Hyperlocal food & grocery e-com startup PepperTap raises $10M led by SAIF

Gurgaon-based Nuvo Logistics Pvt Ltd, which runs a hyperlocal grocery and food e-tailing startup under PepperTap, has secured $10 million (Rs 62 crore) in Series A funding from SAIF Partners and existing investor Sequoia Capital, it said on Wednesday.

The funding will be used for hiring and to expand the reach to 10 more cities in the country by the end of 2015. It is currently operational only in Gurgaon and a few parts of Delhi.

Ravi Adusumalli, managing director, SAIF Partners, said: "Grocery in India is a huge market and grocery shopping on mobile is already seeing strong adoption. We believe that PepperTap's hyperlocal marketplace approach is the most efficient way to cater to this market, and can scale very rapidly."

Founded in November last year by Navneet Singh and Milind Sharma, the startup is a mobile-first hyperlocal grocery delivery service that provides on demand grocery products to consumers. It claims that it delivers the products within two hours after the order is placed. Although also available as a web product, it is primarily pushing its apps which are available on the Android and iOS platforms.

A location-based platform, PepperTap offers a wide range of products that include grocery & staples, fruits & vegetables, household & beauty care, among others.

An IIM-Ahmedabad alumnus, Singh has over a decade of experience across financial services, transportation and logistics industries. Sharma has four years of experience in client acquisition and general management in the e-commerce industry. Prior to setting up PepperTap, the duo had co-founded NuvoEx, an e-commerce focused reverse logistics company.

In February, the firm had disclosed a seed round of funding from Sequoia.

Other players in on-demand grocery ordering and delivery space that have recently received backing include ZopNow, which recently raised $10 million from Dragoneer, Accel Partners, Qualcomm Ventures and Times Internet, and Grofers, which just received an additional $35 million from Tiger Global and Sequoia.

Other ventures in this space include BigBasket, Aaramshop and MyGrahak.

(Edited by Joby Puthuparampil Johnson)