Tag: mumbai startups

Growth Story of HumSafer – Alexa for Truckers!

Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by HumSafer.

Good Mind (Parent Company of HumSafer App) has built an asset-light, free, AI-based Road Safety Solution that aims to cut the rate of road incidents to zero. Founded by Jehaan Kotwal and Sumedh Mane, HumSafer aims to reduce road accidents and improve the lives of truckers by implementing measures to improve their lives. It’s a revolution in road safety through an evolution in behavior!

#DriveForOxygen by HumSafer is an initiative that aims to support 4000 HAZ certified drivers that clock over 12 hours to supply oxygen across the country. This initiative not only went viral but was also was able to raise over 11 Lakhs from 250 sponsors; the resulting fund-‘COVID Kavach’ will then be guaranteed to 10,000 drivers in the first leg of the drive.

StartupTalky interviewed the founders of HumSafer, Jehaan Kotwal and Sumedh Mane to know the startup story and the roadmap of the organization. Know how HumSafer started, its vision, USP, future plans, business model & more.

HumSafer – Company Highlights

Startup App Name	HumSafer
Founders	Jehaan Kotwal, Sumedh Mane
Head Office	Pune
Operational Office	Mumbai
Launched	January 2019
Industry	Auto-tech
Website	humsafer.ngo
Parent Company	Good Mind

HumSafer – About and Vision
HumSafer – Industry Details
HumSafer – How it Started
HumSafer – Product/Service and USP
HumSafer – Founders and Team
HumSafer – Name Meaning and Logo
HumSafer – Launch and Marketing Strategy
HumSafer – Business Model
HumSafer – Challenges Faced
HumSafer – Funding
HumSafer – Advisors and Mentors
HumSafer – Competitors
Tools used by HumSafer to run Startup
HumSafer – Recognition and Achievements
HumSafer – Current Status and Future Plans
HumSafer – FAQs

HumSafer – About and Vision

Good Mind (Parent Organization of HumSafer App) has built an asset-light, free, AI-based Road Safety Solution that aims to cut the rate of road incidents to zero. By prompting drivers at the right time with gentle nudges with regard to their driving, truckers are able to modify their behavior and take corrective measures. Coupled with incentives for good driving, the team @ HumSafer is confident that road accidents can be avoided entirely.

Its vision is centered around reducing road accidents and improving the lives of truckers by implementing measures to improve their lives.

“We have created an entire ecosystem via our accessible platform to empower and uplift this community. Our core belief is that by using our technology, we can change driving behavior and save over 200 lives a day. It’s a revolution in road safety through an evolution in behavior” says Jehaan Kotwal & Sumedh Mane, HumSafer founders.

Sumedh Mane talks about HumSafer and the #DriveForOxygen

HumSafer – Industry Details

The transport industry is like a bloodline of any nation and over the period of time the industry today may seem booming as the products are reaching to people faster, deliveries are done before time and the experience of sending/receiving a package is becoming more seamless.

There are about 80 lakh truck drivers, across India according to a research report published in 2019. The majority of truck drivers are single owners and their ecosystem is highly unorganized – there are neither standard rates, schedules, shifts, routines, nor any union or unity amongst them.

The drivers are not left with any savings for their future, which makes them more hopeless about their future thoughts in life. As they don’t have any savings for the future, they land up in a very critical situation when there is some medical or money emergency in the family. It really is a vicious cycle of poverty and unpredictability that plagues generations of truck drivers.

Founders of HumSafer see the industry moving towards multimodal and more technology-savvy in the next 5 years. They hope to implement key products that are centered around empowering and uplifting this community.

HumSafer – How it Started

The idea and conception of this startup are anecdotal as much as it is research-based. Jehaan Kotwal’s father, who was a truck driver brings over 30 years of domain knowledge to the table. While Jehaan himself has dedicated the last decade of his career to this sector, he realized that the needs of an entire marginalized community, whose services keep the country moving, have been neglected far too long. Using feedback from the primary research based on the principles of Human-Centered Design the MVP was designed. HumSafer App was then launched in January 2019.

Sumedh centered his career in Product, exploring technology, marketing, business acumen, but the one thing that remained through his startup and product career as Human-Centered Design, something he’s always been passionate about.

Jehaan would go on his truck every once in 2 years to understand the issues drivers face on-ground which is why he was able to build one of India’s safest transportation companies in the country, his solutions weren’t designed in an insulated office space but were derived from a root cause identification that is done on-ground to better serve the drivers.

When Sumedh came back from the UK after finishing his Computer Science Course, at the University of Glasgow, Jehaan had finally created the application he had briefly discussed before Sumedh left for 2 years.

They started informally discussing the idea and what can be done, and without knowing, organically, the idea flourished further and Sumedh decided to work on the idea full time! It was a professional relationship that had Human-Centered Design at its core.

HumSafer – Product/Service and USP

Problem Existent –

More than 90% of this segment start off as a cleaner first and are trained by the drivers they are helping. There is no formal training. If we want our roads to be safer, we need to help this community become better drivers.

Insight

Lack of safety concerns is not by choice but due to bad driving skills passed on due to the lack of centralized and formal training. Understanding what are the right incentives and motivating factors for changing their behavior is important for us to change their behavior

Solution

The HumSafer App! – Good Mind has built an asset-light-free AI-based Road safety solution that can help reduce accidents by giving gentle driving nudges to the drivers when they are driving badly and providing rewards when they are driving well. Think of it as Alexa for truckers!

Pivot Point –

Although they did not pivot from the offering, what it learned in its pilot is if this was to be sold to truck drivers as a safety product, this isn’t going to work, which is why the company pivoted its product communication to a solution built for truck drivers as their companions: Aap ke saathi, aap ke saath! (Translation: Your companion, With you!)

USP –

Using gamification to understand motivation, incentives, and rewards, are the unique offerings that set HumSafer apart from any other safety app in the market. Some of these features include:

Alerts that gently nudge drivers on their safety and good driving behavior
Monetary rewards that are credited straight to the driver through UPI
Insurance and other medical aid they can register onto through the app
Live sharing of location with select contacts to keep in touch with their families
A 24/7 helpline for any road assistance
Community page-to share and discuss grievances and others with the community

HumSafer – Founders and Team

Jehaan Kotwal and Sumedh Mane are the founders of HumSafer. Jehaan and Sumedh Mane studied in the same university where they were flatmates about 12 years ago, they have remained very close friends since.

Jehaan Kotwal

HumSafer Founders — Jehaan Kotwal – Founder, HumSafer

Jehaan Kotwal is the son of a truck driver who traveled the length and breadth of the country as a cleaner. This hands-on experience was a real eye-opener for him as he witnessed firsthand the problems that the 8 million truckers were facing- lack of safety for one. As his experience grew, it became a dream to come up with a cost-effective solution that drivers can use and really depend on.

