One-a-half-year-old Indonesian e-commerce startup Ula, which has raised over $30 million and courted many high-profile investors, is inching closer to adding one of the biggest tech profiles to its captable. The Jakarta-headquartered startup — which counts B Capital Group, Sequoia Capital India, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and Quona Capital among its existing investors — is in […]
SoftBank-backed Oyo files for $1.16 billion IPO
Oyo is ready to explore the public markets. The eight-year-old Indian budget hotel giant has filed the paperworks (PDF) with the local market regulator for an initial public offering, in which it is seeking to raise about $1.16 billion. The Gurgaon-headquartered startup — which offers an operating system of sorts to help hoteliers accept digital bookings, payments, […]
Tech giants brace for impact in India as new payments rule goes into effect
Apple, Sony, Google, Zoom, PayPal and several other tech companies as well as scores of banks have cautioned customers and partners in India to expect a surge in declined transactions as the world’s second-largest internet market’s central bank enforces a new directive for the way recurring payments are processed in the country. The Reserve Bank […]
Indian social commerce Meesho raises $570 million at $4.9 billion valuation
Meesho has more than doubled its valuation in less than six months, to $4.9 billion, as a growing number of high-profile investors back the Indian social commerce startup that is reporting strong growth despite the pandemic. The Bangalore-headquartered firm said on Thursday it has raised $570 million in its Series F financing round, following a […]
Indian online learning platform Vedantu becomes unicorn with $100 million funding
Online learning platform Vedantu has raised $100 million in a new financing round and has become the latest Indian startup to become a unicorn following a year of strong growth. Vedantu, which last month refuted rumors of it considering a sale to Byju’s, said on Wednesday it has raised $100 million in its Series E […]
Notion now offers free credits to any startup globally, partners with AWS and Stripe
Two years ago, Notion partnered with dozens of accelerators and incubators to provide free credits for its work collaboration platform to their portfolio startups. The firm is now aggressively making the program open to all startups. Notion is launching a new startup program Tuesday to offer a credit of at least $500 to any startup […]
Amazon launches computer science education program Future Engineer in India
Amazon said on Tuesday it is extending its computer science program Future Engineer to India. Through the program, for which Amazon partners with players such as Code.org, Amazon aims to bring CS education to underserved and underrepresented children and young adults. The company said it will offer several educational resources, scholarships, internships, and mentors to […]
Amazon-backed buy now, pay later platform Capital Float raises $50 million
Capital Float, an Amazon-backed startup that offers its buy now, pay later service on many popular online platforms in India including that of the e-commerce firm, said on Tuesday it has raised $50 million in a new financing round following a strong growth in recent quarters. Lightrock India led the Bangalore-based startup’s Series D financing […]
Indian food delivery giant Swiggy in talks to raise funds at over $10 billion valuation
Indian food delivery startup Swiggy is in talks to raise over $500 million in a new financing round that could value it at over $10 billion, two sources familiar with the matter told TechCrunch. Atlanta-headquartered Invesco is in talks to lead — or co-lead — the new financing round in the Bangalore-based startup, which counts […]
India’s Bijnis lands $30 million to help manufacturers build digital identity and sell to retailers
The proliferation of affordable and fast mobile data allowed hundreds of millions of Indians to come online for the first time in the past decade. But there are scores of areas in the South Asian nation’s economy that remain largely offline. One of those is factories. There are about 150,000 factories in India, but the […]