Decoding Seed round of former Swiggy CTO Dale Vaz’s startup

Foodtech decacorn Swiggy’s ex-chief technology officer Dal Vaz announced the launch of his new startup Aaritya Technologies, which raised seed funding in September 2023. The Bengaluru-based startup secured funds from Accel Partners and Elevation Capital but didn’t disclose the amount.

Startup data intelligence platform TheKredible has sifted through its regulatory filings to uncover all the essential information like funding amount, post-money valuation and shareholding pattern. 

The board at Aaritya Technologies has passed a special resolution to issue two equity shares at an issue price of Rs 11,700 per share and 56,44,548 seed compulsory convertible preference shares (CCPS) which have a conversion ratio of 117 (every 117 Seed CCPS will be converted into 1 equity share). The aforementioned shares have been issued at a consideration of Rs 56.45 crore or $6.8 million.

Accel Partners and Elevation Capital injected the sum of Rs 28.22 crore or $3.4 million each. At the time of announcement, Vaz also said that the firm’s angel allocation will be announced soon. However, it has not filed any related documents yet.

As per TheKredible’s estimates, the company has been valued at around $25 million or Rs 204 crore (post-money). 

The company intends to utilize the proceeds to meet general operating, working capital requirements, capital expenditure and to expand the business operations, as per the regulatory filings.

According to the company’s Linkedin profile, it is a personalized trading platform.

Aaritya also passed a separate special resolution to create Employee Stock Option Plan 2023 of up to 26,316 equity shares amounting to Rs 30.8 crore.

Following the allotment of the seed round, Accel Partners and Elevation Capital acquired 13.82% stake each. The company also has an ESOP Pool of over 15%. For the complete shareholding pattern, visit here.

Vaz joined Swiggy as the head of engineering and data science in 2018, and became the group chief technology officer in early 2020.

During his tenure, he managed technology for various Swiggy services, including Food, Instamart, Dineout, SuprDaily, Genie, Minis, Meat, and the alcohol delivery business.

In April, amid a series of exits and broader restructuring ahead of its IPO, Vaz left Swiggy. Before joining Swiggy, Vaz served as the director of software engineering at Amazon India, and started his career at Infosys.