Tuesday, March 19

FUNDING

Startup Funding News: Get the latest news on startup funding, small business funding, investor management and many more about funding on Pixr8.

IIT Bombay Incubated Lucideus Tech Raises Funds From Angel Investor
FUNDING

IIT Bombay Incubated Lucideus Tech Raises Funds From Angel Investor

Cyber security service provider Lucideus Tech has received angel funding from Amit Choudhary, director of Motilal Oswal Private Equity Advisors. The start-up, which was incubated by IIT-Bombay, has previously received funding from Anand Chandrasekaran (former Snapdeal chief product officer) and Flipkart chief financial officer Sanjay Baweja. It helps enterprises assess risks to their IT infrastructure. "Typically, our angel investors have invested in the range of about USD 50,000-100,000 individually," Lucideus co-founder and CEO Saket Modi said without disclosing the size of the latest round of funding. Lucideus will use the funds for expanding its team and business operations. "The funding has also to do more with the mentorship that our angel investors provide. We have st...
One97 Communication Which Runs Paytm Raises 400 Crore From Mediatek, Valuation Upto $5 Billion
FUNDING

One97 Communication Which Runs Paytm Raises 400 Crore From Mediatek, Valuation Upto $5 Billion

Taiwanese chip designer MediaTekis investing USD 60 million (about Rs 400 crore) in One97 Communications, which runs Paytm. The transaction values the digital payment services and e-commerce firm at about USD 5 billion. When contacted, a Paytm spokesperson confirmed the development. The funds will be used for expanding payments and commerce businesses and for building and launching the payments bank, she added. Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma has earlier said its payments bank will become operational later this year. Interestingly, Mediatek is also an investor in Paytm's rival, Mobikwik in India. In May this year, Mediatek had participated in an estimated USD 50 million fund raising by Mobikwik. Alibaba-backed Paytm is looking at raising about USD 300 million (over Rs 2...
Zapmart to Raise $10 Million From First Round of Funding
FUNDING

Zapmart to Raise $10 Million From First Round of Funding

Mumbai based online grocery startup Zapmart is all set to raise $10 Million in its first round of funding from investors. Zapmart which is a self-funded startup by Parvez Siddiqui has got a seed funding of Rs.3 Crore, which was led by two businessmen from the real estate sector. "The seed funding will be used to strengthen our technology backbone and logistics within Mumbai," said Parvez Siddiqui, founder of Zapmart. Zapmart is also keen to raise $10 million from its Series A round of funding, in which they are in talks with few angel investors and are looking out for large venture capital funds. “The Series A funds will be utilized for geographic expansion in Maharashtra and especially in Pune within this year. Another main usage of the funds will be utilized for turning k...
Livspace Raises Rs 100 Cr Series B Funding From Existing Investors
FUNDING

Livspace Raises Rs 100 Cr Series B Funding From Existing Investors

Online home design company Livspace today said it has raised Rs 100 crore from existing investors in a second strategic round (Series B) of funding. The round was led by Bessemer Ventures Partners and saw participation from Jungle Ventures and Helion, Livspace said in a statement here. The funds will be used to launch services across cities -- Noida, Gurgaon, Mumbai in 2016 and Pune, Hyderabad in the first half of 2017, it added. This round of funding comes close on the heels of the company's launch of its Home Design Automation Platform. "With this round of funding we will aim to reach revenue of USD 100 million by the end of 2017 and achieve operational profitability across cities," Anuj Srivastava, CEO and Co-founder of Livspace, said. Founded by Srivastava and Ramakant Sharm...
Fintech Firm LoanTap Raises $3 mn From HNIs
FUNDING

Fintech Firm LoanTap Raises $3 mn From HNIs

Fintech platform LoanTap today said it has secured USD 3 million in a first strategic round of funding (Series A) from high net worth individuals (HNIs) Abhishek Pandey and Jaysukh Sapra. LoanTap said nearly 85 per cent of the funding, which was led by Mumbai-based HNIs, will be used for onward lending by the platform, while a part of the remaining capital will also be used to augment its technology and distribution frameworks. Further, LoanTap will be leveraging the raised capital to expand its operations in NCR, Mumbai Metropolitan Region, Pune and Bangalore, it said. LoanTap has an inhouse NBFC platform delivering flexible EMI-free loan and overdraft products to salaried professionals. Headquartered in Mumbai with the back office in Pune, LoanTap follows an agency-based coll...
BlackBerry to Raise $605 Million From Shareholder Fairfax, Others
FUNDING

BlackBerry to Raise $605 Million From Shareholder Fairfax, Others

Troubled smartphone maker BlackBerry Ltd said it would raise about $605 million by selling convertible debentures to shareholder Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd and other investors. The Canadian company will also redeem on Sept. 2 roughly $1.25 billion worth of outstanding debentures carrying a coupon of 6 percent, it said on Friday. The new debt that BlackBerry plans to issue will have a coupon of 3.75 percent and will be due in November 2020. If all of the new debt is converted into stock, it will represent about 11.57 percent of BlackBerry's outstanding shares, the company said. FairFax, led by well-known contrarian investor Prem Watsa, is BlackBerry's second largest shareholder with a stake of about 8.9 percent, according to Reuters data. Once a dominant force in smartpho...
Couponhaat.in Gears up to Raise $2M in Series A Funding
FUNDING

