Food tech startup raises funds from Indian Angels Network

Proost, a domestic beer brand established in 2017 by Tarun Bhargava and Vijay P. Sharma, has raised 30 crores in the Series-A investment round.

Hyderabad Angels, Chennai Angels, and other prominent HNIs participated in the venture, which was spearheaded by Chimes Group and Srinivasan Namala.

Commenting on this achievement, Tarun Bhargava, Co-Founder & CEO of Proost, said, "We are thrilled to announce this new round of funding, which represents a significant step forward in Proost's journey. With these funds, we will focus on expanding into strengthening our production capacity, expanding into a few new markets while also ensuring that we go deeper into our existing ones on the back of brand building.”

He further added, “This is Tranche-1 of our ongoing Series A round and it's great to see 90% of the round size being mopped by our existing investors. Our commitment to delivering value to our stakeholders remains unwavering, and this investment brings us closer to our goal of capturing a substantial share of the Indian beer market by the end of the decade."

The money will strengthen Proost's financial base and play a key role in its growth into new areas. With a significant presence in retail establishments in Delhi, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Jharkhand, and Karnataka, Proost, which operates under the Grano69 Beverages banner, has established itself in the beer sector.

By the end of the decade, the brand hopes to have 5% of the Indian beer market thanks to strategic market expansion, customer-focused product development, and innovation.

Cafe chain, The Chocolate Room is looking to raise Rs 100 crore from venture capitalists this year as it eyes doubling its footprint to 500 outlets by 2020.

The company is also planning to open stores outside India by next year through franchise route.

Chaitanya Kumar , Co-founder & CMD, The Chocolate Room, told PTI, "We are looking at raising Rs 100 crore to fund our expansion. We will also use funds in brand marketing. We have already begun talks to raise funds."

Kumar said, "The Chocolate Room, which reported turnover of Rs 100 crore in the previous fiscal, is eyeing up to Rs 300 crore by fiscal 2020."

Vikas Punjabi, Co-founder & MD, The Chocolate Room, said, "After opening our first outlet in 2007, we started expansion by opening outlets in tier II and tier III cities. Now, our major openings will be in bigger cities."

The company is also launching its first chocolate factory in Ahmedabad this year with production capacity of 100 tonnes.

Chaitanya Kumar said, "We will also looking at opening factory in Hyderabad at a later stage."

Punjabi said, "Going forward, the company also intends to get into retailing chocolates through its outlets and modern trade outlets."

Ninjacart, B2B agri-marketing platform, has raised Rs 37 crore ($5.5 million) in series B funding from investors including Accel Partners, Nandan Nilekani's NRJN Trust, Mistletoe, Qualcomm Ventures and M&S Partners.

Bengaluru based Ninjacart, aims to use the funds to raise hiring and look at increased automation of its supply chain.

Ninjacart delivers fruits and vegetables to businessess directly from farmer's fields. It pegs its USP on freshness and quality of more than 80 fruits and vegetables on its platforms.

Thirukumaran, CEO & Co-founder, Ninjacart, said, "We want to build cost efficient, reliable supply chain that can handle more than 300 tonnes a day. Currently, we are moving 60 tonnes of produce a day from farm to store in less than 14 hours at a cost lower than traditional supply chains.” 

Online grocery store,BigBasket, is in talks with multiple financial and strategic investors to raise $110-150 million. Thse funds will be used to expand its warehousing and cold chain facilities.

Recently, BigBasket secured nearly $16 million from existing investors including Dubai-based private equity firm Abraaj Capital, Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm Bessemer, US-based investment firm Sands Capital, and the World Bank's International Finance Corp.

The company has raised debt financing of about $7 million from venture debt firm Trifecta Capital to meet its working capital needs. BigBasket is presently holding talks with Chinese investors including WeChat owner Tencent and conglomerate Fosun.

Amazon, US-based online retailer, is also eyeing a strategic stake in BigBasket to boost its daily consumables segment but the talks have not advanced as the online grocer is seeking better financial terms.

Competition is heating up in India's online grocery market with the entry of e-marketplaces such as Amazon India and Flipkart.

Amazon is seeking permission from Indian government invest $500 million in a fully owned venture that will allow it to stock locally produced food items to sell online. Amazon India also plans to open physical stores.

