Funding round up: How India is investing in 2017
Funding round up: How India is investing in 2017

There is no denying the fact that food is something which is not going to stop its growth. Despite 2016 being slow on attracting investors towards food ventures, 2017 has welcomed good investment in the very first month. From a promising growth that industry is having there is lots of development and global trends that is pushing the continuous growth.

ShopHop which is a marketplace for natural, artisanal and home grown food products has raised its angel round from an undisclosed private investor earlier this month. It is a place for food entrepreneurs and independent brands to showcase their products and stories and for customers to discover and explore new and exciting brands. "We plan to use these funds to recruit high quality talent, boost our recent foray into offline sales and omni-channel distribution, and invest in marketing initiatives to raise customer and supply side awareness of the platform,” shared Anirban Poddar, Founder and CEO, ShopHop during the time of funding.

Continuously luring the investors towards their innovative product, Orissa based dairy start up Milk Mantra has bagged USD10 million (Rs 66.5 crore) in a fresh round of funding that has been led by State Bank of India-backed Neev Fund. The start ups existing investors Eight Roads Ventures and impact investor Aavishkaar, have also participated in the series-D equity financing round.

"Our whole focus has been to establish our dominance in eastern India. We are looking at multiple acquisitions in Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Bengal,” said Srikumar Misra, CEO at Milk Mantra who is also planning to set up greenfield projects.

And this doesn’t end here Bengaluru based ready to eat brand which has become a leader in the south Indian batter segment has attracted Azim Premji led Premji Investment to fund the company. The group has invested $25 million in ID Fresh Foods acquiring 25 per cent stake in the dosa and idli batter brand. According to the sources, with the new round of funding ID Fresh is planning grow its national foot prints and also expand its product portfolio.

Though, we have seen the downfall of food tech ventures in 2016 by many start ups closing their platform or shutting their delivery operations partially at many locations. 2017 throws some light when these start ups with exciting ideas bagged funding from investors with a plan to expand them. Mumbai based NativeSpecial, which retails snacks and sweets through its online portal across India has bagged an undisclosed amount of funding from Indian Angel Network and Madurai-based Native Angels Network.

According to the release, the start up will use funds to upgrade its laboratory facilities and expand to new demographics. "Native Special caters to a very pertinent yet untapped gap in the current market through a scalable business model and effective utilization of technology to serve fresh and authentic traditional south Indian sweets and snacks,” added K Premnath, the lead investor from IAN.

Also, seeing the opportunity that the sector is garnering Sequoia Capital and UK government-owned CDC Group are also in news pick up a controlling stake in the country’s largest organic food maker Sresta Natural Bioproducts, which sells the 24 Mantra brand.

Hence, going ahead we can say that 2017 will be a fruitful year for food brands in terms of showcasing their talent and luring investors to put money in them. 

                                                                                                                              Pic Courtesy: http://www.canberraentrepreneur.com/

 
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