Weekly wrap: Messaging platform Gupshup raises $240 million for share buy-back, Mamaearth turns 'soonicorn' with $50-million fundraise

B2B payments platform Nium has raised a $200 million plus Series D round led by Riverwood Capital, a US-based high-growth tech investor. Temasek, Visa, Vertex Ventures, Atinum Group of Funds, Beacon Venture Capital, Rocket Capital Investment, and other notable angel investors, including DoorDash executive, Gokul Rajaram; Chief Product Officer at FIS, Vicky Bindra; and, Co-Founder of Tribe Capital, Arjun Sethi, also contributed to the round. The new funding round values Nium at over $1 billion. The funding will be used to expand Nium’s payments network infrastructure, drive innovative product development, attract top industry talent, and acquire strategic technologies and companies.

Mohalla Tech, the parent company behind social media platforms Moj and ShareChat, has raised $145 million as an extension of its Series F round, at a valuation of $2.88 billion. The investment has been led by Singapore state investor Temasek, Moore Strategic Ventures (MSV) and Mirae-Naver Asia Growth Fund, which is jointly set up by Mirae Asset and South Korean web portal Naver Corp. This is an additional investment beyond the $502 million raised in April this year from Tiger Global, Lightspeed, Snap and Twitter. The company had been valued at $2.1 billion at the time. Founded in 2015, Mohalla Tech has now raised over $911 million across seven fundraising rounds.

D2C personal care startup Mamaearth has raised $50 million in a funding round led by Belgian investor Sofina Ventures, valuing the company at $730 million. Existing investor Sequoia Capital also participated in the funding round. Meanwhile, early investors Fireside Ventures, Stellaris Venture Partners, Sharp Ventures and Titan Capital also sold a portion of their stake in the round. The company will use the fresh funds to double down on its brand’s growth through deeper offline expansion and explore inorganic growth opportunities in beauty and personal care.

 

D2C beauty brand MyGlamm has closed its Series C funding at Rs 530 crore, raising an additional Rs 355 crore in a round led by venture capital firm Accel. The round also saw participation from existing investors, including Bessemer Venture Partners, L’Occitane, Ascent, Amazon, the Mankekar family, Trifecta and Strides Ventures. MyGlamm will be utilising its latest funding to invest in product development, support data science and technology research, increase offline expansion, fund working capital requirements and expand content creation capabilities and digital reach of POPxo and Plixxo.

Cryptocurrency exchange platform CoinDCX is in talks to raise $100-120 million, in a financing round that could value the company at over $1 billion. Facebook co-founder Eduardo Saverin's B Capital Group is likely to lead the investment, The Economic Times has reported. Existing investors Polychain Capital and Coinbase Ventures are also expected to participate in the fundraising. If CoinDCX is valued at over $1 billion, it would become the first cryptocurrency exchange to enter the unicorn club.

D2C brand G.O.A.T. BrandLabs has raised $36 million in Series A funding round led by Tiger Global, with participation from Flipkart Ventures, the early-stage venture fund of Flipkart, Mayfield, Nordstar & Better Capital and prominent angel investors. G.O.A.T. Brand Labs was launched by Rishi Vasudev, a former Flipkart executive who had headed Flipkart’s Fashion along with Myntra and Jabong for more than five years. The startup says it will invest fresh capital in digitally native brands to accelerate its growth. According to the company, it is in advanced discussions with at least 10 brands for acquisition and is looking for brands in fashion, beauty, personal care, and home and kitchen spaces.

Vauld, a crypto platform for financial products, has raised $25 million in a Series A funding round led by PayPal founder Peter Thiel's Valar Ventures. Existing investors Pantera Capital, Coinbase Ventures, CMT Digital, Gumi Cryptos, Robert Leshner, and Cadenza Capital, among others, also participated in the round. The company has raised $27 million total capital since its inception. The funding will be used to support the company’s international growth and licensing as well as expand its retail crypto banking and investing platform, the firm said.

Mortgage tech startup Easy has announced that it has raised $15 million as part of its Series A funding round. The round was led by Xponentia Capital Partners and saw participation from global VC funds, existing investor Harbourfront Capital, Finsight VC, RaSa Future Fund, Navida Capital AB, Helena Wasserman Eriksson, and Integra Software. Easy operates across geographies in a ‘phygital’ model and provides an instant decision on home loans. The firm aims to achieve $150 million assets under management over the next 24 months and will expand its network to more than 100 locations across the country.

Intercity mobility startup Zingbus has raised Rs 44.6 crore in a funding round led by Infoedge ventures. The pre-series A round also saw participation from investors from Silicon Valley like Funders Club, Pioneer fund, Anim Fund (Founders Fund Scout), Locus Ventures, and Liquid 2 Ventures. Existing investors AdvantEdge Technology Fund, 9 Unicorns, and Venture Catalyst also invested in this funding round. The startup will use a fresh influx of capital to develop technology for the next leap of improvement in traveller experience and expand the service to new geographies. The startup is also hiring across engineering, product, business, and operations profiles.

Health food brand The Whole Truth has raised $6 million in a Series A funding round led by Sequoia Capital India. The round saw participation from existing investors Matrix Partners India and Sauce.Vc, along with a clutch of marquee angels like Flipkart CEO Kalyan Krishnamurthy, Udaan Co-Founder Sujeet Kumar and BharatPe Co-Founders Ashneer Grover and Shashvat Nakrani. The company said the fresh capital will be used to hire talent, expand manufacturing capabilities and enter new clean food categories. The clean-label food brand claims to have grown 12x in the last 18 months.

Slice, a fintech startup, has raised Rs 75.5 crore in debt in Q1FY22 from financial institutions such as Northern Arc Capital, Niyogin Fintech Limited, Credit Saison India, and Vivriti Capital among others. The payments and credit startup had launched an instant rewards programme, and 'slice in 3' feature in June 2021. Slice in 3 is a pioneer feature that allows users to convert their monthly bills into three months without any extra cost. Following the launch, Slice has had robust growth in monthly new card issuance, making it the third-largest card issuer in the country, the firm claimed.

Strata, a tech-enabled commercial real estate investment platform, has raised $6 million in Series A round, co-led by Kotak Investment Advisors, Gruhas Proptech, a fund of Nikhil Kamath of Zerodha, Abhijeet Pai of Puzzolana Group for proptech investments and special situations, and Sabre Investments, which is the investment arm of Rahul Talwar, who belongs to the promoter family of DLF. This round also saw participation from Elevation Capital, Mayfield India and Gemba Capital. The company said it will use this capital to expand aggressively in the next year, taking its current asset under management (AUM) of approximately Rs 330 crore to Rs 1,500 crore by FY21-22. The startup is eyeing to spread its geographical footprint across key markets of Mumbai, Hyderabad, Chennai, Bengaluru, Delhi and Pune. It is also looking to accelerate product development and introduce new investment offerings.

Israel-based tech startup Coralogix has raised $55 million in a Series C funding round led by Greenfield Partners. The latest round of funding also saw participation from Red Dot Capital Partners, StageOne Ventures, Eyal Ofer’s OG Tech, Janvest Capital Partners, Maor ventures, and 2B Angels. In October 2020, the company had raised $25 million in a Series B funding round and had also announced a strategic expansion into India, with a commitment to invest over $30 million in the upcoming five years. The company said it is currently pursuing its investment goals for the Indian market to provide sales and customer success support to India-based companies. As part of its expansion plans for India, Coralogix has set up a new Amazon Web Services (AWS), Mumbai region, offering superior server support and data storage capabilities to its India-based customers.