Weekly startup funding roundup: CoinSwitch and Licious emerge as new unicorns

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Another funding frenzy-filled week in the startup world has brought the total number of unicorns in India in 2021 to 30, with CoinSwitch and Licious joining the league. Unicorns are privately funded firms valued at over a billion dollars.

In the week ended October 8, startups from across sectors like cryptocurrency, online meat delivery, development and operations and public transport technology raised over $480 million, according to data by Tracxn.

This was led by cryptocurrency exchange CoinSwitch which raised $260 million led by top Silicon Valley fund Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Coinbase Ventures. This Series C round has led CoinSwitch’s valuation to grow by four times to $1.9 billion.

Existing investors like Tiger Global, Sequoia Capital and Paradigm too took part in the round. CoinSwitch founder and CEO Ashish Singhal told Moneycontrol that its user base shot up from 10 million to 11 million within a day after the announcement.

Therapy-focused healthcare company Integrace Health raised $72 million in its Series C round led by Temasek. The company is owned by Mumbai-based private equity firm True North which partially sold its stake as part of the funding round. However, True North will continue to hold a majority stake in the healthcare player.

DevOps platform Esper raised $60 million as part of its Series C round. The company which has offices in the US and in India builds tools for Android Device deployment and application management.

This round which was led by Insight Partners and saw participation from Scale Venture Partners, Madrona Ventures and Root Ventures brings the total funds raised by the company to $100 million. This announcement came just four months after the company raised $30 million in its Series B round in May 2021.

Next is the newest unicorn – online meat delivery company Licious which raised $52 million led by IIFL AMC’s late-stage tech fund. This Series G round comes after the company raised $192 million in July 2021 under its Series F round.

Lastly, Navi Mumbai-based public transport technology firm Chalo raised $40 million. The Series C round was led by Lightrock India and Filter Capital and also saw participation from existing backers like WaterBridge Ventures, Raine Venture Partners, former WhatsApp chief business officer Neeraj Arora and former Google SVP Amit Singhal.