‘Soon To Be Unicorns’ : India’s Top 40+

The Indian startup ecosystem already has more than a half- dozen unicorns which have crossed the valuation of a $1Billion. Lets’ take a look at the ones who reached the mark first:

1. Ola- Founded in 2011, HQ: Bengaluru, Karnataka (TravTech)
2. Paytm –Founded in 2015, HQ: Noida, Uttar Pradesh (Fintech)
3. Quikr- Founded in 2008, HQ: Mumbai, Maharashtra (E-Comm)
4. Zomato- Founded in 2008, HQ: Gugaon, Harayana (FoodTech)
5. Shopclues-Founded in 2011, HQ: Gurgaon, Haryana (E-Comm)
6. Hike Messenger- Founded in 2012, HQ: New Delhi (Mob-Tech)
7. Zoho- Founded in 1996, HQ: Pleasonton, California (Big Data)
8. Flipkart- Founded in 2007, HQ: Bangalore, Karnataka (E-Comm)
9. Snapdeal- Founded in 2010, HQ: New Delhi (E-Comm)

These 40+ players in the startup space have been picked up primarily on parameters like funding/valuation and the company’s disclosed growth/ traction metrics — such as GMV, seller base, business model, clients, downloads, social media followers, suppliers and work ethics etc.

Other parameters that BWDisrupt has considered include maturity of the sector in terms of competitors, leadership, core teams, segmentation of the market, technology moats, government push and digital presence that give a company a sustainable advantage.

The companies which are market leaders, mostly function successfully if they have a first mover advantage or are uniquely positioned with a sound monetization model. They tend to grow with or without raising a great amount of investment from outside or going public (in IPO). Some hand-picked startups in the list are also such that, they have survived a steady growth rate organically all these years and earned sustainable revenues throughout their course of time.
The Delhi-NCR region collectively accounts for 18 soonicorns, while Bangalore hosts 16. Mumbai has eight soon to be unicorns, while Chennai has four. Pune, Jaipur and Kolkata also earn a spot in the soonicorn club. The average age of a soon to be unicorn is seven years and one month. The Soonicorns have raised $71.56M on average.

India’s 40+ soonicorn companies are:

BigBasket is an online grocery retail store for grocery shopping at ease from anywhere. It started out in Bangalore and operates Mumbai and Hyderabad and has a diverse portfolio that carries more than 12,000 products and over 1,000 brands. The grocery marketer is $250 M in size. Other start-ups in the area, such as ZopNow, Aaram-Shop, and Farm2Kitchen too cater to the multiple challenges in delivering a great service to the customer. The founders of Fabmart.com took to BigBasket later on, Mr V S Sudhakar, Mr Hari Menon , Mr Vipul Parekh , Mr Abhinay Choudhari and Mr V S Ramesh and brought it to the heights it has reached today.

CarTrade is an online platform for the sale and purchase of second hand vehicles through a horizontal listing method. It started out in Mumbai. Recently, CarTrade.com acquired CarWale, an online classifieds portal in an all-cash deal in November 2015. The business called CarTrade.com was established in 2010 by Vinay Sanghi and Rajan Mehra, and it stands at a valuation of $188 M as of now.Other than the online marketplace, it has physical presence with a network of over 4,000 dealers across 80 cities in India. The website currently lists over 1,65,000 certified used cars.

Grofers is online grocery portal that serves on-demand food stuff in a hyper-local way. It brought out an on-demand product delivery service from local merchants for customers. It first began in Delhi-Gurgaon area. The company was started as OneNumber by Saurabh Kumar and Albinder in early 2014 and the idea was to have an efficient fleet which will help merchants deliver items that customers order. Soon from a B2B model, Grofers has shifted to a B2C mobile startup and has raised $46.5 million, valuing the company at around $165M.

Ecom Express is a logistics service provider for e-commerce portals pan India. The startup was built in Delhi promoted by the veterans of the Express Industry of India with teams of varied and rich experience holders. The Company was formed to cater to the dynamic needs of electronic commerce industry which is growing by leaps and bounds. Founded by T. A. Krishnan, K. Satyanarayana, Manju Dhawan, Sanjeev Saxena this company operates in the e-commerce, delivery and logistics arena and currently stands at a valuation of nearly $150M.

OYO Rooms brought in this concept of cheap travel and stay. They made budgeted hotel accommodation very easy for the masses. The operations first began in Gurgaon, founded by Ritesh Aggarwal. With a total of five funding rounds up till now it has raised nearly a grand amount of $187.65M, from SoftBank, GreenOaks and others. OYO plans to expand Asia outreach and introduce concierge service called 'OYO Captains'. At present the valuation of the company is very close to the billion mark, i.e. $193M.