Nusra

Gurgaon-based Bite Club, a marketplace for chef prepared meals, has successfully raised a Pre-Series A round of funding from growX ventures. The Phoenix Fund via Enablers, and existing investors Powai Lake Ventures also participated in the round. The company plans to utilize the fresh round of capital infused to expand its footprint in Delhi-NCR and introduce more product categories.

Started in November 2014, Bite Club acts as a marketplace connecting chefs and consumers. They have a daily changing menu that customers can order from via their mobile and web app. The food is prepared by a curated community of home chefs, amateur chefs, and professional chefs. The firm has already served over 1,00,000 meals within one year of its inception, and is currently delivering almost 1000 meals a day.

Commenting on this fresh round of funding, Prateek Agarwal, the CEO and Founder, Bite Club said, "At Bite Club, we are chasing a vision of replacing home cooking. We have had a fabulous first year of operations and recently hit the milestone of serving 1,00,000 meals in the city. We’re blessed to have some of the best home-chefs on our platform relentlessly working to delight our consumers with wholesome meals every day of the week."

The food delivery platform brings an interesting mix of offerings in the gourmet & comfort food segment across regional Indian & World cuisines within the price range of Rs. 100-300 per person. Carrying certain traits of both a restaurant and a Tiffin service, Bite Club is not conventionally one or the other. At present, it is on an expansion spree in the entire Delhi NCR region.

“We are excited to be investing in Bite Club. We believe in the company’s vision to make incredible home cooked food accessible to everyone. It’s a truly unique business model with a strong focus on providing wholesome meals at great value. I am a huge fan of Bite Club and have been averaging 3-4 meals a week for months now. With the current round of funding, we looking to go deeper into the current market, improving efficiency, building a strong platform for growth and introducing newer products” said Ashish Taneja, Managing Director at growX ventures.

Earlier this year, BiteClub had raised an angel round from Powai Lake Ventures with participation from angels including Aneesh Reddy (Capillary Technologies), Ashish Kashyap (Goibibo Group) and Alok Mittal (Canaan Partners).

Nusra

Tipping Mr Pink Pvt Ltd, which owns burger chain and online ordering platform Burger Singh, has raised Rs 2.2 crore (around $5k) to expand its services in Delhi-NCR.

Started in November 2014 by Kabir Jeet Singh, Rahul Seth and Nitin Rana, three childhood friends, the company has raised the money from group of angel investors including Avtar Monga, COO, IDFC Bank; Dheeraj Jain, partner at Redcliffe Capital, a UK-based hedge fund; angel investor Ashvin Chadha; and early-stage investor Udaan Angels.

At present Burger Singh is running four outlets in Gurgaon and is planning to open two more in next six month entering to Delhi.

“Online ordering ensures minimum error in placing and delivering orders. We aim to enhance the technology so that automated text message goes to the customer with the tracking information. They will be able to get live update of the food being dispatched. The aim is to Uberize the delivery and thus enhance the customer experience,” shared Singh.

Before starting his own venture, Singh was general manager, North India, at the Pint Room; Seth worked at Hope Monkey, a social crowd funding platform, and Rana was employed with restaurants such as Pizza Hut, KFC and Thank God Its Friday.

Sharing more about the revenue, Singh added, around 35 per cent of the business comes from dine-in, while delivery and takeaway consist of the rest of the business.

The group is also planning to raise another $3 million and will be initiating conversation with institutional investors in a few months.

“Smart menu, solid and impressive on-ground team and filling portions of food, Burger Singh has all the right ingredients for a potential global Indian QSR,” said Dheeraj Jain of Redcliffe Capital.

Tawak, the fine dining restaurant chain in Noida is in talks with angel investors to raise first round of funding.

“We have received interest from various angel investors and HNI's and are in talks with some of them. Looking forward to something materialisng soon,” shared Deepankar Arora, Partner, Tawak to Restaurant India.

Deepankar along with his partner Vinayak Gupta has bootstrapped the initial investment and now wants to grow their business in Delhi-NCR after getting huge response in Noida.

The group is planning to open two more restaurants with different concepts by 2016.

Known for serving Pan Asian cuisine, the restaurant ahs everything from the region.

