Here is a list of deals that happened in Indian Startup Ecosystem today including funding, merger, acquisition, fund launch etc. Read a brief description about all of them:1. Fintech startup Balance has raised Rs 1.5 crore from discount broking firm Zerodha, which has invested through its Rainmatter fund, to expand the team from seven members at present, especially to hire designers and developers. Balance is set to launch an app this week designed to help individuals make smart savings and invest in low-risk mutual funds.
This is the seventh investment for Rainmatter, which usually invests between Rs 1.5 crore and Rs 3 crore. It has earlier invested in startups like e-signing platform Digio and analytics software startup TradeLabs.
2. The Hinduja family has acquired a stake in UACTIV.com, a social networking and discovery platform for sports and fitness enthusiasts, for an undisclosed sum, reported
ET. Hindujas picked the stake in December as the lead investor in the startup’s first seed round funding. UACTIV plans to to spend a majority of the funding in strengthening its technology while the remaining would be spent on marketing and operational expenses.
Launched in September 2016 by Atish Chhabria and Bhavik Mehta, UACTIV is a mobile app that facilitates meet-ups between users for games, events, classes and other fitness activities organised by professionals, studios and communities. The app is currently active in Mumbai and has around 3,000 users. The company is looking at expanding to places like New Delhi, Gurgaon and Pune, and will consider testing the response in Hyderabad and Chennai.
3. The family office of YES Bank Founder and Chairman Rana Kapoor, which is run by his three daughters (Radha, Raakhe and Roshini), plans to invest $150 million to incubate and fund new businesses. The family office, The Three Sisters, is looking to invest in sectors including education, tourism, family entertainment centres, and agri-logistics among others.
“We are not really passive investors,”
said Radha Kapoor Khanna, promoter of The Three Sisters. “Our model has been to partner with good management teams at a concept stage and build businesses for the long term,” she said.
The family office has already invested $100 million in a variety of ventures since its inception nine years ago including in dry cleaning chain Presto and co-working space Awfis.
4. Indonesian ride hailing and payments app, Go-Jek has raised $1.2 billion in its latest funding round led by Chinese Internet company Tencent at $3 billion valuation, reported
TechCrunch. The newly raised funding will be used to expand its presence across Southeast Asia, prominent destinations being Philippines, Thailand, Myanmar and Vietnam and to further compete with Uber and Grab’s presence in the Indonesian region. Also, the startup further plans to improve its digital payments feature and e-wallet, GoPay.
5. Artificial intelligence-driven health content startup HealthMir has raised seed funding from angel investor and insurance industry veteran Nimit Panigrahi, reported
VCCircle. With this new round of funding, the company plans to expand its operations to six more cities in the coming 18 months namely Bangalore, Mumbai, Chennai, Chandigarh, Jaipur, and Pune. It will also make the content on its app available in multiple languages.
6. Hyderabad-based peer-to-peer lending startup i-lend has secured pre-series A round from seed and incubator firm 50K Ventures. The startup will use the fresh capital to expand to more Indian cities and strengthen its tech infrastructure and on marketing efforts. The company connects borrowers and lenders to facilitate personal loans of Rs 25,000 to Rs 5 lakh for six to 36 months.
7. Madhya Pradesh SME Innovation Fund, which seeks to invest in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and startups, is looking at a first close within two months, reported VCCircle.
8. As the government aims to train 400 million youth by 2022, education technology startup Trans Neuron has developed a skills ecosystem platform called eKaushal, which is currently being used by the Andhra Pradesh government through multiple skills training institutes across the state, reported ET.
9. Technology solutions firm Altimetrik on Thursday announced the launch of its global tech and innovation platform Playground in Pune that will be an integral part of the US-headquartered company's strategy to enable technology-led business transformation for clients. The Pune centre will work on areas like banking, healthcare, fintech and manufacturing, reported ET.
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