Deal Street: Brand Capital Backs Home Services Startup Housejoy 

As the year 2016 wound to a close, temperatures plummeted and so did fund raising by Indian startups. Fewer investments in the startup space hit the news-stands.

The main highlights of the week were Brand Capital’s investment in home services marketplace Housejoy, and Infosys Ltd. co-founder Nandan Nilekani's additional capital infusion in e-commerce startup 10i Commerce Services.

Nilekani, who is also the former chairman of Unique Identification Authority of India pumped in an additional Rs 26 crore in 10i Commerce in two tranches, one in October worth Rs 16 crore and another one in November worth Rs 10 crore. His total investment in the company stands at Rs 55 crore, according to the documents filed with regulators and reviewed by BloombergQuint. With around 35 percent stake, Nilekani is now the majority shareholder in the company.

10i owns and operates technology platform, Shopx, which enables retailers to offer products and services by listing their offerings on the app. According to the company’s website, the app has nearly 35,000 retailers on-board so far, and is present across 180 towns in India.

Queries sent to the company did not elicit a response at the time of writing this report.

Also on Nilekani’s list of sizeable investments is an auto-parts technology startup, Sedemac Mechatronics.

Brand Capital Backs Home Services Startup Housejoy

Home services marketplace Housejoy, run by Sarvaloka Services On Call Pvt Ltd., raised fresh investment from Brand Capital, the advertisement-for-equity investment arm of Bennett Coleman & Co., a person privy to the development told BloombergQuint

Saran Chatterjee, chief executive officer of Housejoy confirmed the development but refused to divulge the size of the deal, which will allow the startup to display advertisements on Brand Capital properties.

“The association with Brand Capital will help accelerate the brand building effort to reach more users,” Chatterjee said.

Launched in January 2015 by Sunil Goel, who had previously founded cloud-based video screening solution called VuFirst, the startup connects home services professionals such as plumbers, interior designers, home cleaners, and many others to customers. It gets more than 1 million users on the platform.

In December 2015, the firm had raised Rs 150 crore ($22.4 million) in Series B round of funding from a group of investors led by e-commerce giant Amazon.

Fitness App HealthifyMe Raises $1 Million

Mobile health and fitness startup, HealthifyMe, raised $1 million from Dubai-based investor Neelesh Bhatnagar through his firm NB Ventures, Tushar Vashisht, co-founder of HealthifyMe told BloombergQuint.

The company aims to utilise the funds to strengthen top leadership and invest in product and tech innovation, Vashisht added.

With 208 employees on board, the firm has physical presence in Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai, and Chennai. Founded in 2012, HealthifyMe is a fitness mobile application which enables users to keep track on the number of calories consumed, set personal fitness goals, and track their progress. It also connects users with nutritionists and trainers on the platform.

The startup had earlier raised $6 million in Series A funding in May last year. IDG Ventures, Inventus Capital and Blume Ventures had participated in that round.

Other Deals

Omnichannel book renting platform, JustBooks, secured an undisclosed amount in seed funding from investment firm CoCreate Ventures, the company said in a media statement. The amount raised will be used to revamp its digital presence.

Video streaming platform, Dekkho, raised $1.2 million in seed funding from seven angel investors, the company said in a media statement, but did not reveal the name of the investors. Dekkho currently has over 12,000 hours of programming, which is made available by partnering directly with digital channels such as Sony Music, Zee Music, Blush, MissMalini, Times Group, ScoopWhoop, and others.