Sumedh Mane

Sumedh in his company Hackathon built a logistics-based solution which his team won. He shared two of his ideas with Jehaan which he really liked and implemented in his solution. Those two ideas included using the sleep detection from the mobile phone front camera itself instead of spending 30-40k on an expensive device as well as Community and interaction to alert other drivers about dangers on their route.

How is the task divided?

Simply put, Jehaan runs the business arm of the organization, this includes liaising with external stakeholders such as investors and Revenue streams Connection as gathered from industry experience.

Sumedh runs the product arm of the organization and heads the tech and marketing teams. This includes CTO – Harsh Shah (Last Byte), Branding and Communication – Ayshwarya Sharma, and the UX and Design team, Nidhi Shah (Shrishti Bangalore Graduate with Design Experience).

This team is part of all product meetings regardless of their roles. The branding and communication team is involved in very early discussions of the product so they are integrated very well with the team

Current team size

2+6
Principles of hiring: “We hire people who are interested in solving this problem with the same passion we are. It is about making sure we share the same values and know what it takes to make our teams reach their highest potential” Founders of HumSafer further added.

HumSafer – Name Meaning and Logo

Jehaan and Sumedh wanted the name of the parent company to reflect their attitude towards their work and life. Good Mind (Vaho Mano in Avestan) is also one of the main pillars of Zoroastrianism which is their guiding principle. “Everything we build reflects that thought process and is the core of our belief” they added.

HumSafer App was a wordplay with ‘Humsafar’ as it means companion in Hindi and HumSafer is indeed drivers’ companion but mainly focused on safety hence the ‘Safer’

HumSafer – Launch and Marketing Strategy

The company had its in-house 200 drivers, with JFK Transporters as a strategic partner. All its experiments and use-cases are tested on them before launching it to the 10 million.

Apart from that, HumSafer also started with Oxygen drivers as the first real users during the second Covid wave where it insured 10k drivers and rewarded over Rs. 500-2000 per driver to over 1000 oxygen drivers for their amazing work during these tough times. HumSafer’s is predominantly driven through word of mouth and various transport associations. Its spend on marketing has been so far 0 (Zero). The team wishes to put its energy more into building the best product for the truck driver, instead.

HumSafer has crossed over 10k and now is looking to reach 1 lakh drivers as its next milestone. It has made its technology scalable and the backend expandable, but outsourcing many of its non-core activities e.g. BPO’s and on-ground engagements. HumSafer’s #Driveforoxygen went viral and the team was able to raise sufficient funds to insure 10k drivers. Now it wishes to insure 50k more.

#DriveForOxygen is an initiative that aims to support 4000 HAZ certified drivers that clock over 12 hours to supply oxygen across various parts of the country. These drivers risk deliveries through containment zones, lockdowns, and exhaustion- all while not being considered as ‘frontline workers’, essential or even emergency services, and working on a basic salary.

Together with Uplift Mutual, HumSafer has been raising funds to benefit the most at-risk and marginalized section of its community- truck drivers. These drivers have been tirelessly ferrying oxygen to and from various locations across India.

“Through #DriveForOxygen, over 11 Lakhs has been raised from 250 sponsors; the resulting fund-‘COVID Kavach’ will be guaranteed to 10,000 drivers in the first leg of the drive. The next phase aims to empower and enrich the lives of the 8 million marginalized trucker community” Jehaan & Sumedh added.

HumSafer – Business Model

Good Mind is a social venture, which is why it also has an NGO partner HumSafer Driver Safety Foundation. It allows all its road safety NGO partners to use the HumSafer platform for free. It, in turn, provides services to the drivers and the companies on their products to be transported. It has 3 revenue streams that will make the company profitable from the get-go. The three revenue streams are currently not being disclosed until significant volumes are achieved.

HumSafer – Challenges Faced

“We went too big too fast with our technology spends and learned to fail fast quite late. We could have experimented more in a smaller way in terms of cost. We quickly covered it up in our learnings in the second version that the new in-house team built” as said by Jehaan & Sumedh, Fouders, HumSafer.

Key learning from its pilot was as follows:

Selling ‘safety’ to an Indian audience
As an idea and the story, they liked the idea very much but in terms of using the product, it wasn’t very exciting for them
The team had to go back to the drawing board and rethink incentives and behavior change communication strategy

HumSafer – Funding

HumSafer raised its seed round in October 2020 for INR 2 crore.

Date	Stage	Amount	Investors
October 2020	Seed	INR 2 crore	Undisclosed

HumSafer – Advisors and Mentors

Adil Malia – Ex HR head of Essar Group
Pirojshaw Sarkari- Ex MD of Mahindra Logistics
Cyrus Guzder- Ex MD of DHL and AFL
Naushad Forbed- MD of Forbes Marshall and Ex-President CII

HumSafer – Competitors

Competitors of HumSafer – Green road, Netradyne and Cambridge Mobile telematics

Tools used by HumSafer to run Startup

Notion and Firebase – Tools used by HumSafer to run the startup.

HumSafer – Recognition and Achievements

This past May, Jehaan was nominated by the Ministry of Commerce & Industry and the Logistics Skill Council to start and spearhead the Oxygen Transporters & Drivers skill, Train and Deploy initiatives. Under this initiative, HumSafer will be training an additional 3000 drivers for Liquid Medical oxygen transport.

In terms of awards, Microsoft for Startups Grant had selected HumSafer amongst many other startups for a grant of $25,000. The grant came alongside access to Microsoft tools like – Power BI, Azure (server credits) as well as Github repository access for premium. They are also fortunate to be mentored as well as get network opportunities through access to webinars and conferences tailor-made for startups.

HumSafer – Current Status and Future Plans

HumSafer runs its operations across India, however, its head office is in Pune and the operational office is in Mumbai. It also has a Bangalore-based tech team that works relentlessly on the backend.

HumSafer is a pre-revenue start-up but has successfully signed a major tyre company with more than a 10k user base. The team @ HumSafer is confident that they will reach 30,000 drivers in March 2022 and 9 lakh drivers in five years.

HumSafer plans to reach 9 lakh drivers in the next 5 years. It is building its company to be profitable and scalable with the least amount of funding required.

Product and Tech – Currently, HumSafer is an asset-light product (software) and will eventually expand to a hardware device. Presently, it tracks drivers’ behavior and journey and in the future, the team would like to track the vehicle’s data as well to optimize for efficiency
Business Expansion – Right now, the team would like other segments of trucks, buses, 4 wheelers, with a geographic foray into other developing countries (East Asia, African markets)

HumSafer – FAQs

What is HumSafer?

Who founded HumSafer?

Jehaan Kotwal and Sumedh Mane are the founders of HumSafer.

What is #DriveForOxygen initiative?