Zomato, the restaurant search and discovery app, has raised USD 60 million in a fresh round of funding that is being led by Singapore investment company, Temasek with participation from existing investor Vy Capital.

The company will use the investment to further grow its new business verticals. This takes Zomato’s total funding to ~USD 225 million - it comes from a close set of only four investors - Info Edge, Sequoia India, Vy Capital, and now Temasek.

“We will use this round to make investments in our new businesses such as online ordering, table reservations, point of sales, and our newly launched Whitelabel platform. With this round, and with some of our markets turning profitable recently, Zomato is well capitalised for at least two years. We are also stoked to have Temasek partner with us, and are looking forward to building one of the largest food-tech companies in the world,” shared Deepinder Goyal, Founder and CEO of Zomato.

Just last week, Zomato made strategic investments in Gurgaon-based Pickingo, and Mumbai-based Grab, both hyperlocal delivery players, to enable last-mile delivery for restaurants including dine-in-only restaurants that don't otherwise deliver.

Earlier today, Zomato also announced the launch of its Whitelabel Platform (zomato.com/whitelabel), a full suite of technologies for restaurants to run their business on the internet. The key feature on the platform is the ability for restaurants to launch custom-branded native mobile apps to help them connect with and engage their customers, and operate at internet scale.

BetterButter, the online social food discovery platform,  has raised USD 250,000 (about Rs 1.65 crore) in seed funding led by growX ventures.

Founded by Sukhmani Bedi and Niyaz Laiq, the Delhi-based start up focusses on recipes and allows users to create, discover and share recipes.

Apart from growX, Singapore-based investment firm M&Y Growth Partners and angel investor Manish Singhal participated in the round, it said in a statement.

Singhal will take on a Board Observer role in BetterButter, it added.

"Cooking plays a central role in Indian homes; in fact, Indians spend the maximum amount of time in their kitchens as compared to any other country in the world. Despite this, there is no large recipe brand in the country today, and our goal is to make BetterButter synonymous with cooking at home in India," Bedi said.

The recipe space has seen significant global deal activity.

Last month, Beijing-based online recipe and cooking platform Xiachufang raised a second round of funding, while in November last year, online cookbook app Douguo secured a reported USD 25 million in Series C round of funding.

Mumbai based restaurant in cloud service Holachef has raised Rs 20 crore Series A funding from Kalaari Capital.

Anand Lunia’s of India Quotient will also be participating in this investment.

“The investments will help us in fueling our infrastructural expansions that will enable better preparation and delivery of the food. This will help us penetrate deeper into Mumbai as well as other cities in India,” said Saurabh Saxena, Co-Founder, Holachef.

Currently, Holachef is serving over 1000 orders per day across locations in Central and Western suburbs of Mumbai.

It receives over 65 per cent of orders through the mobile app on Android, iOS and rest from the desktop website. Holachef offers select signature dishes from professional and amateur, based on a dynamic daily menu. It ensures delivery of the meals at a pre-selected time slot by the customer.

Speaking about the investment, Vani Kola, MD, Kalaari Capital, said, “We are excited to be investing in Holachef. The team has a deep passion to offer great food and commitment to customer service. These are the ingredients to create a great company. We are pleased to be working with dedicated founders like Saurabh Saxena and Anil Gelra. We believe food tech will be a large opportunity in India.” The service was founded in September 2014 and had raised a seed fund of Rs 2 crore by India Quotient in February 2015. The investment was in the form of convertible notes, a short term debt that converts to equity when a startup raises Series A funding.

Anand Lunia, who is investing in the venture for the second time, said, “The fundamental idea behind Holachef is the fact that food for home delivery doesn't need to be cooked inside restaurants only. Holachef is creating an alternate food supply the same way Airbnb created a whole new inventory of high quality rooms. We see this much bigger than mere aggregation of restaurant menus for delivery.” On any given day, Holachef lists upto 50  options for lunch and dinner respectively along with some snacks. It offers starters, meals, desserts and soft drinks; catering to vegetarian and non-vegetarian customers. Regional Indian food to world cuisine, Holachef serves a good mix of dishes on a daily basis and delivers the food in a one-person meal format for nil or minimal wastage.

RI Bureau

Swiggy, the Bengaluru based food start up has raised $ 16.5 million in series B round of funding.

