TaxiForSure co-founder, others back BHIVE Workspace

BHIVE Workspace, a Bangalore-based workspace solution provider for startups, has raised an undisclosed amount in angel funding from a bunch of investors including TaxiForSure co-founder Raghunandan G, Venturesity co-founder Rajesh Rai and Patni family scion Arihant Patni.

Sanjay Mirchandani, owner of Mirchandani Group and Arun Narayan, director of UK India Business Council have also participated in the angel round.

The company plans to use the capital raised for overall expansion. "We want to make all our available workspace operational, increase the number of seats, increase our central team headcount and investment in technology," Ravindra M.K., co-founder of BHIVE, told Techcircle.in.

BHIVE was founded by Shesh Paplikar and Ravindra a year ago with the vision of providing workspaces and business centres with a focus on co-working and community for startups. It houses startups, small businesses and mid-range companies. Paplikar, also the founder of big data analytics firm Tusker Data Lab, has worked with Bloomberg R&D and Global Crossing while Ravindra has worked with SAP, Hexaware Technologies and Comat Technologies before launching BHIVE.

Today, the company operates three plug 'n' play workspaces in Bangalore and plans to open the fourth workspace shortly. BHIVE claims to house nearly 90 startups covering 4000 active members.

"Entrepreneurs need all the help they can get to achieve their vision. Physical workspace is one thing, but having support from a community of mentors and other entrepreneurs in the same space is a big asset. BHIVE aims to provide this ecosystem in a way that will really help startups get to the next level," Patni said. Arihant Patni is the managing director of Hive Technologies and son of Gajendra Patni, one of four Patni brothers who started Patni Computers and later sold it to IGATE.

BHIVE claims to offer a bunch of benefits to its member startups including access to the startup community and global investor network, free events, mentoring sessions, panel discussions and workshops across varied areas such as funding, women entrepreneurship, investments, legal procedures and more.

Mycuteoffice, Nasscom Startup Warehouse and Kochi's startup village are other similar space-sharing hubs for startups. In May 2015, Mycuteoffice had raised an undisclosed amount of angel funding.