillment service at Walmart from 2018 to 2024.

Prior to that, he served as the tech director at Amazon India Payments.

“With Rippling now serving the Indian market, and Asia Pacific more broadly, Mrinal will lead the expansion of our Bengaluru-based engineering, support, and sales operations to support that growth,” said Rippling’s cofounder and chief executive officer Parker Conrad.

The development comes at a time when Rippling recently secured $200 Mn funding at a valuation of $13.5 Bn, said the company in a release. The company counts Kleiner Perkins, Founders Fund, Sequoia, Greenoaks, and Bedrock among its key investors.

This new appointment aligns with company’s strategy to deploy the fresh capital in expanding the Indian workforce across various departments

In 2018, the San Francisco – headquartered company inaugurated its first India-based office. Currently, it claims to have achieved 400% workforce growth in the country with over 500 employees across various divisions. 

In 2022, the company’s valuation stood at $11.25 Bn, making it a decacorn.

Founded by Conrad and Prasanna Sankar in 2016, Rippling streamlines business operations like human capital management, payroll, IT and finances with its unified platform. The company offers its services across different sectors including tech, retail, manufacturing and healthcare among others. 

It is pertinent to note that India’s HRtech space is growing with some key startups including Keka, Erekrut and Darwinbox and others. In 2022, Darwinbox’s valuation crossed the $1 Bn mark, making it the third Indian unicorn that year.

As per a report, the India HRtech market size reached $ 1.4 Bn in 2023. Further the market is expected to reach$ 2.1 Bn by 2032, exhibiting a growth rate (CAGR) of 8.3% during 2024-2032.

The post HRtech Platform Rippling Ropes In Former Walmart Executive Mrinal Chatterjee As SVP And India Head appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Days after increasing stake in its NBFC arm Trillion Loans, fintech unicorn BharatPe has now rolled out loan facilities for its merchant partners.

For this, the Gurugram-based company has partnered with OTO Capital and Volt Money to facilitate two-wheeler loans and loan against mutual funds (LAMF), respectively, for its existing merchant partners.

In the first phase of this launch, BharatPe claims to facilitate two wheeler loans of up to INR 2.5 Lakh and to INR 1 Cr loan against mutual funds. The lending process will be enabled on BharatPe’s platform and later, both the partner companies will handle disbursal and collection, the company said in a statement.

The company further plans to expand loan offerings to different sectors, it added.

“I am excited about the launch of the secured loans offerings as this further bolsters the credit portfolio enabled by BharatPe and underscores our commitment to enable credit access to our merchants,” said BharatPe’s chief executive officer Nalin Negi.

This comes close on the heels of BharatPe making its second investment in Trillion Loans, increasing its stake to 60% in the Mumbai-based NBFC.

Also, last month, BharatPe raised a debt funding of INR 85 Cr (around $10.1 Mn ) from Trifecta Venture and InnoVen Capital through issuance of non-convertible debentures (NCDs). This was the company’s second debt raise this year, after securing $100 Mn from InnoVen Capital and Credit Saison in January. 

In April, BharatPe also launched ‘BharatPe One’, an all-in-one payment device that integrates point-of-sale (PoS), QR code scanner, and speaker.

In May, BharatPe settled its long-standing legal disputes with PhonePe regarding the use of the trademark with the suffix ‘Pe’ in their brand names.

It is pertinent to note that in the same month, PhonePe also partnered with Volt Money to offer loans against mutual funds to its customers.

In January, BharatPe posted a 125% jump in its operating revenue for FY23 to INR 1,028.9 Cr against INR 456.8 Cr in the previous fiscal year. 

The post BharatPe Partners OTO Capital & Volt Money To Offer Loans To Merchant Partners appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Coupons and cashback platform CashKaro’s operating revenue jumped over 20% to cross the INR 300 Cr mark in the financial year 2023-24, its cofounder Swati Bhargava said.

The Ratan Tata-backed startup is yet to file its financial statements for FY24 with the Ministry of Corporate Affairs. However, as per its unaudited statements, it clocked an operating revenue of INR 302 Cr in the year ended March 31, 2024, Bhargava told Inc42.

This would translate to an increase of about 21.5% compared to its operating revenue of INR 248 Cr in FY23. 

Founded by Swati Bhargava and Rohan Bhargava in 2013, CashKaro offers coupons, price comparisons, and discounts and allows users to earn cashbacks and rewards for shopping online across over 1,500 ecommerce platforms, including Nykaa, Amazon, Flipkart, Tata 1mg and Myntra.

The startup primarily earns revenue from the commission that it receives from its brand partners for displaying their products or services on the site.

However, Swati Bhargava said that the finance vertical now accounts for about 20% of CashKaro’s revenue. Under this vertical, the startup provides users suggestions about credit cards based on their shopping behaviour. Users can reach a bank’s website directly from CashKaro platform to apply for the cards, and earn extra cashback when they get the cards. 

The cofounder said that CashKaro is now looking to double down on its financial offerings and also plans to add products like insurance, loans and mutual funds, among others. Last year, the startup launched a dedicated platform, BankKaro, for financial offerings to facilitate its expansion plans.

CashKaro also operates an affiliate marketing arm EarnKaro, which was launched in 2018. It also launched online D2C marketplace BuyKaro towards the end of 2023. 