Pepperfry Ecommerce is an online retail managed marketplace for furniture and home products. It started off from Mumbai, up till now in a total of five rounds it has managed to raise $159M from Goldman Sachs and others. Pepperfry.com founded in 2011 but opened for business on the 3rd of January 2012 to give customers a wide selection of amazingly priced Furniture, Home and Living products and a consistently great shopping experience. The founders Ambareesh Murty, Ashish Shah have believed in the venture which now stands at a mark of $128M.

Delhivery Logistics is a logistics services provider for all Indian e-commerce companies. It started as a Gurgaon-based logistics company SSN Logistics Pvt Ltd, which runs the web platform Delhivery.com. It offers a full suite of services such as last-mile delivery, third-party and transit warehousing, reverse logistics, payment collection, vendor-to-warehouse and vendor-to-customer shipping and more. The company is backed by Times Internet Ltd and promoted by Mohit Tandon, Sahil Barua, Bhavesh Manglani, Kapil Bharati, Suraj Saharan. It stands today at a valuation of $128M.

Practo HealthTech is more like practice management software for doctors and a platform for consumers to search for doctors. It is doing pretty well in the health-tech startups. It started out in Bangalore, promoted by Shashank ND, Abhinav Lal, the startup has managed to raise $179M of investment so far. Operating since 2008, today it connects 200,000 doctors, 10,000 hospitals and over 8,000 diagnostic centers and 4,000 across 50+ cities and 15 countries across the world including India, Singapore, Indonesia, Philippines, Malaysia and Brazil. Practo enables consumers to search for and book doctor appointments, have online consultations, buy medicines, manage health records and access healthcare related content through its website and apps. It current valuation is $500-600M.

Book My Show is an online ticketing website which serves ticketing functions for most of the entertainment shows and events pan India. The business venture started from Mumbai. Off-lately it has acquired its near competitor MastiTickets, a Hyderabad-based startup. Its founders and promoter trio are Parikshit Dar, Rajesh Balpande, Ashish Hemrajani. Their venture has successfully managed to raise $124.5M from three rounds of funding so far and that is its current valuation too.

BYJU’s is a learning app in Ed-tech sector that functions as a hybrid test preparation & learning platform for students. It began its operations from Bangaluru, it has 8 investors who are currently invested in the startup who have together put in a whopping amount of $174M, It record users crossing 7M.

Manthan Retail is a business intelligence retail and CPG analytics solution platform. It started first in Bengaluru. Manthan's clientele includes Woolworth, Game Group, Ferre, McDonald's, Novartis, Loblaws, Haggen, Supervalu and Castorama. Its founder is Atul Jalan, who started its operations in 2003. Its present valuation is $101M and is steadily growing

Lenskart is an e-commerce portal for online + offline eyewear brand bookings and purchases. It started from the capital city, Delhi by Amit Chaudhary in 2010. So far, Lenskart has managed to raise a grand amount of $129.54M, from 8 investors. Lenskart.com has the biggest collection of discounted contact lenses consisting all top-notch brands (viz. Johnson & Johnson, Bausch & Lomb, Ciba Vision are to name a few) and be it disposable, toric, coloured or bi-focal contact lenses, you can find all possible types here. At present, the valuation of this startup is $96M.

Freshdesk is SaaS customer service support provider. It is a helpdesk in cloud computing. It started its operations from Chennai in 2010 but is head-quartered in San Bruno, California. Its founder is Girish Mathrubootham. Freshdesk , today has over 100,000 customers across the world, including 3M, Honda, Hugo Boss, University of Pennsylvania, The Atlantic, and QuizUp. So far, it has raised $149M from 6 rounds and 4 investors such as Tiger Global and Sequoia Capital. Now, it stands at a valuation of $95M.

MobiKwik is Fintech mobile wallet for cashless bill payments or making recharge amounts for any facility. It began its operations in Gurgaon. MobiKwik, is India’s largest independent mobile payments network, trusted by over 35 million users and 100,000 retailers. Founded in 2009 by Bipin Preet Singh and Upasana Taku, the company has raised three rounds of funding from Sequoia Capital, American Express, Tree Line Asia, MediaTek, GMO Payment Gateway, Cisco Investments and Net1. It stands at a valuation of $90M.

