Online grocer Town Essentials raises $1M from Infosys' Sharad Hegde, others

Bangalore-based online grocer Town Essentials Pvt Ltd has raised $1 million (around Rs 6.6 crore) in a fresh round of angel funding led by Infosys' first non-founder employee Sharad Hegde.

The other investors include former Workday executive Girish Reddy, Siddharth Patil from Twitter, and existing investor Shrikant Patil. The investors will be part of Town Essentials' governing council, The Economic Times.

Town Essentials' founder Amar Krishnamurthy confirmed the development but did not provide details immediately.

The company plans to use the funds for marketing activities.

Founded in 2003, Town Essentials delivers farm-fresh groceries in Bangalore. The company claims that it gets 200 orders a day in Bangalore.

With this latest round, the company has raised close to Rs 12 crore from angel investors.

In addition, Town Essentials has launched a new platform called Morning Drop. The platform will focus on subscription-based products such as milk, bread and eggs. Besides, it also plans to expand its customer base to about 10,000, and also launch a mobile app for customers.

Town Essentials has been in the grocery delivery business for 11 years, but the hyperlocal grocery space has seen a bunch of startups enter the market and many have raised funding too. Some of its rivals include BigBasket, RainCan besides grocery marketplaces such as PepperTap, Grofers, ZopNow, Jugnoo and Satvacart.

In August, BigBasket.com, owned and operated by Bangalore-based SuperMarket Grocery Supplies Pvt Ltd, raised $50 million led by existing investor Bessemer Venture Partners.

Pune-based Bloomskart Retail Pvt Ltd, the firm behind online grocery e-commerce startup RainCan, raised about $100,000 in seed funding from angel investors.

In June this year, Ahmedabad-based e-grocery startup Myonsto.com secured Rs 2 crore (about $315,000) in angel funding from Oswal Industries' director Jayant Bokadia.

In-fact, the country's largest e-commerce player Flipkart also forayed into the e-grocery space through a new standalone app, christened Nearby. The app is currently operational for 14 locations across Bangalore. And, cab aggregator Ola also jumped onto the e-grocery bandwagon this year with its standalone hyperlocal grocery delivery app Ola Store.