Startup news and updates: Daily roundup (September 3, 2024)
YourStory presents the daily news roundup from the Indian startup ecosystem and beyond. Here's the roundup for Tuesday, September 3, 2024.
Funding news
BigEndian bags $3M seed funding by Vertex Ventures SEA & India
Semiconductor design startup BigEndian has raised $3 million in seed funding in a round led by Vertex Ventures SEA & India and strategic investors.
The company plans to use the funds to develop homegrown semiconductor IP in India, including its surveillance system-on-chip (SoC) solution. It will use the proceeds to expand the company’s engineering team, enhance research and development capabilities, and scale operations.
“Besides our SoCs, we are also building an advanced, truly Indian ecosystem with upstream and downstream innovations, which would be transformative in the nascent Indian semiconductors industry,” said Sunil Kumar, Co-founder and CEO of BigEndian.
“Realignment of electronics supply chains has provided a rare opportunity for India to become a global leader in semiconductors,” said Ben Mathias, Managing Partner of Vertex Ventures SEA & India.
The company was founded by Sunil Kumar (CEO), Renuka Prasad (Head of System Engineering), Harpreet Wadhawan (CFO), Dinesh Annayya (Head of Silicon Engineering), Kanagaraju Ponnusamy (Head of Engineering), and Jansen Cheng (Head of Global Business Development).
Apparel brand Theater raises $1.5M in pre-Series A funding
D2C fashion brand Theater raises $1.5 million in pre-series A round led by Prath Ventures, with additional participation from existing angel investors, the company said in a press note.
“This funding empowers us to drive growth through new channels like quick commerce, expand our offline presence, and accelerate our design iteration and production processes,” said Sarthak Aggarwal, Co-founder and CEO of Theater.
The company expects to use the fund to push forward with its plans of becoming a design-driven, mass-premium fashion brand, specializing in women’s footwear, stockings, perfumes, and bags. Theater was founded by Sarthak Aggarwal, Vikram Jain, Karan Jain, and Shruti Aggarwal.
Mytek Innovations raises Rs 6 Cr in debt
EPC and manufacturing marketplace Mytek Innovations on Tuesday raised Rs 6 crore in debt, under its overall plans to raise up to $10 million (Rs 84 crore) by December in debt and equity to cash in on the improving macro environment and cater to its growing order pipeline.
Founded in 2020 by Shivkumar Borade and Ashwajeet Wankhede, the company clocked a Rs 251 crore order book at the end of FY24 and has a targeted revenue of Rs 320 crore at the end of this fiscal.
The company has been working on increasing its order pipeline over the years. At the end of FY 22-23, the company had an order pipeline of Rs 119 crore and revenues of Rs 10.48 crore.
“We are helping SMEs solve a multitude of problems. SMEs don’t have enough working capital to complete the project in defined timelines and also often don’t have the capital to furbish performance guarantees. We help them do end-to-end execution across many issues they face,” noted Mytek Innovations Founder and Chief Managing Director, Shivkumar Borade.
So far, Mytek has been focusing on civil and electrical services. It now plans to expand to other sectors like automobile, manufacturing, textile and garments, cosmetics.
Recircle bags bridge funding in round led by Venture Catalysts and Mumbai Angels
Cleantech startup ReCircle said it received bridge funding from Venture Catalysts, Mumbai Angels and HNIs, as it focuses on forward integration into the plastic waste supply chain.
This will allow the company to provide high-quality, traceable recycled plastic content to companies using plastic packaging and open up a new revenue channel, helping it achieve its targeted revenue of Rs 100 crore in FY2025-26.
"The funds raised will be crucial in our journey towards diversification, expanding our impact, and launching our own recycling unit in the coming months,” said Rahul Nainani, CEO & Co-Founder, ReCircle.
Founded in 2016 by Rahul Nainani & Gurashish Singh Sahni , the company operates its own advanced Material Recovery Facility in Mumbai. It has diverted over 169,000 metric tonnes of waste from landfills and water bodies across 270 cities and towns in India with the help of 45+ processing partners across the country.