CarDekho is a second hand online auto portal for car research and buying/selling deals, it started off from Jaipur, by two founders- Amit Jain and Anurag Jain. The startup has been functional since 2005 and it has managed to raise $65M from 6 investors Sequoia, HDFC and others. It is now head-quartered in Gurgaon, Haryana and stands at a valuation of 80M. CarDekho is not just a web portal that lists cars in India, but is a rich automotive platform that brings to its readers to-the-minute insights from around the world.

Capillary Tech is one of the SaaS/Enterprise and customer engagement solutions for retailers. It started off from Bangaluru, and works for customer analytics marketing platform for retailers and consumer businesses. It offers loyalty, client, social consumer relationship management, back-end analytics, and multichannel campaign management solutions. Founders Aneesh Reddy, Krishna Mehra, Ajay Modani came up with the company in 2008, which is headquartered in Singapore. Its current valuation has reached $79.1M.

Urban Ladder is an e-commerce online retailer for furniture, operate from Bangaluru first, and was co-founded by Ashish Goel (CEO) and Rajiv Srivatsa (COO) in July 2012. The online furniture company aims to provide a curated destination for home solutions, to help the Urban Indian build well-furnished, beautiful homes. With over 1000 products and 25 categories such as wardrobes, sofas, beds, dining tables, storage shelves etc

Cleartrip Travel is an Online travel website that offers flights, hotels and train bookings. It started off in Mumbai, Maharashtra in 2006 and it managed to raise $77M in 4 Rounds from 7 Investors, Cleartrip.com is the travel site that gives you what you need without any annoying fluff. Currently, it stands at a valuation of $74M.

Financial Software and Systems (FSS) is a leading global payment systems company offering business value in the areas of electronic payment. The company has raised 4 rounds of PE investment to the tune of $ 140 million from leading PE firms Carlyle, NEA, NYLIM Jacob Ballas and Premji Invest. Founded by Nagaraj Mylandla, this company is headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. The Company clocked revenues of INR 8,100M in FY16. 

Policybazaar It is leading fin-tech online insurance aggregator in India, set in Gurgaon, Haryana. The current valuation of the firm is $69.6M. In 5 Rounds from 9 Investors the founders of Policybazaar.com Alok Bansal, Yashish Dahiya has raised a grand amount and has become one of India’s prominent and unique comparative system boosts our credibility, since 2008.

First Cry is Asia’s Largest Online Portal for Baby Products and Toys. They have over 20000+ items from 250+ top International and Indian brands like Mattel, Ben10, Pigeon, Funskool, Hotwheels, Nuby, Farlin, Medela, Pampers, Disney, Barbie, Gerber, Zapak, Mee Mee and so on. So far, it has raised total equity funding of $129M in 7 Rounds from 10 Investors. It has been set in Pune, Maharashtra. Its current valuation $69M. Founders of this startup are Supam Maheshwari, Amitava Saha.

Dhruva is a SaaS/Enterprise, enterprise endpoint backup & DLP solution which started in Pune, Maharashtra. This Dhruva is a game developer, providing game development and art production services to the global games industry. Having worked on over 100 titles across various platforms and genres, the company has built domain expertise across consoles on social, casual, and mobile devices in serving marquee global clients, both big and small. It was founded in 1997 and so far it has raised $5M from Clearstone Venture Partners.

FINO PayTech is a business and banking technology platform combined with extensive services delivery channel that carries a vision to be the universally preferred choice of customers by fulfilling all financial service needs. It was founded on July 13, 2006 and is headquartered in Mumbai with offices across India. No Investments has been raised by this company so far but still its current valuation is $65M.

BlueStone is an e-commerce online retail jewelry store. BlueStone.com offers latest designs with COD, 30-day free returns on jewelry, free shipping and a lifetime exchange policy. It has its headquarters set in Bangalore, Karnataka. Founders Gaurav Kushwaha, Vidya Nataraj together have managed to raise $60.8M in 4 Rounds from 8 Investors.

Swiggy is an Indian-based company that provides a food ordering and delivery solution from the neighborhood restaurants to the urban foodie. The startup managed to turn a lot of heads and raise $75.5M in 5 Rounds from 7 Investors. With its base currently in Bangalore, Karnataka. It charges between 15-25 percent in commission to restaurants and for smaller orders, customers pay between 20 and 24 rupees depending on their city. Currently, Swiggy is in eight cities where it has more than 9,000 restaurants on its platform. It stands at a valuation of $60.5M.

