Deal Roundup: Pepperfry, Vedantu, Simsim draw follow-on capital; Titan buys wearables maker HUG

The second week of February saw two Tiger Global Management backed companies -- Vedantu and Chaayos -- draw follow-on capital from new and returning investors. Apart from coming in as a return backer in those follow-on rounds, the New York headquartered alternative investments firm also co-led a $70 million round in Silicon Valley-based healthcare data analytics startups Innovaccer, which also has substantial operations in India.

Apart from Tiger Global, Chinese investors Shunwei Capital and Xiaomi, homegrown adhesives manufacturer Pidilite Industries, Wipro chairman Azim Premji’s investment firm Premji Invest and the Tata Group’s retail company Titan were among other prominent dealmakers this week.

B2B ecommerce startup Udaan, which is now valued at a massive $7.5 billion, also turned dealmaker with an investment in restaurant management platform PetPooja.

Overall, 16 startups garnered $135 million this week (taking into account only the disclosed deal values), sharply down from the $450 million reported in the previous week. Five out of the 16 deals concluded were seed stage rounds.

Top Funding Deals

SimSim: The SZS Tech-owned video commerce app raised $8.2 million from returning investors Shunwei Capital Partners and Accel India Management in a Series B round. The latest infusion takes the total capital raised by the company to $16 million.

Vedantu: Live online tutoring startup Vedantu has raised an additional $24 million as part of its Series C round, led by Menlo Park and Shanghai-based venture capital firm GGV Capital. The Bengaluru-based startup’s existing investors participated in the round, GGV Capital.

Oga: The Bengaluru-based fitness startup, owned by Qvady Technologies, raised $330,000 in a seed funding round from Inflection Point Ventures (IPV). The company earlier raised $350,000 from Pi Capital CEO David Giampaolo, a London-based investor club as well as yoga and wellness startup SARVA.

Furlenco: The furniture rental startup run by Bengaluru-based Kieraya Furnishing Solutions raised $2.24 million in its Series C round of funding led by existing investor, the Dabur family’s asset management firm Chowdry Associates. With this round, the company stands at an estimated valuation of $97 million.

Chaayos: Sunshine Teahouse, which owns and operates the omnichannel tea cafe chain, raised $21.5 million in a debt and equity round led by San Francisco headquartered hedge fund Think Investments. Think Investments, along with returning investors Tiger Global Management and SAIF Partners, infused $18.5 million while the rest was raised as debt from InnoVen Capital.

MoEngage: The user analytics and engagement platform for mobile apps raised $25 million in a Series C funding round led by Eight Roads Ventures, with participation from its US-based sister fund F-Prime Capital. Returning investors in the round included venture capital firms Matrix Partners India and Ventureast.

WorkIndia: The blue collar recruitment platform raised $5.92 million in a Series A funding round from Beijing headquartered electronic devices maker Xiaomi. The latest round takes the total capital raised by the company to nearly $12 million.

Pepperfry: Mumbai-based Pidilite Industries, maker of adhesive brands such as Fevicol, Dr Fixit and FeviKwik, led a $40 million growth round in omnichannel furniture platform Pepperfry. Existing investors Goldman Sachs, Norwest Venture Partners, Bertelsmann India and State Street Advisors also participated in the round.

PetPooja: In its first investment in a startup, business to business (B2B) ecommerce firm Udaan invested $1.94 million in a Series A round in restaurant management platform PetPooja. The funding was routed through Singapore headquartered Trustroot Internet, the holding company of Bengaluru-based Udaan. 

Brick&Bolt: The marketplace for end-to-end construction services raised $1.5 million in a seed round led by Sequoia Capital India’s accelerator programme Surge. Angel investors in the round included Livspace founders Anuj Srivastava and Ramakant Sharma; Aakash Goel, partner at Trifecta Capital; Meghna Agarwal, co-founder of Indiqube; and Navin Dhanuka of Piramal Fund Management.

Clevergene: The genomics research and analytics startup raised $631,000 in a seed funding round from early stage investment firm Auxano Trust. This is the first fundraising round by the company. cing, bioinformatics, bio-statistics, consulting, and outsourcing.

M&A  

Nestaway: Goldman Sachs-backed home rental company acquired apartment management solutions platform ApnaComplex. With the acquisition, NestAway plans to leverage the user base of ApnaComplex to get more properties on board in gated societies and high-value homes. NestAway will provide gated apartments on ApnaComplex with home services through its network of vendors, the company said in a statement.

NoBroker: The property listing portal acquired apartment management solutions firm Society Connect for an undisclosed amount in an all-cash deal. With this buy, Bengaluru-based NoBroker Technologies Solutions, which runs the platform, aims to strengthen its hold on the visitor and community management space. The company will also hire Society Connect’s employees to combine efficiencies of their enterprise resource planning (ERP) system with NoBroker’s own visitor and community management app NoBrokerHood.

Titan: Tata Group’s omnichannel retailer acquired Hyderabad-based smartwatch maker HUG Innovations in a bid to boost its consumer platform and benefit from Hug’s patented  technologies in the wearables space. HUG Innovations, under the brand name Hug, manufactures products such as gesture control smartwatches with features including making/attending calls, tracking physical activity and nutrition, playing music, finding connected devices, monitoring heart rate and detecting fatigue.