It was a big week for startup funding, as companies across sectors raised large rounds in the middle of a funding boom for the ecosystem overall. Fantasy gaming firm Dream Sports’ $400 million round was the largest in the week ended March 26, 2021.
Dream11’s parent raised $400 million from TCV- an investor in Airbnb and Peloton- and Falcon Edge Capital, with the Indian Premier League set to begin in a few weeks. The round was entirely secondary- where investors bought shares from Dream11’s existing investors Kalaari and Multiples- giving them an exit.
Finnov, the holding entity of lending platform KreditBee raised $70 million- its second such round in a couple of months- from NewQuest Capital Partners and Motilal Oswal Private Equity. It also gave an exit to Chinese investor Shunwei Capital, at a time when Chinese investments have been banned by the Indian government. KreditBee lends to students and young professionals.
Meanwhile, agro-chemicals platform Safex Chemicals raised $50 million from private equity firm ChrysCapital. The firm makes herbicides and weedicides meant to increase crop productivity.
Beauty and cosmetics startup Purplle raised $45 million from new investor Sequoia India and existing backer Verlinvest, giving a part exit to IvyCap Ventures- an early investor who made a 22 times return on its investment.
In another interesting deal, Public, a location based social network raised $41 million from A91 Partners and Addition- the firm founded by Lee Fixel. Public has been spun off from news aggregator InShorts and is run by the same founders. Public provides local videos on topics such as business, entertainment and technology in Hindi and other languages.