Other news
Mercedes-Benz Research and Development India expands Sustainability Garage
Mercedes-Benz Research and Development India (MBRDI) on Tuesday announced the expansion of Sustainability Garage with two new centres of excellence based out of Hyderabad and New Delhi.
The first new Centre of Excellence of the Sustainability Garage, Climate Tech Incubator, is dedicated to supporting 25 social enterprises that focus on sustainable mobility and environmental innovation.
MBRDI will offer seed funding, tailored support, and advanced technological mentorship to the chosen enterprises. T-Hub will engage over 500 students in design thinking and prototyping bootcamp for
innovative climate tech solutions contributing towards decarbonisation.
The Centre of Excellence focusing on Charging Infrastructure will offer a specialised training program on maintenance of charging infrastructure, certifying 60 young professionals this year
Manipal Academy of BFSI appoints Aatash Shah as SVP & Head - Business
Manipal Academy of BFSI announced the appointment of Atash Shah Aatash Shah as the Senior Vice President and Head - Business. In this role, he will be tasked with driving business growth and strategy, fortifying key partnerships, and enhancing the academy’s offerings to address the evolving needs of the BFSI sector.
In his prior role, Shah was the founder CEO of Edvancer, an edtech platform focussed on Data Science and AI upskilling which was later acquired by Global University Systems (GUS) in 2021. Before that, he worked as a Vice President in Nomura Securities.
Samunnati Launches Bharat Farmer Producer Organizations (FPO) Finder
Agri-chain enabler Samunnati along with the National Association for Farmer Producer Organizations (NAFPO) has launched a digital public Infrastructure designed to serve as a comprehensive encyclopedia for Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs).
“It will be a game-changer for farmers, market players, NGOs, and research institutions, offering them unparalleled access to information and insights on FPOs nationwide.” said Pravesh Sharma, Director of Samunnati.
The platform allows users to search for FPOs based on various criteria, such as location, crops grown, services offered, and market links. The platform has been designed to cater to farmers, NGOs, and market players.
WinZO launches talent mentorship program
Interactive entertainment platform WinZO announced the launch of its talent mentorship program Battle of Super Scholars (BOSS), in partnership with India's top B-schools—IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Bangalore, IIM Calcutta, IIM Lucknow, FMS Delhi, and ISB.
Through the mentorship, the company aims to inspire young product and tech talent to pursue entrepreneurship in gaming and solve the frontier challenges facing the sector,
The BOSS program saw participation from about 2,000 students who either developed gaming products for the international market, or conducted comprehensive market entry studies for WinZO's strategic expansion. Winners received a scholarship worth Rs 50 lakh and an option to join WinZO to deepen their interest and expertise in gaming.
Droom’s SaaS Platform, Droom Cloud Services (DCS) Achieves Rapid Growth
Automobile ecommerce platform announced the crossing of 25 large enterprises and 500+ SMEs for Droom’s SaaS platform for automobiles, Droom Cloud Services (DCS) in less than a year of launch.
Droom Cloud Services (DCS) offers standardized, reliable, and data-driven services that benefit OEMs, banks, NBFCs, insurance companies, fleets, and others to manage information asymmetry, moral hazard, lack of transparency, and inconsistent service standards.
“We are very excited that some of the largest OEMs, banks, insurance companies and other enterprises in the automobile sector are finding our products useful for their businesses and critical decision making. We will continue to add more products, solutions and services in Droom Cloud Services and will keep on improving and enhancing existing product portfolio”, said Sandeep Aggarwal, Founder and CEO of Droom.
Its Automobile Certification Solution (ACS) offers Pricing as a Service (PaaS), Inspection as a Service (IaaS), and History as a Service (HaaS).
Its ecommerce solutions include ecommerce sites, apps and ecommerce-managed services, while Droom Cloud Services’ Payment Solutions (PS), powered by the product Droom Pay, offers digital payment, analog payment and value-added payment services.
DAEWOO & eBikeGo collaborate to launch Electric bikes
DAEWOO India on Tuesday announced it has entered into a strategic collaboration with eBikeGo to develop and launch a range of personal mobility vehicle over the next 5 years.
