Physics Wallah bagged $100 million in its maiden funding
Bootstrapped edtech Physics Wallah
raised a huge $100 million in its first funding round, led by WestBridge Capital and GSV Ventures, at a $1.1 billion valuation. Launched in 2016 by Alakh Pandey and Prateek Maheshwar, Physics Wallah helps students prepare for competitive engineering and medical entrance exams. The startup plans to use the funds to expand its business, for branding, and to open more offline centres.
Cred raised $80 million from Singapore’s
Fintech startup Cred
raised $80 million as part of a larger $140 million funding round from GIC, Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund at a $6.4 billion valuation. Existing investors such as Tiger Global, Sofina and others also participated in the round. The company is also in the final stages of negotiations to acquire investment platform Smallcase in a share-swap deal, multiple people confirmed to ET.
Kissht closed a $80 million round from Growth
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Consumer lending fintech
Kissht raised $80 million in a funding round from Vertex Growth and Brunei Investment Agency at a $500 million valuation. Existing investors Vertex Ventures SEA India and Endiya Partners also participated in the round. The company will use the funds to venture into the challenger card space, where it will launch its buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) card services.
Purplle picked up $33 million and turned unicorn
Online beauty retailer Purplle
raised $33 million from Paramark Ventures at a $1.1 billion valuation. Premji Invest, Kedaara Capital and Blume Ventures also participated in the round. Started in 2012, Purplle competes with
, and currently has over seven million monthly active users on its platform. Its annualised gross merchandise value (GMV) was $180 million in FY22.
Pepper Content raised $14.3 million from Bessemer
Pepper Content, a content marketplace,
raised $14.3 million in a funding round led by Bessemer Venture Partners. Founded in 2017 by Anirudh Singla and Rishabh Shekhar, the platform connects companies and marketers with freelance writers, designers, editors and illustrators. It will use the fresh funds to increase its US presence.
ETtechJiraaf scooped up $7.5 million from Partners
Alternative fixed income investment platform Jiraaf
raised $7.5 million from Accel Partners, Aspire Family Office and others. The startup aims to help individual investors earn better returns by participating in high-quality opportunities that go beyond equities, fixed deposits, real estate and gold. It claims to have more than 10,000 registered investors. Funds raised in this round will be used to expand its business and strengthen customer service.
SolarSquare raised $4 million
B2C solar products startup SolarSquare raised $4 million from Good Capital and Silicon Valley venture investor Chris Sacca owned-Lowercarbon Capital. Symphony Asia and Nithin Kamath’s Rainmatter also participated. The company started as a business-to-business (B2B) commercial solar company before pivoting to providing solar power equipment to homes last year. The fresh capital will be used to strengthen its technology.
Other done deals
■ Content technology and cataloguing startup Text Mercato
closed a $2.6 million pre-Series A round led by 1Crowd, Mount Judi Ventures and Innospark Ventures. The company provides content writing and cataloguing services via its suite of AI products, serving over 50 brands including Nykaa and Myntra. It processes over one million stock-keeping units (SKU) monthly and claims to have tripled its revenues last year.
■ Samudai, a DAO (decentralised autonomous organisation) platform for building and managing communities in Web3,
raised $2.5 million in a pre-seed funding round from well-known investors like FTX Ventures and Coinbase Ventures. The company, started this year, plans to launch a full productivity suite for DAOs, a project management network, and other tools to facilitate collaboration among Web3 users.
