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Deal Street: HealthifyMe Tops Up Investment With $6 Million As It Eyes Expansion

Your weekly dose of startup deals. 

(Source: BloombergQuint)
(Source: BloombergQuint)

Seven Indian startups raised $51 million in angel, seed and venture capital funding across sectors such education, health and fitness, payments, among others last week.

Magicpin Bags $20 Million

An employee pushes shopping carts at a Big Bazaar hypermarket, operated by Future Retail Ltd., in Mumbai, India (Photographer: Dhiraj Singh/Bloomberg)  
An employee pushes shopping carts at a Big Bazaar hypermarket, operated by Future Retail Ltd., in Mumbai, India (Photographer: Dhiraj Singh/Bloomberg)  

Magicpin, a neighbourhood discovery platform, raised $20 million (around Rs 142 crore) in a fresh round of funding led by venture capital firm Lightspeed Venture Partners, according to two people privy to the development.

Existing investors Lightspeed India Partners and WaterBridge Ventures also participated in the round. The round values the firm at around $100 million, said one of the people quoted above, requesting anonymity.

Founded in 2015, the startup helps local retailers drive discoverability and sales across categories like restaurant, fashion, beauty, grocery, spa, yoga, gym, among others.

Besides, the firm also provides real-time promotions, loyalty programmes and content updates to users. Users can upload their bills on the app and avail cashback offers.

The platform is said to have more than 800,000 listed merchants, all the way from a local kirana store to big retailers and established brands such as Hard Rock Cafe, McDonald’s, Fabindia to name a few.

Omidyar Network Leads $11 Million In Online Tutoring Platform

Online tutoring startup Vedantu raised $11 million (around Rs 78 crore) in a round led by impact investment firm Omidyar Network.

Existing investor Accel Partners and an undisclosed overseas education conglomerate also participated in the round, the company said in a statement.

Bengaluru-based Vedantu said it aims to deploy the majority of the fresh capital to strengthen its technology for creating a personalised, live learning experience for students. A part of the investment will also go in developing its students app.

Founded in 2011, the company’s online platform allows interaction between students and tutors via a whiteboard in an audio and video environment. It offers one-year courses for CBSE and ICSE students from classes nine to 12 and also offers courses for engineering entrance exams.

The company said its student base is spread across 1000 cities from 30 countries, including in West Asia and Southeast Asia.

Health And Fitness App HealthifyMe Raises $6 Million

Health and fitness app HealthifyMe raised $6 million (Rs 43 crore) as an extension of a previous round it raised earlier this year from Innoven Capital and other existing investors, it said in a statement.

The fresh round is an extension of its $12 million round it raised in February led by Russia’s Sistema Asia Fund and other investors, taking the total round to be of $18 million.

With the fresh investment, the company aims to expand to Malaysia and other Southeast Asian geographies, including Singapore and Indonesia. It is also planning a foray into West Asia over the next six months, it said in a statement.

Founded in 2012, the fitness app helps track calorie intake, provides nutrition and dietary services and fitness coaching. It is also said to have built a library of over 900 Southeast Asian food items with protein, fibre, carbohydrate and calorie mapping and hired nutritionists and fitness coaches, as it eyes forays in other geographies.

“More than 10 percent of our eight million user base, 10 percent of our coaches and 20 percent of our overall revenues are already coming from international geographies,” Tushar Vashisht, co-founder of HealthifyMe, said in a statement.

Others

Non-banking financial company, Aye Finance raised about $10 million (around Rs 72) crore in debt funding from Switzerland-based impact investor BlueOrchard Finance. The company said in a statement that it will use the funds to enhance its credit portfolio.

Signzy, an artificial intelligence and blockchain-based platform for digital on-boarding of Know Your Customer (KYC) details raised $3.6 million (around Rs 24 crore) in a growth funding led by venture capital firms Stellaris Venture Partners and Kalaari Capital, it said in a statement.

Wealth management app CashRich said it has raised $1 million (around Rs 7 crore) in angel funding from three undisclosed UK-based individuals.

Mumbai-based payments gateway BillDesk raised an undisclosed amount of funding from global payments technology company Visa to develop new product lines for its payments and loyalty businesses, and to also expand its footprint into other geographies