OTT platform STAGE to utilise Series A fundraise of Rs 40 crore for business expansion in Rajasthan, Haryana

After losing a Rs 40 crore viral content company overnight, Vinay Singhal and his co-founders went on to create a Netflix for Indian dialects called STAGE.

A hyperlocal OTT platform, STAGE has now raised Rs 40 crore in a Series-A funding round led by Blume Ventures with participation from NB Ventures, Dholakia Ventures, TSM Ventures, WeFounderCircle, Mumbai Angels and others, along with existing investors.

In an interview with CNBC-TV18, Singhal said they will be utilising the funds to expand the business in Haryana and Rajasthan. He added that the company aims to cover the top 20 dialects by 2027.

“Haryanvi is spoken in about eight million households, Rajasthani is spoken in about 25 million households, so these are very large markets and we plan to go very deep in them for next 12-15 months. Post that, we will be in the market to raise Series B so that we can launch new dialects. The target is to cover the top 20 dialects by 2027,” Singhal said.

Also, Utpal Isser, Co-Founder & MD of SarvaGram, and Jyotsna Krishnan, Managing Partner at Elevar Equity, spoke about how SarvaGram plans to utilise its Series C fundraise of $35 million. The Mumbai-based startup operates a data science-enabled platform that offers users personal loans, gold loans, consumer durable loans, farm loans, and business loans.

Moreover, Rohit Gajbhiye, Founder & CEO of Financepeer, spoke about the road ahead for the company. Founded in 2017, the fintech provides interest-free EMIs to finance education, and collects commission from the educational institutions. Financepeer has raised two rounds of funding so far, with $31 million having come in April 2022.