CashKaro’s user base stands at around 25 Mn currently. The startup aims to add another 3-4 Mn users in FY25, while increasing its revenue beyond INR 400 Cr, the cofounder said.

Meanwhile, CashKaro’s net loss is expected to be under INR 20 Cr in FY24. In FY23, its net loss narrowed 25% to INR 11.1 Cr from INR 14.8 Cr in FY22. 

CashKaro last raised INR 130 Cr (about $16 Mn) in November 2022 in its Series C round, led by Affle Global. It also counts Kalaari Capital and Korean Investment Partners among its backers.

The post Exclusive: Ratan Tata-Backed CashKaro’s Revenue Crosses INR 300 Cr Mark In FY24 appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Beauty and fashion ecommerce major Nykaa is acquiring an additional stake in beauty brand Earth Rhythm for INR 44.5 Cr.

In an exchange filing, Nykaa said Earth Rhythm will become a subsidiary of Nykaa following the acquisition. The acquisition is expected to be completed by September 2025.

Earth Rhythm is currently an associate of Nykaa. The ecommerce major acquired an 18.6% stake in Earth Rhythm in 2022. 

“The company will be acquiring up to 57,302 equity shares and 12,226 warrants of Earth Rhythm through primary and secondary acquisition thereby resulting in Earth Rhythm becoming subsidiary of the company,” the filing said.

Founded in 2019, Earth Rhythm is a D2C skincare and beauty brand with over 250 SKUs. Its revenue rose 20.3% to INR 30.7 Cr in FY24 from INR 24.5 Cr in FY23.

“What we like about this brand (Earth Rhythm) is it has a very differentiated positioning. It’s sustainable and inclusive. It’s certified organic, plant-based, and 99% plastic-free… that’s what we like about the positioning of this brand,” said Nykaa’s MD and CEO Falguni Nayar during company’s Q1 earning call.

Meanwhile, Nykaa also said that it is acquiring an additional 39% stake in its subsidiary Dot & Key for INR 265.3 Cr.

The additional stake acquisition in the skincare solutions subsidiary will increase Nykaa’s holding in Dot & Key to 90%. 

“The company will be acquiring 5,29,286 equity shares of Dot & Key from the Promoters/ existing shareholders of Dot & Key,” Nykaa said, adding that the acquisition is expected to be completed by September 30, 2024.  

It is pertinent to note that Nykaa first acquired a 51% stake in Dot & Key in 2021.

Founded in 2018, Dot & Key provides differentiated skincare solutions. Nykaa said that the brand has been profitable since Q4 FY23. Dot & Key’s revenue surged 244% to INR 198.3 Cr in FY24 from INR 57.7 Cr in the previous year.

““This has been a fantastic investment by Nykaa and (that’s why we have) decided to go ahead and acquire an additional 39% stake… What we like about Dot & Key is it has a differentiated assortment. It also has clutter-breaking packaging, unique and patented,” added Nayar.

Nykaa made the acquisition announcements along with its Q1 financials. The startup reported a 152% YoY increase in its net profit to INR 13.6 Cr in Q1 FY25. Operating revenue increased 22.8% to INR 1,746.1 Cr during the quarter under review from INR 1,421.8 Cr in the year-ago quarter.

Ahead of the earnings announcement, shares of Nykaa ended today’s trading session 4% lower at INR 186.60 on the BSE.

The post Nykaa To Acquire Additional Stakes In Dot & Key, Earth Rhythm For INR 309.8 Cr appeared first on Inc42 Media.

Cross-border payment startup Skydo has secured $5 Mn (around INR 41 Cr) in its Pre-Series A funding round led by existing backer Elevation Capital, along with a participation from a host of undisclosed angel investors.

The Bengaluru-based startup plans to deploy the fresh capital in scaling its operations and strengthening risk monitoring and compliance stacks. Besides, the startup aims to expand globally by acquiring payment licenses across international markets with the fresh infusion.

As per the company, this is the second equity investment, after it raised $5 Mn in its first institutional round from Elevation Capital back in 2022.

Founded by Movin Jain and Srivatsan Sridhar in 2022, Skydo is a cross-border payment startup which enables businesses to open international accounts (collection accounts) with the help of its global banking partners. It also claims to reduce forex charges for businesses by more than 50%. 

This comes at a time when Skydo is awaiting payment aggregator cross-border license from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), which will help the company to offer domestic merchant payment services too.

The startup currently claims to process payments for over 6,000 Indian small and midsize businesses (SMB).

The development comes at a time when cross-border payment startups in India have been seeing a lot of activities around funding and licensing.

For instance,last month, fintech startup BillDesk, Amazon Pay India, and global payments major Adyen recently received the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI) approval to operate as cross-border payment aggregators.

This also comes at the heart of Bengaluru-based fintech startup Cashfree Payments becoming the first entity to receive Payment Aggregator Cross Border (PA-CB) licence from the RBI. The license will enable the startup to process cross-border online transactions for the import and export of goods and services. 

In October last year, cross-border fintech platform HiWi raised INR 7.25 Cr in a Pre-Seed funding round led by Unicorn India Ventures and the Unmaj Group Family Office.

As per Inc42 report, the Indian fintech space is expected to be a $2.1 Tn market opportunity by 2030. 

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