ZoomCar is an online self-drive car rental service provider which started out its operations in Bangalore. It is at present valued close to $51.9M. Zoomcar is the first company in India to focus on self-drive car rental, in contrast to earlier companies in India that focused on chauffeur-driven rentals. Founded by David Back and Greg Moran in 2013, the company now owns a fleet of over 2,000 vehicles across 12 cities in the country.

ItzCash It is a fintech multi-purpose prepaid cash card in Mumbai. It offers many consumer solutions such as ItzCash reloadable prepaid card; a prepaid card for Dish TV DTH customers to renew their subscriptions; NoQ24x7 Card, to make payments for various bills; and more. Its corporate solutions include cash management services; an online payment gateway; experience-based gift boxes; and more. Incubated by Essel Group with Co-Founder Naveen Surya, it has been able to raise $51.6M in multiple rounds from 3 Investors, Matrix Partners, Lightspeed Ventures and Intel Capital.

Limeroad It is an Ecommerce Online social shopping marketplace for women fashion products like shoes, bags, apparels and more set in Gurgaon, Haryana. It is currently valued at $50M. So far, it has closed 3 Rounds from 4 Investors including Tiger Global Management, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Matrix Partners etc. The four founders Ankush Mehra, Manish Saksena, Suchi Mukherjee, Prashant Malik had launched this venture in 2012.

NetMeds It’s a HealthTech online store for medicines and healthcare products, which started in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. Netmeds.com, advertises itself as ‘India Ki Pharmacy’, brought to you by the Dadha & Company. It raised nearly $50M in their 1st round from 1 investor, i.e. Orbimeds.

Zivame It a unique e-commerce lingerie store for women based out of Bangalore, founded by Richa Kar, Kapil Karekar in 2011. They have managed to raise close to $49M in 3 Rounds from 7 Investors. Zivame has enabled its customers to browse items by category, brand, color and size and affect the buying behavior of the Indian tier-1 and 2 audience.

Portea The healthtech marketplace is also set in Bangalore, Karnataka and has been operational since 2013. Founded by a team of three minds - Ganesh Krishnan, Manjusha Anumolu, Meena Ganesh; Portea Medical has become one of the fastest growing provider of in-home medical care in India today with a 24-city network. The startup has managed to gain $46.5M in 2 Rounds from 4 Investors.

PropTiger Founded in 2011, PropTiger.com is India’s real estate advisory
firm offering a one-stop platform for buying residential real estate. The
company has a team of real estate experts spread across 9 cities in India, namely Noida, Gurgaon, Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Ahmedabad. PropTiger has acquired Makaan.com, Out of Box Interactions and 3DPhy to strengthen its portfolio of offerings. Following the recent merger with Housing.com, the new entity has become India’s largest full service online-to-offline (O2O) real estate platform. Since inception, the platform has sold homes worth nearly $1.5 billion to 17,000+ people. It has raised a capital of $105M in
5 rounds from investors including News Corp, REA, SoftBank, SAIF and Accel
among others. The company was co-founded by Dhruv Agarwala, Kartik Varma and
Prashan Agarwal in Noida.

NestAway The Real Estate Tech marketplace for furnished shared rental, NestAway is a startup set in Bangalore, Karnataka. It has raised a total amount of $43.2 M from 7 investors in 4 rounds of funding. The business started with its operations from 2015 and has been doing well since, founders Amarendra Sahu, Jitendra Jagadev have showcased great enthusiasm and vision for this startup and its future.

GreenDust is an e-commerce online retail business set in Delhi. It is a reverse logistics retail for sale of factory second products, founded by Hitendra Chaturvedi. The company has managed to raise $50M in 2 Rounds from 4 Investors, such as Vertex, Lightbox Ventures and others. It currently stands at a valuation of not more than $40M.

Rivigo It is a logistics startup, which began in Gurgaon, Haryana. The rounds of investment Rivigo has closed so far is $114.9M in 3 Rounds from 2 Investors. It is trucksfirst built for clients who need hassle free, reliable, professional and super-express logistics services. The company coordinates delivery trucks going between different cities, using technology and innovative operational processes. It aims to significantly improve the truck driver ecosystem and operational efficiencies while doing so. Founders Deepak Garg, Gazal Kalra have managed to get SAIF Partners and Warburg Pincus on board.