The start-up has raised funding from a group of investors, including Norwest Venture Partners (NVP), SAIF Partners, Accel Partners and an undisclosed global investment entity.

Founded by Sriharsha Majety and Nandan Reddy, boths BITS Pilani alumni, Swiggy is a food-tech company with its own delivery personnel equipped with smartphones which enables the company to pick up orders from restaurants and deliver to customers.

“We have seen a 10x growth in order numbers over the past few months and this investment will help us expand exponentially as we intend to establish ourselves in several new cities by the end of the year,” said Majety, CEO, Swiggy.

Started in 2014 end in Bengaluru, recently Swiggy also expanded its services to Gurgaon and Hyderabad partnering with over 100 restaurants in both the cities.

According to the statement, more than 50 per cent of daily orders have shifted from the website to the app in a short period of time.

“The funds will primarily be used to support the next phase of growth, including expanding Swiggy’s footprint to other cities in India. The financing is also expected to fuel growth towards establishing a stronger brand platform and capturing an increased share of the burgeoning food delivery market in India,” added Majety.

RI Bureau

Eat Treat which started as a Facebook group back in 2014, when co-founder Arjun Sawhney—a self-confessed foodie with an insatiable appetite—felt the need to start a dialogue that would educate and empower the online community by engaging them in discussions about food.

The group has over 50,000 members and has become one of the engaging space on food in social media.

“I wanted to know where to eat, what to eat, and how and why to eat it. I had so many questions and so many ideas, that forming a community seemed only logical”, said Sawhney.

The group is garnering instant recognition amongst the food community in the country and abroad providing a whole together experience where people can discuss about foods and places to have good food.

Eattreatonline.com has been developed as a reaction to this success, and aims at filling the void that currently exists in the online food industry.

The team at Eattreatonline.com wants to make food fun, and the website endeavours to promote a lifestyle that looks at the world through a culinary lens.

With a target audience ranging from home cooks and food lovers to restaurateurs, retailers and e-commerce executives, the site promises an all-encompassing reach across the spectrum.

In terms of both traffic and revenue, it will aggressively target the Indian & international audience to raise its first institutional funding in the first half of 2016.

“The funding raised in this round will be utilised to bring the product to life, build infrastructure and make key hires of relevant and excellent talent. The proprietary content we will develop will make us stand apart. The commencement of the platform will see a large database of tested recipes and quality articles covering various topics related to food,” added Sawhney.

The online entity will be operated by Delhi based Egg Communication Pvt Ltd, and is being backed by a pool of 15 investors including, Divitas Capital, filmmaker Homi Adajania, VOGUE India Fashion Features Fashion Bandana Tewari, interior designer Sussanne Khan, Kalyani Saha (VP Communications, Dior Couture, India), Nonita Kalra, Former Editor, Elle India, Andrea Aftab and Pia Pauro (Directors at EATINC and proprietors of Amici and The Imperial Hotel), and Shiv Khanna (Director, Catalyst Ventures).  

foodpanda, the online food delivery marketplace active in 40 countries across five continents, has secured another round of funding of USD 110 Million.

The sum comes from Rocket Internet AG, as well as other existing and new investors. Since its launch in 2012, the company has now raised more than USD 200 Million.

After acquiring key competitors this year in India, Mexico, Russia, Brazil, Eastern Europe, Middle East and Asia, the company will now further invest into product and technology, and continue focusing on customer service and loyalty for becoming the most convenient and most user friendly way of ordering food delivery or take-away.

“Over the last couple of months we have become the leading online food delivery marketplace across the most promising and fastest growing emerging markets. The new funding allows us to fully focus on user experience and customer service with the aim of completely disrupting the way people order food by establishing a real alternative to pizza flyers and phone calls,” said Ralf Wenzel, Co-Founder and CEO, foodpanda.

Rohit Chadda, MD and Co-Founder, foodpanda said, “We have seen excellent growth over the past year attracting new users from all corners of the country. This round of funding will allow us to scale up and strengthen the foodpanda brand across geographies. We are strongly rooted in the belief that ‘customer is king’ and will continue working harder to reinforce our status as the prime choice when it comes to online food ordering.”

foodpanda offers ways to order food via the mobile app or online. Globally, foodpanda partners with over 45,000 restaurants in 40 countries, being market leader in 32 of those countries.