“Together with DAEWOO India, we aim to create a range of products that are not only efficient and reliable but also environmentally friendly,” said Irfan Khan, Founder & CEO of eBikeGo.
The new product line will feature advanced battery systems, smart connectivity, and sustainable designs. It will leverage DAEWOO’s technology and eBikeGo’s expertise in electric vehicle manufacturing, allowing both the companies to extend their operations in India.
Mygate forays into consumer electronics with smart door lock launch
Bengaluru-based launched a range of smart door locks that allows users to go completely keyless and remotely manage access to their home. The locks come in three variants—Lock SE, Lock Plus, and Lock Pro, that are available to all consumers across India, on its website, app and Amazon.com.
The locks offers remote unlocking via quick OTP, end-to-end data encryption, easy user management, real-time notifications, and integration with the existing MyGate app in gated communities. These locks can be bought and operated by anyone outside MyGate communities as well. The lock can be operated and managed by an app developed by MyGate.
The company expects to follow this up with two new home security products by the end of FY25.
Supercoder looks at expansion in India
Developer job platform Supercoder said its plans to offer job opportunities and quality placements through strategic partnerships in India. From 800 current job openings, the platform plans to maintain 3,000 opportunities by the end of 2025, catering to a wide range of skills in AI, ML, Data Science, web, and mobile technologies.
“In the future, we plan to gradually expand our talent field to include positions that do not require a physical presence in Korea, such as quality control (QA), product management, and marketing. We aim to prepare for this field expansion alongside the advancement and automation of Supercoder and are also considering global expansion. Our strategy includes connecting Indian developers with Singaporean companies and Vietnamese developers with Japanese companies, effectively breaking down traditional hiring borders,” said Supercoder CEO Jay Choi.
The platform offers jobs from countries like Jordan, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, and the United States. It is expanding its focus to include junior-level software engineers—an initiative which is expected to begin in the second half of 2024.
The company is also part of K-Startup Centre (KSC)-India 2024, an accelerator program run by The Circle: Founder Club.
Eton Solution launches EtonGPT
Eton Solution announced the launch of EtonGPT, a GenAI module for family offices which integrates transactional capabilities of Eton Solution's ERP platform with conversational AI functionalities.
“With EtonGPTTM, AtlasFive can now parse and integrate data buried in more than 250 document types such as trust plans, estate plans and partnership agreements. This combination of structured and unstructured data processing offers wealth managers the ability to gain a 2 to 4X increase in operational efficiency,” said Satyen Patel, Eton Solutions’ executive chairman.
EtonGPT serves dual functions within the secure, cloud-based AtlasFive ERP platform: it acts as both an internal search tool and a data extraction assistant. It will enhance family office operations by seamlessly integrating document data with transaction information on AtlasFive, streamlining processes and boosting productivity.
Infibeam’s BillAvenue gets certified as TSP partner
Fintech player Infibeam on Tuesday announced that its BBPS Bill Payments processing unit BillAvenue was certified as a Technology Service Provider (TSP) Partner for both Biller Operating Units (BOU) and Customer Operating Units (COU) by NPCI Bharat BillPay Limited (NBBL).
The certification allows BillAveneue to enable banks, small finance Banks (SFBs) and other certified fintech players to become a part of the Bharat Bill Payment System (BBPS) (now known as Bharat Connect) ecosystem by providing them with a technology stack to go live quicker. It offers these entities on-premises deployed solutions under a capital expenditure model, as well as cloud based solutions on an operating expenses model.
“This is a pivotal moment for us, and we believe it will propel BillAvenue to the forefront of the BBPS (now known as Bharat Connect) ecosystem. As a neutral facilitator, we are uniquely positioned to attract major billers and customer-facing apps to partner with us,” said Daykin Creado, CEO of BillAvenue.
This certification also accelerates the go-to-market time for OU license holders, lowering operational costs. It will help the company to bring more participants into the BBPS ecosystem and expand the scope, reach and acceptability of BBPS as a preferred mode of bill payments.
(This article will be updated with the latest news throughout the day.)
Edited by Jyoti Narayan
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