#DriveForOxygen by HumSafer is an initiative that aims to support 4000 HAZ certified drivers that clock over 12 hours to supply oxygen across various parts of the country. These drivers risk deliveries through containment zones, lockdowns, and exhaustion- all while not being considered as ‘frontline workers’, essential or even emergency services, and working on a basic salary.

Who is HumSafer owned by?

Good Mind is the parent company of HumSafer. It is founded by Jehaan Kotwal and Sumedh Mane.

August 13, 2021

Kushal Bhargava sheds light on MyBranch’s Story & Co-working Industry

Coworking space is a business for some people and a home to many startups!

Mr. Kushal Bhargava, the Co-Founder of MyBranch sheds some light on the Co-working Industry in India during pandemic times and also shares the interesting startup story of MyBranch in this article. From finding locations, to assisting with documentation, to handling essentials and daily administration, MyBranch takes care of it all! In terms of managing and maintaining workspaces, MyBranch serves as a one-stop shop for all business needs.

To begin, a little background information about Mr. Kushal – He is a qualified Chartered Accountant and holds a master’s in commerce degree from Mumbai University. He is also an active member of the Student’s Committee of WIRC (Western India Regional Chapter) of ICAI. He started managing a pan-India BFSI business after completing his education. An innovative and strategic thinker, Kushal sets the vision for MyBranch and supports its operations team with delivery. He also assists in developing the business and forges ties with companies. In addition, he oversees MyBranch’s ancillary businesses – Meeting Rooms, Virtual Offices, and Managed Offices.

MyBranch – Company Highlights

Startup Name MyBranch

Founders Nayaran Bhargava, Kushal Bhargava

Headquarters Mumbai

Industry Co-working, Real Estate

Website mybranch.co.in

1.What were the major challenges in terms of co-working operations during and post lockdown?

The entire country came to a standstill during the lockdown. We were no different, even though the existing clientele at the time did not decline, the offices were left vacant during the entire lockdown period. Also, when the lockdown was lifted, several restrictions were in place, most of our clients who had expansion plans became reluctant and took a step back.

Here’s a list of Top Coworking Spaces in Bangalore.

2. How did MyBranch tackle it efficiently? What were the measures taken?

Not just our country, Covid has impacted the entire world at an unprecedented level. The pandemic laid an impact on business and overall operations up to a great extent. However, still, MyBranch was quick to respond in a strategic manner. During the lockdown, we gave utmost importance to brand building activities because it was supposed to be managed from the ease of our homes. We also planned supporting activities and drills for our customers. We were fortunate to not lose even a single enterprise client due to Lockdown. We maintained constant touch with all our clients and kept them informed about the new and updated office protocol. Also, we strictly followed all Covid-19 guidelines at our offices across India, as a result almost 80% of our clients started working from our offices just within two months of unlocking.

MyBranch Coworking Space

3. How was the company’s start-up journey in context to growth, team building, and customer satisfaction?

We believe, for any startup idea to become successful, the most important thing is its uniqueness and scalability. We utilized the lockdown for focusing on brand-building activities and spreading awareness about MyBranch. And even after we reopened, we ensured all sanitization and fumigation standards are met and our offices are completely safe for the guest employees.

We believe in the phenomenon of ‘Happy customers bring more business’, hence we consider our customers foremost.

MyBranch Logo

4. How do you see the co-working industry pacing ahead of a pandemic? What are the key points the young entrepreneurs, or start-ups in the industry, should keep in mind?

There is no denying that just like any other business, this industry too, has its share of pros and cons. But in the bigger picture, we think the co-working industry is going to boom because numerous offices and organizations have opted for work from home as a permanent way of working and are now seeking small office spaces at different locations instead of consolidated working space. Young entrepreneurs who aspire to enter into this business should most importantly focus on the conceptualization of their ideas. They should lay emphasis on offers leading to maximum satisfaction for the customers, in return, this can get a lot of recognition and references for future deals.

5. What were the learnings you got from your journey as an entrepreneur?

As an entrepreneur, one of the biggest learning we got was — bite only as much as you can chew. It is very important to only cater to as much demand as you can deliver effectively and efficiently. We believe in maintaining quality even if means lesser quantity. As an entrepreneur, you are responsible for all things from top to bottom, and for a business to become successful it is really important to manage all aspects efficaciously. A business can become fruitful with a multi-dimensional approach and a will to never give up.

The Complete Office Setup Guide for Entrepreneurs

Let’s dig into some must-haves in a new working space. Let us see the complete report on the ultimate office setup guide for entrepreneurs.

StartupTalkyYash Gupta

6. Do you want to share an anecdote or inspirational story that you think would be enriching for our readers.

To us, ours is an inspirational story because contrary to what we thought, MyBranch was able to increase revenue by 8% for this financial year despite 2020-21 being such an unfortunate year in regard to business and humanity as well. This has inspired us to work towards setting up 100 branches across India.

August 4, 2021

Startup Name	MyBranch
Founders	Nayaran Bhargava, Kushal Bhargava
Headquarters	Mumbai
Industry	Co-working, Real Estate
Website	mybranch.co.in

Websites.co.in – Easy and Instant Website Development | Company Profile | Startup Story

Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by the Websites.co.in

There’s no mystery in the fact that in today’s world, online presence is the face of the organization. However big and small a firm is, websites and digital media marketing are of utter importance to them. To help businesses get discovered online and attract more customers from all over the world, Kartik Raichura founded Websites.co.in in the year 2017.

Websites.co.in is one of the world’s easiest and instant Business Website Builder Platform that makes it extremely easy for a business owner to create a digital footprint of his business.

With the vision to empower India’s 63 million-plus micro and new businesses with online visibility, discovery and customers, Kartik started the journey with India because if something works for India, it by default works for the world.

Indian business owners know that “online jaega, toh dhandha aaega” but they struggle with the complexities of existing service offerings.

With a mobile-first approach, this venture has made the platform so easy that even a school kid or a grandfather can make the business website. Indian business owners know how to install apps and use WhatsApp, Facebook, and Youtube. They can upload status updates, add friends, play videos, and send messages. This platform is created in such a way that if one knows how to use the basic smartphone features, one can easily use the platform and grow the business online.

Furthermore, websites.co.in have also been selected by the early-stage startup mentorship program of Facebook, FbStart, in 2017. This association also helped the government-recognized startup to raise credits close to $40,000 along with other free tools and services from Facebook. Amazon, UserTesting, Dropbox, and MailChimp are some other partners from over 30 companies that are there with Facebook.

All in all, the idea is to empower the world’s 200 million micro-businesses with an online identity that’s easy for them to manage. This platform puts the world’s businesses noticed by customers globally and online. Websites.co.in’s journey so far is certainly one among the most inspiring SaaS success stories. Read on to know more about this Mumbai-based SaaS startup that is helping millions of small business owners in taking their businesses online.

