Top 6 Fundings By Artha Group In 2022

Founded in 2012, Artha Group is an amalgamation of Artha Venture Fund, Artha India Ventures and Artha Energy Resources, based in Mumbai, India. The firm invests in startups in their seed and early stages in a variety of industries, including hospitality, travel, fin-tech, blockchain, data analytics, consumer goods and services, big data, the Internet of things, cloud service, renewable energy, and edtech. The Group deployed almost Rs 100 crores across 30 investment rounds in 2022 spread across Africa, India, the US, and Europe. Below are the top 6 investments by the Group in 2022 (by size). 

Leverage Edu 

In January 2022, Artha India Ventures backed the edtech startup with $2.3 million in a Series B funding round. With one-touch access to personalised mentors and leading global universities, New Delhi-based Leverage Edu empowers students across India to choose the best-matched career and higher education options. 

The company is backed by DSG Consumer Partners, Blume Ventures, and other prominent entrepreneurs and business builders from India and the Silicon Valley. Founded in 2017 by Akshay Chaturvedi Leverage Edu has been recognised as one of the most trusted university admissions companies in India.

Agnikul Cosmos 

Artha Venture Fund infused $2 million in the Series B round as a follow-on investment for Agnikul. The company, founded in 2017 by Srinath Ravichandran and Moin SPM, is based at IIT-Madras’ National Center for Combustion Research and Development (R&D). It provides a dedicated launch vehicle for smaller satellites at a lower cost. CIIE, Speciale Invest, Mayfield, Pi Ventures, Globevestor and LetsVenture are among the company’s backers.

Agnikul is democratising access to space by designing and manufacturing orbital-class rockets for microsatellites and nanosatellites. The company’s rocket, Agnibaan, is a dedicated launch vehicle that can carry 100 kgs of payload at a fraction of the global costs. Agnikul is all set for a sub-orbital test launch by December-end.

Laminar Global 

In March 2022, Artha India Ventures co-led $1.82 million in a seed funding round for Laminar along with Leo Capital. Laminar is a video-streaming platform as a service (PAAS) designed for content companies looking to run a Netflix-scale service. The platform has 4 major moving parts that work together to help content creators and businesses build a streaming business.

Anirudh A Damani, the Director of Artha India Ventures, stated that funding is available for founders building businesses, solving real problems with positive unit economics and solid moats through efficient technology utilisation and seeking reasonable investment terms and valuations. 

Everest Fleet 

In May 2022, Artha Venture Fund invested $1 million in a Pre-Series A round as a follow-on investment in Everest Fleet, along with Param Capital. Founded in October 2016, the company currently operates in 8 cities across India. Their fleet mix consists of 5000+ cars, including CNG and EV vehicles, and they operate on the Uber and Ola platforms.

KarmaLife 

In February 2022, Artha invested $700k in KarmaLife’s Pre-Series A funding round. The company provides subscription-based finance to blue-collar workers based on Digital Karma. It currently provides them with digitally integrated credit and is developing insurance solutions to help them better manage their daily cash flows and become more financially resilient.

Their UPI-linked credit stack is routed through employers and aggregators, allowing it to capture user work histories, provide instant recurring loans or pay-out advances and ensure that the funds are used productively. Businesses collaborating with them can provide comprehensive, impactful and simple-to-implement employee benefits that boost productivity and retention without incurring financial risk.

Their existing partners have reported a 25 per cent increase in worker productivity after implementing the solution. KarmaLife collaborates with major digital gig platforms in industries such as ridesharing, FoodTech, e-commerce, logistics, and flexi-staffing.

Hubbler 

In September 2022, Artha Venture Fund invested around $600k in a seed funding round along with Unicorn India Ventures.

Founded in 2016, Hubbler is a DIY no-code platform to build applications for enterprises without having to write a single line of code. The company offers a PaaS (‘Platform as a Service’) to instantly develop applications, UI/UX customizations, integrations, back-end logic, and data management. Hubbler has created a repository of 50+ microservices called ‘Hubbles,’ that are pre-built blocks of code designed to reflect distinct features to get included in an application.

Artha Group stated that they would finish deploying into new investments from Artha Venture Fund-I by the end of Q4 FY23. Anirudh expects the Group to begin warehousing for Artha Venture Fund-II in Q1FY2024, completing 10–12 deals in the next fiscal, deploying over Rs 100 crore. In addition, he aims to deploy Rs 100–120 crores from the Artha Select Fund into growth opportunities from their over 108+ company portfolio.