Darwinbox raises $40 Mn funding from Canada's OTPP

Software-as-a-service (SaaS) firm Darwinbox has secured $40 million in a funding round from Teachers’ Venture Growth (TVG), the late-stage venture and growth investment arm of Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan.

Prior to this, the Hyderabad-based company had raised $140 million in March this year in Series D funding round from Partners Group and KKR along with participation from Gravity Holdings. It has raised $280 million till to date. Soon after the fundraise, it also announced an ESOP buyback plan worth $10 million. 

Co-founded by Jayant Paleti, Rohit Chennamaneni, and Chaitanya Peddi, Darwinbox is a cloud-based HR tech platform that helps with recruitment, payroll, employee engagement, talent management, and people analytics. Last year, the company partnered with Microsoft to integrate its HCM platform with Microsoft's tools, aiming to improve the employee experience.

Darwinbox claims to have served more than 1,000 enterprises in various sectors across 130 countries. Its customer base includes companies such as Starbucks, Nivea, Cigna, WeWork and Crisil. Over the past few years, it has been expanding overseas, including Asia-Pacific, West Asia, the UK and the US. In August 2024, the firm announced the elevation of Vineet Singh, its chief technology officer (CTO), to the position of co-founder.

The company recently launched an AI-powered product suite spanning multiple HR functions and is actively developing AI-driven agents to assist HR professionals in talent acquisition, digital transformation, and other areas. 

According to data intelligence platform TheKredible, Darwinbox reported Rs 392.95 crore in revenue from operations in FY24 with a net loss of Rs 191.82 crore. Its FY25 results has yet to come.

OTPP makes its growth equity investments through the Teachers’ Venture Growth vehicle and has backed Indian startups including Mintifi, Perfios and Xpressbees.