Last week in startup funding | Dailyhunt gets $100 million more; D2C brands, meat delivery continue to attract investors

News aggregator Dailyhunt raised $100 million, its second such round in two months, making it the largest startup deal in the week ended February 12. Dailyhunt raised the money from Qatar Investment Authority and Glade Brook Capital, valuing it at over a billion dollars. It became a unicorn when Google and Microsoft led a $100 million round in December 2020.

In other news, SUGAR Cosmetics raised $21 million led by Elevation Capital (earlier SAIF Partners) along with existing backer A91 Partners-indicating a growing interest in direct to consumer brands.

Founded by the husband-wife duo Kaushik Mukherjee and Vineeta Singh, SUGAR was valued at $100 million, making it a particularly lucrative bet for early investor India Quotient. 

SplashLearn, which is looking to gamify online learning, raised $18 million in a Series C round from Owl Ventures and existing backer Accel.

Online education continues to gain interest among investors, though whether edtech firms will be able to show user retention and the same level of growth as the economy opens up remains to be seen.

Meat and seafood brand TenderCuts raised $15 million from German private equity firm Paragon Partners. The online meat delivery space has been lucrative for dealmaking in the last few months, with FreshToHome raising $121 million and Licious and ZappFresh in talks to close rounds. Organising the traditionally fragmented and inefficient meat market is seen as a big opportunity by founders and investors alike. 

In another key deal, gaming firm Nazara raised $13.6 million from Hornbill Capital, as part of its pre-IPO fundraising. Nazara has been planning to go public for a couple of years and has filed documents with the regulator. It is eyeing listing at a time when IPOs have been booming.