India’s 100th unicorn🦄, Zepto raises $200 Mn💸, Delhivery IPO soon📊
Open turns India's 100th startup unicorn, Zepto nears unicorn status, Delhivery may launch IPO soon, Funding Deals & more.
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Open turns unicorn with $50 million funding from IIFL🦄
Neobanking platform Open has closed a $50 million funding round led by IIFL Finance at a valuation of $1 billion. This makes it India’s latest startup unicorn and, by some counts, the 100th billion-dollar company minted in the country.
Existing investors Temasek, Tiger Global and 3one4 Capital also participated in the round. Open will use the funds and IIFL Finance’s strategic expertise to build a lending business.
After setting a blistering pace in 2021, India’s startup ecosystem has been churning out relatively few unicorns this year. In March and April, only four unicorns were minted in India, from 10 during the same period last year.
Zepto nears unicorn status with $200 mn fundraising💸
Kiranakart Technologies Pvt. Ltd, which runs the 10-minute grocery delivery platform Zepto, has raised $200 million in a Series D funding round led by American technology startup accelerator Y Combinator’s Continuity Fund, which valued it at $900 million.
Zepto claims to have posted 800% quarter-on-quarter growth in revenue while reducing its burn rate 5X on a per-order basis.
The fresh capital will be deployed for growing ‘sustainably’ across India, as it looks to hire across engineering, analytics, operations, marketing, finance, and human resource divisions.
Zepto has over 50,000 delivery partners and around 1,000 employees. It plans to double its employee base in the next one year.
Hot Shorts⚡
Toothsi, a dental startup, has raised $40 million in funding from Eight Roads Ventures, South Korea-based Paramark and IIFL, among others.
AI-powered smart interviewing platform BarRaiser has raised $4.2 million in seed funding round led by 021 Capital and Global Founders Capital.
Social commerce startup Frendy has raised Rs 23 crore ($3 million) in Series A funding round led by New York's Marv Capital and UK-based Centera Fund.
Twixor, a low-code no-code conversational AI and process automation platform has bagged $2.4 Million in Series A round led by Indo-US corridor VC firm Season Two Ventures, Axilor Ventures and The Chennai Angels.
Delhivery may launch IPO at reduced size of Rs 5,500 crore📊
Delhivery, an integrated logistics firm, is likely to launch its initial public offering this month. The company may cut the issue size to Rs 5,500 crore from Rs 7,460 crore it had planned earlier due to challenging market conditions.
The Gurgaon-based startup held a board meeting on Saturday to discuss whether it should go ahead with the IPO this month. The board cleared the plan and the offer is likely to launch after the LIC IPO subscription window closes on May 9, said sources aware of the matter.
Delhivery's IPO was cleared by Sebi in January but the company had to postpone the share sale due to weak market sentiment.
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