Funding Wrap: CarTrade, Voonik, Zenatix, BotWorx raise capital

Moneycontrol Bureau

Even as the year 2017 is yet to see blockbuster fresh fundings that were prevalent in 2014-15, follow on late stage rounds have started in the Indian startup ecosystem – first with Practo in January and now with CarTrade in February.

VC funds are flush with cash. Thus follow on rounds from existing and new investors to save their portfolio startups have started. This week saw Temasek investing in its existing portfolio company CarTrade. It is likely to put pressure on its biggest rival Chinese funds Hillhouse Capital and Tybourne Capital-backed CarDekho.

Investments continue at a decent pace with BotWorx, Wooplr, TravelTriangle and Voonik raising rounds. Here are some top funding deals of the week1. CarTrade raises USD 55 million: Mumbai based Car buying portal USD 55 million led by Temasek, a Singapore based investment company, alongside a large US family office. The capital will support CarTrade’s growth plans through acquisitions and expanding in new areas such as auto finance. CarTrade’s existing investors including Warburg Pincus, Temasek, JP Morgan and March Capital.

CarTrade merged with Carwale in January 2016. The combined company claims to have 15 million unique customers per month. 2. Wooplr raises USD 8 million: Fashion discovery platform, Wooplr raised USD 8 million in Series B round of funding led by Sistema Asia Fund, Amereus Group and existing investor Helion Ventures.

Launched in 2013 by Arjun Zacharia, Praveen Rajaretnam, Soumen Sarkar and Ankit Sabharwal, Wooplr is a consumer content-driven marketplace. It raised USD 5 million Series A from Helion Ventures in January 2015. In December 2016, the company raised USD 225K from Anand Chandrasekharan, ex- chief product officer Snapdeal. 3. Voonik raises USD 6 million: Founded in 2013, Voonik Technologies Pvt. Ltd, raised USD 6 million from Singapore-based RB Investments and existing investor Sequoia Capital. The latest round is a follow-on to its Series B round of USD 20 million in July,2016 led by Sequoia Capital. Other investors in Voonik’s previous round included Times Internet, Seedfund, Beenos, Beenext, Parkwood Bespin, Tancom Investments and Freecharge’s Kunal Shah.

In June last year, Voonik acquired Zohraa, Styl and Picksilk – to enter the premium e-commerce segment. Before these, Voonik also acqui-hired TrilKart, Getsy and a team from apparel rental startup Klozee. 4. Botworx raises USD 3 million: Botworx.ai, the platform for Authentic Conversational Commerce raised USD 3 million seed investment led by Costanoa Ventures with support from SV Angel. Founded in 2016 by Mahi de Silva, Manoj Malhotra and Mark Fruehan, Botworx.ai with help of funding will build a platform that enables brands to acquire, engage and transact with consumers through messaging app.

Prior to founding AdMarvel/Opera Mediaworks, the team built the Mobile Messaging and Content business at VeriSign, inter-connecting over 300 mobile operators around the globe and pioneering SMS messaging and marketing campaigns for customers such as TV’s American Idol, Citi and Lufthansa. 5. Food startup 48East raises USD 0.5 million: Bangalore based food startup, 48East raised USD 500K funding in Pre Series A round led by Al Dhaheri Family based in UAE. The startup offers Asian gourmet food from 48 different countries, the investment will help startup in unit expansion, enhancing logistics, ramping up technology and marketing.

Founded in 2016 by Joseph Cherian and Nabhojit Ghosh, 48East earlier raised USD 250K funding in angel round led by Agra based ACPL exports.6. TravelTriangle raises USD 10 million: Travel Triangle an online marketplace to discover travel agents, raised USD 10 million funding in Series B round led by RB Investments, SAIF partners and Bessemer Venture Partners.

In April 2015 company raised USD 8 million funding in Series A round led by Bessemer Venture Partners and SAIF Partners.

7. Zenatix raises USD 1.1 million: Co-founded by alumni of IIT Delhi, IIM Ahmedabad and UCLA – Rahul Bhalla, Vishal Bansal and Dr. Amarjeet Singh, Zenatix Solutions raised a pre-series A round of funding led by pi Ventures and Blume Ventures. 

Zenatix is an energy monitoring and analytics company that helps large electricity consumers understand their energy consumption pattern and take steps to save energy.

The Startup previously raised angel round led by Rahul Khanna (Trifecta Capital), Rajan Anandan (Google) and Snapdeal co-founders, Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal.

(Source: Industry reports, company press releases)