Student housing platform Stanza Living sets up employee contingency fund

Student housing platform Stanza Living, owned by DTwelve Spaces, has set up an emergency contingency fund to cover the medical expenses of any employee who tests positive for Covid-19.

The New Delhi headquartered company has raised Rs 10 lakh so far, it said in a statement. All its employees have voluntarily contributed a part of their salaries to the fund and the co-founders of the company have pledged to donate 50% of the total employee contribution, it added.

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“Businesses have been going through a tough time with the Covid-19 pandemic spreading, and the co-living space is no different. The key focus area for preparedness is the safety of our workforce, as they ensure we stay agile and adaptive to external factors,” Anindya Dutta, managing director and co-founder, Stanza Living, said.

The company also has other initiatives in place, the statement said. Several of its corporate employees already work from home and a group of staff members, called Corona Warriors, will take care of people living in its residences, it said. Its Skill Camp initiative will host webinars to ensure that on-ground employees and those working from home have opportunities to learn beyond their daily jobs, the statement added. Additionally, the annual sick leave quota of employees has been extended till April 15 from April 1.

Stanza Living was founded in 2017 by Sandeep Dalmia and Dutta. Dalmia is an alumnus of Delhi College of Engineering and IIM Ahmedabad. He was also a principal at the Boston Consulting Group. Dutta, an alumnus of IIT Kharagpur and IIM Ahmedabad, was a real estate investor with Oaktree Capital and has worked at Goldman Sachs as well.

The company has raised $70 million in total, to date, from marquee investors such as Falcon Edge Capital, Sequoia Capital, Accel, Matrix Partners and Alteria Capital.

Read: How Stanza Living is building out a full-stack coliving solution for migrant students, professionals

Earlier this week, Stanza Living announced that it will offer its residences to people who have been asked to vacate their hostels and paying guest (PG) accommodation in the wake of the Coronavirus outbreak, at flexible contract periods and rentals. The startup said it will also offer its residences for quarantine purposes.

Earlier this month, it received an undisclosed amount of capital from Equity International, a private equity firm founded by American billionaire Sam Zell. The investment was part of the company’s Series C round.

In December last year, it bagged $5.7 million in venture debt from Alteria Capital.