Websites.co.in – Company Highlights

Startup Name	Websites.co.in
Headquarter	Mumbai
Sector	SaaS, B2B, B2B2C
Founders	Kartik Raichura and Dhaval Mehta
Founded	2017
Parent Organization	InstaWeb Labs Pvt Ltd
Website	Websites.co.in

Websites.co.in – About and How it Works
Websites.co.in – Founders and Team
Websites.co.in – How was it started?
Websites.co.in – Startup Launch
Websites.co.in – USP and Innovation
Websites.co.in – Business Model and Revenue Model
Websites.co.in – Funding and Investors
Websites.co.in – Growth
Websites.co.in – FAQs

about Websites.co.in

Websites.co.in – About and How it Works

Websites.co.in is a SaaS platform that enables businesses to get an active online presence within minutes using their App or Web dashboard. This application was featured as the “top-grossing business application” on the Google play store at the 1st position.

Websites.co.in logo

There are 200 million Microbusinesses in the world, 51 million in India but 68% of them don’t have an online presence. Digital SMBs grow profits up to twice as fast as offline SMBs. However, 35 million businesses in India are lagging in the digital movement. The World’s Micro businesses need some sort of online identity.

This app or web dashboard that websites.co.in offers, is designed to empower the business owners to quickly create business websites, update them and manage content on their website on the go in a hassle-free way.

The client only has to push content on the website and this platform completely takes care of the technology stack, custom domain name, SSL certificate, hosting, auto-SEO, auto social media pushes, statistics, business inquiries, e-commerce, dynamic responsive mobile-first themes, etc.

Websites.co.in – Founders and Team

Kartik Raichura and Dhaval Mehta founded Websites.co.in in 2017.

Kartik Raichura, Founder & CEO of Websites.co.in — **Kartik** **Raichura** and Dhaval Mehta- Founder of Websites.co.in

Websites.co.in founder and CEO Kartik Raichura, is a business post-graduate from Welingkar Institute of Management, Mumbai. Kartik is a serial entrepreneur, a TEDx speaker and an angel investor.

During his teenage years in 2004, he founded ManagementParadise.com – World’s leading social learning platform focused on management education. He started his company when he was 19 and kept at it for more than a decade. As one of the top 10 educational portals in India, it has served over 100 million visitors and created a user base of 1 million + members and growing.

Kartik is a ‘Star Young Entrepreneur Award’ recipient by the Indira Innovation Summit 2013 and his company was among the top 100 startups to work for in 2014. He was felicitated as as one of the Top 100 MARKETING TECHNOLOGY INNOVATORS in 2018 by WORLD MARKETING CONGRESS and TOP 100 INNOVATIVE LEADERS in 2017 by World Innovations Congress.

In 2019, Kartik was felicitated with the prestigious Karmaveer Chakra award and Rex Karamveer Chakra Global Fellowship for impact contributions in getting micro businesses of the world visibility through Websites.co.in and education equilibrium through his past edtech startups by the United Nations & iCongo.

Websites.co.in cofounder, Dhaval Mehta, has been in technology industry for over 13 years. After dabbling with several software solutions worth millions as an employee, he started his own infotech solutions company and kept at it for over 7 years. He has delivered projects for Fortune 500 companies and SME’s from different fields across the globe however his heart lies in helping SMBs grow their business – be it web, software or app. After successfully exiting his past SaaS startup focused on healthcare, he took the plunge to join Websites.co.in and champion digital movement for micro businesses of the world.

Websites.co.in – How was it started?

“I had been on the lookout for an idea that has a large target addressable market and is in the unorganized sector that had a potential technology disruption play. Technology has been a challenge for me personally in my previous startup.” Kartik on the idea that built this venture.

Kartik Raichura- Websites.co.in- CEO — **Kartik** **Raichura- Websites.co.in CEO**

Kartik came across several business owners, who would inquisitively always ask him, how they can take their business online, and always be fascinated by the opportunity.

“Ideally, getting their business online has been a Pandora’s box for a large business population in India and he wanted to solve this challenge with simplicity. That’s how the idea of assisted instant websites built-in front of the client was born” quotes Kartik, Founder & CEO, Websites.co.in

Websites.co.in – Startup Launch

To start with, the team only build an MVP and took it to the market to achieve a product-market fit. Kartik would himself do telephone calls to random business owners from online business directories, introduce himself as a consultant and set up a physical meeting with them. The services and product offerings developed and evolved from consultative conversations the team had with their clients. The prime focus in the first six months was to deliver on the promise of instant websites that get SMB’s online, get them more visibility, more customers and more profit.

As seen for most startups, the first 100 users were founder-driven.

“As the founder, I diligently and shamelessly demonstrated the product to just about everyone I could. It isn’t uncommon to say that I used to take up OLA and Uber Pool cabs to and fro from office just so that I could demonstrate the product to my co-passengers.” Says the founder fondly.

Websites.co.in – USP and Innovation

The whole idea behind Websites.co.in is based on the fact that the internet is an empowering tool for the world’s business owners and this venture is going to pass the toothbrush test for this audience.

“Our startup will be used at least 2 times a day by these business owners as an enabler.” Says the founder

Websites.co.in’s USP is that unlike other website builders, who charge before you can take the website online, Websites.co.in puts the website on the internet immediately as soon as the users fill up a few basic details about their business. They also get a 30-day risk free trial and can try out all the features of the platform. If the user is convinced and wants to upgrade to one of the premium plans, they can go ahead and purchase an affordable subscription plan of their choice.

This platform is available in 98 world languages and can collect payments from 190+ countries. The team is striving hard to create a world-class “Made in India” SaaS platform with a vision to empower micro-businesses and business owners globally.

Websites.co.in – Business Model and Revenue Model

Websites.co.in is a Freemium model. It gives the users a 30-day free trial of the platform. Post which if the customers choose to continue, they have to upgrade to a paid premium plan. The pricing bit is a little trickier as a user from a third world nation will not be able to pay the same price as a business owner from a developed country.

For this reason, this platform maps the purchasing power parity according to geographies and dynamically come up with a pricing that is best for that particular location.

Websites.co.in – Funding and Investors

Websites.co.in got pre-seed funding at the ideation stage itself. Before Kartik had an MVP or even a corporate bank account, he had commitments from a few angels. This confidence shown by his early investors was a real boost.

“I did knock many unknown doors too but the conversions from known friends and their network came in pretty quickly.” Kartik, Founder & CEO, Websites.co.in

Websites.co.in – Growth

Here are some key growth highlights of Websites.co.in:

App downloads per day- 2500 +
Total App Downloads – 300,000 +
Total Reviews – 2000+ reviews
Ratings – On an average of 4.5 stars out of 5
Paying customers – Paying customers from 49 + countries.