Grey Orange It is a Robotics Warehouse automation solution which is set in Gurgaon, Haryana. At present it is valued at $39M; and has $30M in 2 Rounds from 2 Investors including Tiger Global and Blume Ventures. Founded in 2011, this business is headquartered in Singapore. The Co-founders had a wolf-gang Hoeltgen, Akash Gupta, Samay Kohli who have been Robotics, Logistics, Hardware, Software, Industrial Automation.

UrbanClap It is a mobile-first open marketplace for local service providers. UrbanClap helps you find the right service professionals for activities important to you. Whether you are looking to decorate your home, get candid pictures of your wedding, get your doorbell repaired, plan your kid’s birthday or get healthier, they are a sure shot destination for your service needs. Founders Varun Khaitan, Raghav Chandra, Abhiraj Bhal raised a total amount of $36.6M in 4 Rounds from 6 Investors.

IndiaMART It is B2B online B2B listing platform based out of Noida, Uttar Pradesh. Founded in 1996 by IndiaMART.com is India’s largest online marketplace connecting buyers with suppliers. They, Brijesh Agrawal, Dinesh Agarwal, co-founders have so far raised up to $35-36M in 3 Rounds from 5 Investors which have Amadeus Capital and Intel Capital.

Mswipe It has become a Fintech PoS terminal for accepting card payments that works with smartphones, tablets, computers and links to bank account. It is based in Mumbai, Maharashtra. Founded single-handedly by Manish Patel in 2015, Mswipe is doing well as it has raised a total amount of $25M in 4 Rounds from 8 Investors.

Power2SME This startup is a B2B retail buying club for SMEs, set up in Gurgaon. It is currently has acquired a total investment of $35M and founded by R. Narayan in 2012. Their focus is on reducing SME’s purchase prices and increasing productivity by taking on the role of sourcing input raw materials at the most competitive price points across multiple products in categories like Chemicals, Metals & Polymers.

HealthKart It is one health tech online store for consumer health products based out of Gurgaon, Haryana. Its current valuation is about $34.5M. It had managed to raise $12M in 2 Rounds from 3 Investors, since its inception in 2012. The venture was founded by Sameer Maheshwari and was envisioned to be a one stop shop for health, fitness & beauty.

BlackBuck Logistics It’s an online portal for freight transport booking, operations began in Bangalore in the year 2015. Keeping technology at the core, BlackBuck is redefining the logistics landscape of India, founded by Chanakya Hridaya, Rajesh Yabaji, Ramasubramaniam B. Currently the company is worth $30M.

Voonik is an e-commerce online retail platform that serves as a personal-stylist especially for women, it started in 2013 by Sujayath Ali, Navaneetha Krishnan. It was born in the city of Bengaluru, Karnataka. At Voonik, they are imagining how shopping will happen after 20 years and are trying to create the future NOW. Voonik.com founded by like-minded people from companies including Amazon, Zoho, HP Research Labs, IBM, Fresh Desk, and Aryaka and from institutions including ISB, IIT, MIT, Pearl Academy Image Consulting Business Institute.

FreshMenu The food tech and home delivery of fresh meals for lunch and dinner which began functioning from Bangalore first. FreshMenu’s amazing meal packages are now available for delivery at Koramangala, Richmond Town, Langford Town, Lavelle Road, MG Road, Victoria Layout, Domlur, Old Airport Road, Indiranagar, Ulsoor, Old Madras Road and other JP Nagar areas. Founder of this venture is Rashmi Dagga, who started this venture in 2016. It currently valued at $21.5M.
Pine Labs It is a fintech payment technology venture, which started its days from Noida, Uttarpradesh. Today Pinelabs has evolved into a payment acceptance partner choice for more than 40,000 retailers, ranging from large worldwide enterprises with wide network across India to locally-owned small businesses. The company provides its users with solutions such as Instant EMI, Instant Discounts, Cash Back Programs, PaybyPoints, Loyalty Solution, Gift Solution, e-Wallet, Targeted Promotions, Dynamic Currency Conversion, and more. It was founded by Tarun Upaday in the year 1998, it is now worth $20M.

Out of these 40+ startups, seven are Fintech companies, nine are in the e-commerce space, and five belong to the enterprise/SaaS segment. The list also includes five logistics companies and four health tech startups. As the ecosystem matures further, companies working in the same segments will see consolidations and M&As would be inevitable as we move up in a particular vertical. Though more players would be added, the list will see ups and downs or shuffling among startups depending on the advancement in technology and innovation, as the time suggests. We will keep updating the list. Stay with us!

Source Courtesy: https://twitter.com/hashtag/soonicorns  ; https://www.crunchbase.com/app/search/companies