Exclusive: Tatva rebrands to Traya after Rs 4.5 cr seed round led by Kae, Whiteboard

Healthcare startup Tatvartha Health has raised its first institutional investment in a seed funding round led by venture capital fund Kae Capital and Whiteboard Capital, and rebranded from Tatva Health to Traya Health, the company told TechCircle in an interview.

The seed investment, at Rs 4.5 crore (about $605,103 as per current exchange rates) was closed in early 2020, when the company was amid an operational revamp during the nationwide Covid-19 lockdown. 

Other investors included Steadview Capital vice president Puneet Kumar and BharatPe group president Suhail Sameer.

The funding, which has provided the Mumbai-based startup with a runway of about 15-18 months, has so far been used in technology ramp up, research and development of its products, and clinical research.

Incorporated in March 2019, Tatvartha Health provides doctor prescribed and customized hair loss solutions, through what it said is a combination of three sciences - ayurveda, allopathy, and nutrition. 

The company was co-founded by Saloni Anand and Altaf Saiyed. The MBA graduates came up with the idea of the startup after Altaf’s bout with a hair loss issue, and the experience of its prognosis.

"We have built an online diagnosis algorithm that generates a report and helps people understand the cause of hairloss, recommended treatment and how long it will one take to see visible results. Once a customer enrolls and pays up for the plan, our team of doctors actually take a look at the case and build the entire prescription. Each product is customised and packed as per the prescription,” Saiyed told TechCircle.

Tatvartha Health is Stanford Graduate School of Business alumnus Saiyed’s second entrepreneurial venture. He had previously founded Hav Gourmet in 2015, a cafeteria management solution provider, which shut shop in 2020.

"Altaf and Saloni's customer-first approach reflects strongly in their customer's success - they have seen not only a reduction in hairfall, but also significant improvements in overall wellbeing. We felt their unique offering of doctor-backed, personalized products based on a combination of sciences along with highly tech-enabled customer service was the right way to solve the problem,” Kae Capital partner Gaurav Chaturvedi, said in a statement on Thursday.

Traya currently has a customer run rate of 2,000 to 3,000 orders a month. It expects to reach 12,000 by May 2021. With the rebranding, early November of 2020, it expects to enter healthcare product lines beyond its primary area of hair care solutions.

“We have (health history) data of 20,000 people who have filled our surveys and questionnaires… Even today, we try to fix guts to be able to treat hair loss. So there are gut issues, hair loss issues, sleep issues... That’s when we started thinking about rebranding to understand what we want to stand for, as a brand,” Saloni Anand told TechCircle.

About 95% of the startup’s current customer base is 25-35 years old, she added. The startup aims to continue to serve the same target group, in an effort to bring convenience to treatment of lifestyle related-health care problems for millennials.