Websites.co.in – FAQs

Who is Kartik Raichura?

Kartik is the Founder & CEO of Websites.co.in, a SaaS platform that enables businesses to get an active online presence within minutes using their App or Web dashboard

What is Websites.co.in?

It is a SaaS platform that enables businesses to get an active online presence within minutes using their App or Web dashboard.

Who is the Parent organisation of Websites.co.in?

InstaWeb Labs Pvt Ltd.

July 26, 2021

Wonderchef – Cook like a Chef!

Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by Wonderchef.

The kitchenware industry is evolving at a fast rate. Once an unorganized sector, the kitchenware sector today is witnessing emergence of many new brands. The growth seems to be in an upward trajectory due to continuous technological advancement and evolving lifestyles. The Make in India initiative of the government has also attracted investors.

As of now, as per several reports the revenue of the household appliances industry in India amounts to be US$1,678 million and is expected to grow at 13.9%. The user penetration rate is expected to increase to 21.8% in next five years, as compared to 13.4% of 2019. This increasing demand for quality kitchenware in the Indian market inspired Ravi Saxena to venture into the domain and start ‘Wonderchef’, a company offering stylish and convenient cookware and kitchen appliances. The other co-founder of ‘Wonderchef’ is well-known chef Sanjeev Kapoor, who contributes his rich experience to bring about the best of kitchen appliances to the Indian consumers.

Know about Wonderchef Company Profile, Founders, Revenue, Funding, Growth etc. in this article.

Wonderchef – Company Highlights

Startup Name	Wonderchef Home Appliance Pvt. Ltd
Headquarters	Mumbai
Founders/Owners	Mr. Ravi Saxena, Mr. Sanjeev Kapoor
Industry	Consumer Durables – Cookware & Appliances
Founding Year	2009
Revenue	INR 300 Crore (FY19)
Funding	INR 700 Crore
Website	www.wonderchef.com
Registered Company Name	Wonderchef Home Appliances Pvt. Ltd

Wonderchef – About and How it Works
Wonderchef – Founders and Team
Wonderchef – Story of Starting up
Wonderchef – Name, Tagline and Logo
Wonderchef – User Acquisition
Wonderchef – Startup Challenge
Wonderchef – Revenue
Wonderchef – Funding and Investors
Wonderchef – Future Plans
Wonderchef – FAQs

Wonderchef – About and How it Works

Wonderchef is a leader in cookware and kitchen appliances that helps you cook healthy and tasty food with convenience. German standards of quality, Italian designs, & constant innovation are the hallmarks of Wonderchef. It brings warmth to every meal by creating a perfect blend of aesthetics and functionality.

We are inspired by global trends to create beautiful kitchen stories that bring out the culinary artist in you! – says Wonderchef Founder, Ravi Saxena

Wonderchef offers a huge collection of non-stick cookware, stainless steel pans, pressure cookers, appliances, cooktops, chimneys, kitchen tools, flasks, bakeware and much more which are available through their dedicated website and 10,000+ retail outlets. What makes Wonderchef special is the customized recipes that are created for every unique product by none other than Chef Sanjeev Kapoor. These are shared with the consumers via beautifully crafted recipe books, social media interactions, and dedicated apps.

Wonderchef balances between the form and function of the particular appliance, be it choice of design, material, technology or production process. This helps them curate products which impeccably transitions from the kitchen to the table. Wonderchef prides itself in getting new ideas, solutions, & technologies to the market. Wonderchef Royal Velvet Pans brought forth a revolution of fresh hues & colors in non-stick cookware. Wonderchef has changed the perception of cookware from black & boring to colorful & exciting. They have over 25 color palettes form the repertoire of Wonderchef pans.

Our customers often match their cookware to the hue of their kitchen cabinets, setting of their living room or the color of their curtains. Our products are made for making beautiful memories in the kitchen & on your dining table

Being, beautifully designed, the customers love to share the Wonderchef products as treasured gifts. Every product comes in a beautifully designed gift box. Uniqueness, attractive prices and classy designs make them the best choice for gifting. Be it a housewarming party, a birth-day, a wedding or an anniversary, Wonderchef have the perfect gift for every occasion. Wonderchef sets and blenders are the perfect gifts when a young couple sets.

Wonderchef – Founders and Team

The a question is who owns wonderchef? Ravi Saxena and Chef Sanjeev Kapoor are the Founders of Wonderchef.

Wonderchef Founders, Owners — **Ravi Saxena and Chef Sanjeev Kapoor**

Wonderchef – Story of Starting up

Wonderchef was an idea that emanated from Ravi Saxena’s interactions with Indians, whom he interacted with in over 65 countries when he travelled for work. These insights helped him identify certain latent needs that became the cornerstone of the business model of the company. The credibility Ravi had earned during his years of work helped him raise investment from across the globe from fellow professionals who trusted his skill sets and commitment.

Wonderchef was started with a vision to bring in a change in quality, performance and style of kitchenware used in Indian kitchens and in our journey so far we have achieved this. Every product of Wonderchef has its unique story of health, taste and convenience.

The passion to contribute to the growth of society and entrepreneurship in India led to the focus on DTH channel of supplying Wonderchef products. This DTH (direct to home) channel, now engages over 62,000 independent women across 12000 cities in India.

At Wonderchef, the core belief of the brand is to enable every Indian kitchen to cook tasty meals without any compromise on health. Along with this, we have always believed in empowering women by enabling them to create their own business and cook healthy for their families, with pride.

Wonderchef – Name, Tagline and Logo

Wonderchef – the name highlights the innovation, modern designs and colourful kitchenware which they sell. Thus making anyone cooking with them a Wonderchef. Their products make cooking a wonderful experience!

WonderChef Logo

‘Cook with Pride‘ is Wonderchef’s tagline.

As per our detailed study, Indian women consider cooking a daily chore and don’t get recognized for the same. We wanted to add purpose and pride to this daily activity with quality and colourful cookware. Hence Cook with Pride.

Wonderchef’s logo is an amalgamation of a chef’s hat and the W of Wonderchef logo, making it look like a star, which they consider themselves to be one.

sanjeev Kapoor- Wonderchef

Wonderchef – User Acquisition

The focus on technology and innovation ensured that a new brand was able to cut through the clutter in a rather traditional industry, and became the company that took the shortest time to grow from 0 to 200 Crore level in the industry. Today, Wonderchef has a truly omni-channel distribution strategy with a 360 degree approach to target consumers.

Wonderchef team believes that the point of purchase is only the beginning of the relationship. Their reliable warranty ensures that the customers continue to get their support long after their purchase. If the customers have a doubt or question about how to care for the product – Wonderchef provides them with customer service and they are always eager to hear from the customers.

