Funding in Indian startups this week (13 Sep-18 Sep)

This week 40 Indian startups raised funding, of which 32 received a total of $513 million. MPL reportedly raised about $150 million, followed by Apna and Pine Labs which raised $100 million each.

Meanwhile, the funding of eight of the total funded startups remained undisclosed.

Below is the summary of deals closed this week

Growth/late-stage deals

MPL: E-sports and skill gaming platform Mobile Premier League (MPL) has raised a new round and entered the coveted unicorn club. According to media reports, the company has raised around $150 million in this round.

Apna: Professional networking platform for blue and grey collar workers Apna said it has scooped up $100 million in its Series C round led by existing investor Tiger Global Management at a valuation of $1.1 billion, making it one of the fastest startups to achieve the coveted unicorn status.

Pine Labs: Merchant commerce platform Pine Lab has raised $100 million from Invesco Developing Markets Fund. 

Bright Money: Bengaluru and San-Francisco-based wealth management startup Bright Money has secured $31 Mn in funding from Sequoia Capital India, Falcon Edge Capital and Hummingbird Ventures.  

Bidgely: California and Bengaluru-based Bidgely on Thursday announced the closing of a $26 million round of strategic financing to bolster its UtilityAI™ platform deployed around the world. 

BetterPlace: BetterPlace, a platform for blue-collar workforce management, has raised $24 million in its Series C funding round led by Delhi-based CX Partners and Singapore-based Jungle Ventures.

Mensa: Mensa has raised $10 million from Tiger Global. The fresh tranche for the firm has come after raising $33 million co-led by Alpha Wave Incubation (AWI) and Norwest.

Eupheus Learning: B2B edtech startup Eupheus Learning has raised $10 million in its Series C round led by private equity platform Lightrock India.

Early-stage deals

Boutique Spirit: Liquor startup Boutique Spirit Brands on Thursday said it has raised Rs 80 crore or about $10.8 million in equity and debt funding from investors including IIFL, Anicut Angel Fund, Kae Capital, and TradeCred, among others.

Vahan: Vahan, jobs and livelihood platform for blue-collar workers, has raised $8 million in its Series A round led by Silicon Valley-based Khosla Ventures. Airtel, SHAKTI VC, Pioneer Fund, Spike Ventures, Vijay Shekhar Sharma, Guru Gowrappan, Kevin Shannon and others have also joined the round.

BharatAgri: BharatAgri (formerly LeanAgri), a digital farm advisory startup, has raised $6.5 million in its Series A round led by Omnivore. Existing backers such as India Quotient and 021 Capital have also participated in the round.

Ayu Health: Ayu Health, a healthtech startup with a network of hospitals, has raised $6.3 million in its Series A round led by Vertex Ventures and Stellaris Venture Partners. 

Anar: B2B networking platform Anar has raised $6.2 million in its seed round co-led by Elevation Capital and Accel India. First Cheque and Utsav Somani along with founders of startups such as ShareChat, Meesho and BharatPe have also participated.

HexaHealth: Healthcare startup Hexahealth has raised Rs 33 crore or $4.5 million in its seed round led by impact investor Omidyar Network and Chiratae Ventures. 3one4 Capital and a clutch of healthcare professionals such as Viren Shetty, Rohit MA and Rehan Khan have also participated in the round.

Livquik Technology: Chennai-based M2P FINTECH, an API infrastructure company that enables businesses of any scale to embed financial products in their customer journeys, has announced an investment of $4 million in Livquik Technology.

Awon GameZ: Awon GameZ, an online mobile-app based gaming platform, has raised $2 million in its seed round led by family offices.

GTM Buddy: GTM Buddy, a sales-tech SaaS startup, has raised $2 million in its seed round led by Stellaris Venture Partners.

Onesto Labs: Onesto Labs, the parent company of direct-to-consumer personal care brands Chemist at Play and Bare Anatomy, has raised about $2.5 million in a funding round led by 72 Ventures, the family office of KKR India chairman Sanjay Nayar.

Paytail: BNPL fintech startup Paytail has raised $1.5 million from Cholamandalam and other marquee angel investors as part of its seed round.

4Fin: 4Fin, a Pune-based fintech startup, has raised $1.1 million in a pre-seed round.   

Easiloan: AI-enabled fintech solution for home loans, EasiLoan has raised Rs 8 crore or a little over $1 million in its maiden round led by Tomorrow Capital.

Medpho: Medpho, a Noida-based healthcare technology startup, Monday raised $1 million in an angel round led by Cygnus Medicare Group, Probal Ghoshal (Chairman, Amar Ujala), Shuchin Bajaj (Founder and Director of Ujala Cygnus), and Raghavendra Prasad (Founder, Project StepOne).

Flatheads: D2C online brand Flatheads has raised $1 million in its pre-Series A round led by We Founder Circle and Dexter Angels. Marquee investors such as Gaurav Kapur of Oaktree Sports, Sahil Barua of Delhivery and Radhikha Ghai of ShopClues have also participated.

Godamwale: Mumbai-based Godamwale raises $1 million from Capt. Anand Aryamane in the seed round, according to a release shared by the firm.

Gobbly: Gurugram-based retail technology startup Gobbly, on Tuesday announced that it has raised Rs 7.2 crore or $977K in pre-Series A round led by Anicut Angel Fund and Sauce.VC.  

Tinkerly: Tinkerly, a Jaipur-based edtech startup, has raised Rs 6.5 crore or $882K in a round by Navneet Tech Ventures (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Indian publication and content provider Navneet Education Limited (NEL).   

Artium Academy: Online music education platform Artium Academy has raised $0.75 million in a seed round led by Bollywood singer Sonu Nigam, with participation from Whiteboard Capital and JetSynthesys.

eShipz: eShipz, a SaaS-based startup offering shipping automation to SMBs and large enterprises, on Thursday said that it has raised $0.7 million in a funding round led by Indian Angel Network.

Scalenut: Scalenut, an AI-enabled content intelligence platform, has raised $0.4 million in seed led by Titan Capital, First Principles VC, AngelList, Abhishek Goyal and other angel investors.

WickedGud: WickedGud, a D2C food brand, has raised $0.34 million in its pre-Seed round led by Titan Capital. Angel investors such as Archana Priyadarshini, Aman Gupta and Sameer Mehta, and Harsh Vakharia have also joined the round.

Enercomp: Ahmedabad-based drone manufacturing, services, and AI tech startup Enercomp raised its angel round of funding of Rs 1.5 crore or $0.2 million from ah! Ventures angel platform.

Shadez: Home interiors startup Shadez has raised over $0.2 million in its pre-Series A round led by an angel investment platform Inflection Point Ventures (IPV).

Undisclosed deals this week

Genext Students, Hanchens, OneGreen, EventBeep, Atomberg Technologies, Legistify, IppoPay, and Quizbee did not disclose their financial details.

*Every week we track startups that have raised fresh investment. Stay tuned for next week roundup