Couponhaat.in Gears up to Raise $2M in Series A Funding

Delhi-based start-up and Indian e-commerce company Couponhaat which provides best coupons and deals for online shoppers, is gearing up to raise around $2 Million in series A funding. The fund raising plan is in sync with its expansion plans and increasing the team size. So far, Couponhaat is fully self-funded. Within just one year of its operation, Couponhaat has emerged as the fresh face of the online coupons and deals industry. Couponhaat offers more than 300,000 coupons to redeem and 7000 live coupons, thousands of product pages and countless deals listed on the site. Over last quarter Couponhaat has raised its graph tremendously and attracted over 2 million hits on the website. The traffic is steadily increasing each month, since the time of its very inception in the month of Apr...
MobiKwik Raises $40 million (Rs 268 Cr) From South Africa Based Net1
FUNDING

MobiKwik Raises $40 million (Rs 268 Cr) From South Africa Based Net1

South Africa based Net1 will invest USD 40 million (about Rs 268 crore) in Indian digital payment company, MobiKwik. "Net 1 UEPS Technologies has signed a subscription agreement with One MobiKwik Systems. As part of the strategic partnership, Net1 will invest USD 40 million in MobiKwik," the companies said in a statement. In addition, Net1's virtual card technology will be integrated across all MobiKwik wallets, it added. MobiKwik, which has over 32 million mobile wallet users and one lakh retailers onboard, has Sequoia Capital, Tree Line Asia, American Express, Cisco Investments, GMO Payment Gateway and MediaTek among its investors. Over the next three years, MobiKwik aims to reach 150 million users and 500,000 merchants. In May this year, Mobikwik had raised about Rs 330 crore...
Freecharge, Freshdesk Founders Invest in O2O Platform Crownit
FUNDING

Freecharge, Freshdesk Founders Invest in O2O Platform Crownit

Freecharge founders Kunal Shah and Sandeep Tandon, and Freshdesk founder Gireesh Mathrubootham have invested in Crownit, an Online to Offline (O2O) local merchants discovery platform. The size of the deal is however not disclosed. Ex-Snapdeal chief product officer Anand Chandrasekaran has also invested in the venture, the company said in a statement. "We are building Indias largest offline deals company using app-only cost efficient cash-back approach. We are replicating the success of Meituan (China's largest offline deals company) in India. We will continue to scale using product innovation without the need of large capital," Sameer Grover, founder and CEO, Crownit said. Crownit primarily targets offline merchants segment with direct consumer discounts and deals category in India...
Zoomcar Raises $24 Million Fresh Funding From Ford Motor
FUNDING

Zoomcar Raises $24 Million Fresh Funding From Ford Motor

Zoomcar, a Bengaluru-based self-drive car rental company raises $24 million (about Rs 160 crore) funding led by Ford Smart Mobility, a subsidiary of Ford Motor Company. Existing investors Sequoia Capital, Nokia Growth Partners (NGP) and Empire Angels also participated in the round. Zoomcar, which competes with Carzonrent and JustRide, lets users rent cars by the hour or day. It hopes to reach a fleet size of 25,000 in 25 cities by 2018. "We are at an inflection point. Currently, we have 2,000 cars with a presence in 7 cities. We are planning to launch in Kolkata soon and go to more tier-2 cities and penetrate deeper in existing cities," said Greg Moran, who moved from New York to Bengaluru in 2013 to start Zoomcar. This is Ford's first such investment in India. It has been Zoomca...
Witworks Raises Funding From Fireside Ventures, Investopad and Execs of Ola, ITC & Oyo
FUNDING

Witworks Raises Funding From Fireside Ventures, Investopad and Execs of Ola, ITC & Oyo

Witworks Consumer Technologies today said it has received an undisclosed amount of seed funding led by Fireside Ventures, Investopad and executives from Ola, Oyo Rooms and ITC. The consumer technology company will use the funds for development and launch of Blink a wrist-wearable platform designed to provide access to contextual information and services on the go. Witworks aims to tap into the nascent smart wearables market currently dominated by large technology players. "Witworks has raised a seed investment round from Fireside Ventures, Investopad, P39 Capital and a syndicated group of angels, including Anupam Mittal (Shaadi.com founder), Pranay Jivrajka (Ola COO), Maninder Gulati (OYO Rooms chief of strategy), Abhinav Sinha (OYO Rooms COO) and top executives from ITC," it said i...
Shaadisaga Raises Funding From Kunal Shah & Others
FUNDING

Shaadisaga Raises Funding From Kunal Shah & Others

New Delhi: Online wedding platform Shaadisaga had raised an undisclosed amount of pre-series A funding from Anupam Mittal, founder of matrimonial website Shaadi.com, Freecharge founders Kunal Shah and Sandeep Tandon, and Dheeraj Jain, partner at UK-based hedge fund Redcliffe Capital. ah!Ventures and Rohit Chokhani of White Unicorn Ventures were among the other investors who participated in the round. Founded by Himanshu Kapsime and Manish Garg, Shaadisaga offers couples wedding planning services, providing photographers, make-up artists, marriage venue and so on. “Our team is using technology to essentially bring the offline wedding planning experience onto an online platform, while adding convenience and cost-effectiveness,” said Kapsime. The company will use the money in technolo...