Wonderchef – Startup Challenge

Success never comes easy, and initially the Wonderchef team also faced its share of tough times.

I have to sit back and think of the hard times we had for a number of years, to really appreciate what we have today with us – Ravi says recalling the tough times

The company did everything to survive in the initial period which coincided with the global financial meltdown. It offered financial consulting services, strategy solutions, culinary classes, employee engagement services and a few other solutions to be able to pay the bills. Working capital was always in short supply as growth continued year after year. Building a team was also a long, arduous process and thus a challenge for the founding team.

Wonderchef – Revenue

The Wonderchef revenue in FY19 was INR 300 Crore It is aiming for a revenue of INR 800 Crore in next five years.

“We are in 4,000 towns and villages at present. In terms of business, about 70 percent comes from the urban areas and 30 percent from rural areas” Says Ravi Saxena, MD & Co-founder, Wonderchef

Wonderchef – Funding and Investors

The can be seen in the fact that they have raised a total of INR 700 Crore in funding over 1 round led by Amicus Capital.

Date	Stage	Amount	Investors Name
June ’18	Series A	INR 700 Crore	Amicus Capital

Funding has helped Wonderchef invest in marketing, hire the right resources and set up the right infrastructure to facilitate future growth.

Wonderchef – Future Plans

Wonderchef has clocked revenue of 300+ Crore in the last financial year and is growing faster than the category with a healthy bottom line. The company plans to clock in 1000 Crore in the next five years – profitable growth – and does not believe in cash burn. Most of the profit is reinvested in marketing, service infrastructure and hiring the best talent.

Today, Wonderchef operates across India and 4 other nations (Australia, Mauritius, US, UK) and cater not only to the Indian diaspora but also to the locals with customized offerings suiting their needs.

Wonderchef – FAQs

Who is the Owner of Wonderchef?

The WonderChef Owners are Ravi Saxena and Chef Sanjeev Kapoor.

Is Wonderchef Indian Brand?

Yes. Wonderchef is based out of Mumbai, India.

What type of Products does Wonderchef offer?

The product range of Wonderchef ranges from Cookers, Mixed grinders, cookware, appliances to Chimneys, flasks, Kitchen care etc., Wonderchef is a leader in cookware and kitchen appliances.

How much is Wonderchef’s Revenue?

The Wonderchef revenue in FY19 was INR 300 crore It is aiming for a revenue of INR 800 crore in next five years.

Who is Sanjeev Kapoor?

Sanjeev Kapoor is an Indian celebrity chef, entrepreneur and television personality. He is the Co-founder of Wonderchef.

July 15, 2021

ION Energy – World’s Most Advanced Battery Management & Intelligence Platform!
With batteries contributing to 40%+ cost in modern EVs, there is anxiety around their longevity and performance (charging time, safety, etc) that require more than just local safety protection. ION Energy is an Advanced Electronics & Software supplier for EVs & ESS. It is focused on building technology that will improve the life and performance of lithium-ion batteries that power electric vehicles and energy storage systems.

ION Energy is accelerating Earth’s transition to an all-electric planet. With a cutting-edge battery management system, advanced analytics software, and artificial intelligence-powered platform, ION is enabling electric vehicle and energy storage space providers the power of data to make faster and smarter decisions.

Read this article to know about ION Energy, funding, CEO, founders, turnover, products, business & revenue model, investors, awards, challenges, and growth.

ION Energy – Company Highlights

Startup Name ION Energy

Headquarter Mumbai, India

Sector Energy

Founders Akhil Aryan, Alexandre Collet

Founded 2016

Legal Name ION Energy Inc.

Website ionenergy.co

ION Energy – Latest News
About ION Energy and How it Works
ION Energy – Target Market Size
How was ION Energy Started?
ION Energy – Product/Services
Founders of ION Energy and team
ION Energy – Name, Tagline, and Logo
ION Energy – Business Model
ION Energy – Revenue Model
ION Energy – User Acquisition
ION Energy – Startup Challenges
ION Energy – Growth
ION Energy – Funding and Investors
ION Energy – Advisors and Mentors
ION Energy – Acquisitions
ION Energy – Recognition and Achievements
ION Energy – Future Plans

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ION Energy – Latest News

July 2, 2021 – ION Energy raises a total of $3.6 million in pre-Series A funding round led by retail giants Amazon, followed by angel investors YourNest Venture Capital, Riso Capitol, Venture Catalysts, and others. The funding round was initiated by the eCommerce behemoth’s Climate Pledge Fund, which is set aside by Amazon to support promising sustainability initiatives of startups.

About ION Energy and How it Works

ION Energy has pioneered a disruptive battery intelligence platform – Edison Analytics, that is designed to improve performance and extend the life of Lithium-ion batteries. Edison leverages battery data, software analytics, and AI to remotely monitor, predict, and improve battery life. Battery pack manufacturers, OEMs, and electric mobility fleet operators around the world use ION’s platform to optimize their battery management systems (BMS) and build world-class batteries.

Edison Analytics Features

Both the Founders Akhil and Alex are ardent believers of the first principle thinking and aim to build for the future and plan to shepherd the gradual and seemingly inevitable shift from fossil fuels to electric energy, more importantly in a developing yet booming economy like India. They emphasize the importance of educating and mobilizing the masses about the new alternatives of energy to change the prospect of EV as a niche concept to a mainstream.

ION Energy – Target Market Size

Battery storage may be the biggest disruption to the energy sector: Globally, the advanced energy storage market is forecast to grow from an annual installation size of 6GW in 2017 to over 40GW by 2022. In some markets, the improved performance and decreasing costs of batteries are already seeing them displace natural gas from the energy mix.

The company’s success in international markets have enabled them to sell 25,000 BMS that have been used with 100MWh of batteries last year. ION’s battery technology platform is leveraged by 60+ companies in 12 countries like India, France, Germany, Austria, Poland, North America, South Africa, UK, etc. to optimize their battery management systems (BMS) and build world-class batteries.

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How was ION Energy Started?

Despite Akhil’s graduation degree in Finance, he was interested in energy and software, since he was much younger. While he was managing the growth strategy at Haptik as its CPO in 2015, Akhil became intrigued by the launch of the Tesla Model S. The interest piqued further when his father was about to sell his Skoda Superb car and he had suggested converting it into an electric model.

While doing some research, ION energy Founder Akhil realized that replacing an internal combustion engine with an electric engine would cost him more than half of the car’s cost, i.e. a car which is in the range of INR 50 lakhs would require a battery amounting to INR. 1 Crore! Given the challenge of the exorbitant battery cost (the most expensive component in an EV), Akhil recognized that there was a pressing need to make the batteries affordable and accessible so that it lasts longer, performs better, and eventually, significantly reduces the cost of the vehicle.

Identifying the gap that no other company in India was catering to this space, ION energy took birth in 2016 in Mumbai. By the next year, ION Energy acquired Freeman SAS, an almost decade-old French company building Battery Management Systems, to boost its core competency. This led to Alex Collet transitioning from his role as a Founder of Freeman SAS to ION Energy’s Co-Founder and marked the international foray of ION Energy with an office in France.

ION Energy – Product/Services

ION Energy is an advanced battery management and intelligence platform. A BMS consists of a microcontroller and a bunch of sensors on the hardware so the technology involved is interfacing with this microcontroller through all these sensors and then interfacing this BMS with the battery pack. The core functions that a BMS performs include – data acquisition, protection, storage, and communication.

Battery Management System Hardware

In terms of the software used, there are various algorithms that run inside the microcontroller which is used to compute certain parameters of the battery such as the state of charge, state of health, range, etc.

The BMS that’s present in the battery pack has substantial information stored inside it and then there is the cloud that is powerful enough to compute, assess, and analyze. The startup is currently building a telematics unit that can transmit this information via the internet, but in its absence, it is using ION Lens, a telematics gateway unit.

ION Lens collects information from the BMS through Bluetooth over your phone and uses the phone’s internet connection to transmit information to the cloud in real-time. There is also a PC utility tool called CANView which runs on your laptop through a wired medium to the BMS called CAN. It connects, then your laptop sends info to the cloud in real-time, through the PC.

The intelligence layer on top of this is Edison Analytics. This is where the data is analyzed on the cloud. The insights are based on the data and the initial calculations that are being done by the BMS placed along with the battery pack locally, without the cloud.

Get Real Time Alerts with Edison analytics

Edison Analytics is designed to improve performance and extend the life of Lithium-ion batteries. Edison leverages battery data, software analytics and AI to remotely monitor, predict and improve battery life.

Advanced battery management and intelligence platform, ION is focused on building technologies that improve the life and performance of lithium-ion batteries used inside of electric vehicles and energy storage systems. ION also leverages advanced electronics and software that accelerates the effort of engineering teams.

In 2018, after acquiring an 8-year-old French Battery Management System (BMS) developer – Freemens SAS, ION came out of stealth mode and unveiled its first product UDYR, an easily swappable battery for electric scooters and started commercializing its flagship BMS platform. UDYR’s battery management would allow it to enhance performance and increase battery life by up to 200 percent.

Electric vehicles are expensive, primarily because of the lithium-ion batteries that power them. The cost of a battery amounts to 40% of the total vehicle cost. While the upside of using lithium-ion batteries is their high energy density, relatively low self-discharge, and low maintenance, on the other hand, they have a limited life. On average, the estimated life of a lithium-ion battery is up to 3 years or 500-700 charge cycles, after which, they need to be replaced.

This helped them pivot to improve performance and extend the life of lithium-ion batteries that are used inside EVs and ESS with its flagship BMS. ION’s unique advantage is its intelligent ecosystem – BMS + Edison Analytics, that blends advanced electronics, machine learning software, artificial intelligence, and data science with deep domain expertise in energy storage.

ION Energy o-founder Akhil Aryan explains, “The key differentiator – our battery intelligence platform Edison Analytics, uses real-time simulations and visualizations designed to extend battery life by up to 40% and reduce the overall ownership cost, thus boosting ROI.

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Founders of ION Energy and team

ION Energy was founded by Akhil Aryan and Alexandre Collet in 2016.

ION Energy founders

Akhil Aryan – Akhil Aryan is the Co-Founder and CEO of ION Energy, one of the world’s most advanced battery management and intelligence platform. Akhil has been recognized as one of the Young Achievers of 2020 in the coveted ‘30 Under 30’ Forbes Asia (Industry, Manufacturing, and Energy), and Forbes India (Technology) list, and he has also been featured in Entrepreneur India’s ‘35 under 35’ list. Akhil’s objective is to identify missions and build an environment that helps unlock the full potential of his team.

One of the most unique things about Akhil is his versatility and ability to get on steep learning curves to understand markets and evaluate business opportunities. ION is a great example of how he converted his childhood fascination into a business, without an engineering degree. He graduated from the University of Mumbai with a degree in financial markets, but Akhil always says that his laptop is his gateway into the world’s largest repository of knowledge and degrees should not be held as assets that create entitlement.

In his last company – Haptik, one of the world’s largest conversational AI platforms – Akhil led the product team from the start, managed user acquisition and conversion, helping it skyrocket from 100k to 1.5 million users. In 2016, Haptik raised $12M and was on track to become one of India’s largest AI companies (acquired by Jio for $100M). Akhil was instrumental in building a complex Natural Language Processing engine to power the enterprise’s Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence efforts from the ground up.

ION Energy Team

Alexandre Collet – Alexandre Collet is the Co-founder and CTO at ION Energy, a company that is dedicated to reducing carbon footprints and building sustainable cutting-edge technology for lithium-ion batteries with a focus on electric mobility. Alexandre is chiefly responsible for designing and streamlining the technological innovation and product development at ION. A highly proficient engineer, he completed his masters in Power Electronics and Embedded Systems from the University of Grenoble, France.

Alexandre had a plethora of professional experience before his current electric endeavor at ION energy. In 2011, he founded Freemens SAS, an industry leader in battery management systems, that was acquired by ION Energy in 2018. Freemens SAS was powered into existence on his groundbreaking inventions and scientific research in power electronics architecture, lithium-ion cell aging factors, and state identification at the University of Grenoble, France.

ION Energy Team

Inside the company, ION Energy’s CEO Akhil’s role goes beyond the usual responsibilities of product, technology development, and business expansion. As a big believer of first principle thinking, his focus is on turning the green warrior narrative into a business opportunity and exploring ways to reduce the planet’s dependence on fossil fuels.

ION Energy Co-founder Alexandre seeks to concentrate on the software side of things with an increased focus on developing and scaling Edison Analytics, the world’s first and finest AI-powered state of the art battery data analytics software for all Battery Management Systems. He wants to make ION a household name and the face of advanced battery management and operating systems to unleash an electrical revolution in the world.

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ION Energy – Name, Tagline, and Logo

While Akhil is known as a software entrepreneur, he have always been innately curious about the nature of electrons. It never ceases to fascinate him that adding or removing even a single electron changes the properties of the nucleus of the atom, and hence the overall object! Such altered atoms that have gained or lost electron(s) are called IONs. This is how IONs form the basis of energy itself. The overpowering nature of IONs led to the name of as ION Energy.

ION Energy Logo

“I strongly believe that building, maintaining and optimizing the Energy Ecosystem is the greatest opportunity of our generation. Not only from a financial unit economics point of view, but also environmental impact. As a founder I will ensure that ION Energy remains at the forefront of this movement”, says ION Energy Co-founder Akhil Aryan.

ION Energy – Business Model

ION’s full-stack approach blends advanced electronics, IoT, analytics, and AI with deep domain expertise in energy storage. ION’s platform leverages a two-way communication gateway that enables businesses to:
- Identify factors that are contributing to abnormal degradation of the battery’s health and the magnitude of contribution
- Take appropriate actions like configuration changes over the air, drive profile changes, or environment changes to continuously improve the life and performance of the battery.
- Optimize costs and acquire better ROI through all stages of the battery life cycle.
This is deeply integrated with a license to Edison Analytics, its battery intelligence platform that is offered as a SaaS product. With this core differentiator, ION is overturning the unexceptional rigid, one-time configuration approach adopted by other electronics suppliers.

ION Energy – Revenue Model

The company earns its revenue by following three business models:
- The first one is the BMS sale where a bunch of companies buy its battery management system.
- The second is the BMS platform license which means companies can use the platform to accelerate their BMS development by two-three years and save million dollars expenses.
- Thirdly, the subscription to the startup’s software analytics platform which the companies use for diagnostics and warranty validation.
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ION Energy – User Acquisition

Akhil Aryan – “Being a startup, we’ve always made it a point to be transparent with our customers. Our communication with our customers has built trust in our company and our platform. At ION, good news can always wait, but if anything goes wrong, we communicate at the earliest and work on correcting our mistakes.
At ION, it’s our mission to do whatever we can to make our customers successful. That’s why our first 10 customers are still our strongest customers today and brought many more clients to our company”.

ION Energy – Startup Challenges

It’s so difficult to capture all the challenges one faces in the early days of a startup. It’s almost always at the intersection of Market, Product, Team & Traction. For the team of ION Energy, the challenges were mostly around timing their product with market maturity and ensuring they’re investing both in product and customers that can help them create short term revenues but also those that have the long term potential for market penetration.

“Initially when we began operations, one of the biggest challenges we faced was grooming technical talent in-house. There weren’t many engineers who had expertise in the EV sector and the number of engineers who had knowledge in AI and analytics was low as well”, recalls ION Energy co-founder Alexandre Collet.

When a new market starts shaping up, the talent pool is not mature and so it’s difficult to make significant progress on technology unless there is senior leadership in-house grooming talent. Thus, the company had to train them from the ground up and provide knowledge as well within the sector.

This helped in creating the core team that today also helps train any new engineer that is hired by the firm. Founders hope that in the future, there will be more experts in the EV sector in particular with colleges like Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU), College of Engineering – Pune and the Cummins College of Engineering for Women and institutes like IITs beginning courses specifically to EVs.

Explaining the concept to investors at a time when there was low awareness of the need and the technology, inadequate infrastructure, lack of push for electric vehicle adoption and localization of technology by regulatory authorities in the country are some other challenges faced by the company.

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ION Energy – Growth

ION is India’s largest BMS company with 30%+ market share in the 2/3W space, 10 Crores in revenue and offices in India & France.

The company has customers like Exicom Tele-Systems Ltd., IBS, Tork Motors, Wamtechnik, Electro-Mechanique Industries (RGM), Swincar, TYVA Energie, and Yotta Solar.

ION Energy – Funding and Investors

The initial ION Energy funding came from Akhil (Co-Founder). There are also some seed investors that include Astarc Ventures, Advik hi-Tech and executives from Salesforce, Tesla, Haptik, Nippo Batteries, and Dentsu Aegis. The funds have helped ION Energy in product development and bring the technology closer to mass manufacturing.

The latest fund, as disclosed by ION Energy, is led by eCommerce behemoth, Amazon via the Climate Pledge Fund, worth $2 billion that the firm set aside to support sustainability initiatives of the startups around the world. Along with Amazon, the other companies that joined the round were YourNest Venture Capital, Riso Capitol, Venture Catalysts, and more, which helped ION Energy to raise around $3.6 million in its pre-Series A funding round.

ION Energy – Advisors and Mentors

ION Energy is a part of Shell’s E4 Programme and is mentored by Sushil Jiwarajka, Chairman of OMC Power and founder of Nippo Batteries.

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ION Energy – Acquisitions

ION Energy was founded in 2016, and within a year of its inception, ION Energy acquired an 8-year-old French Battery Management System (BMS) developer – Freemens SAS, in a first of its kind cross-border acquisition.

ION Energy – Recognition and Achievements

Akhil has been recognized as one of the Young Achievers of 2020 in the coveted ‘30 Under 30’ Forbes Asia (Industry, Manufacturing, and Energy), and Forbes India (Technology) list, and he has also been featured in Entrepreneur India’s ‘35 under 35’ list.

ION Energy – Future Plans

The next 5 years are going to be pivotal, not only for ION Energy but also for our planet and the human species. If the company manages to make the e-mobility transition holistically, it will go down in history as one of the largest positive recourse that humanity has made. The move away from fossil fuels will define the generations to come. ION Energy has a major role to play in this transition and they take this responsibility seriously.

Over the 5 year horizon, the company sees itself managing 10% of all Li-Ion batteries deployed in the country. To make this a reality, they will scale to 100 engineers by 2021 and leverage India’s strength in electronics and software to overcome the lack of lithium resources.

“We aim to Deliver to the Key Customers with 10x Reliability in – Product + Technology. In the next 18 months, we envision quadrupling the impact and delivering 10x by 2021 to 1GWh under management and $20M in revenue“, says Akhil while talking about future plans.

Frequently Asked Questions – FAQs

What is ION Energy revenue?

The ION Energy turnover is INR 10 crores.

Who is ION Energy CEO?

Akhil Aryan is the CEO of ION Energy.

Is ION Enegy Indian Company?

Yes, ION Energy is headquarted in Mumbai, India.
July 3, 2021

Startup Name	ION Energy
Headquarter	Mumbai, India
Sector	Energy
Founders	Akhil Aryan, Alexandre Collet
Founded	2016
Legal Name	ION Energy Inc.
Website	ionenergy.co

Moneyfront – Simplifying Investment In Mutual Funds

The content in this post has been approved by the organization it is based on.

Mutual Fund is an excellent investment tool as it allows all kinds of investors access to professionally managed portfolios of equities, bonds, and other securities. The only downside is the loss of a significant portion of the investor’s returns as commissions to the mutual fund agent or distributor.

In 2013, Direct Mutual Fund plans were introduced by SEBI that permitted investors to invest directly without resorting to any agent or distributor. In direct plans, the expense ratio is low and with high returns. Still, many are hesitant to invest in mutual funds due to a lack of know-how.

Mohit Gang, Anil Bang, and Puneet Mehta—who are also active investors themselves— noticed these inconveniences faced by mutual fund investors face and came up with a solution. The trio launched Moneyfront, a financial advisory platform that lets investors invest profitably in direct plans of mutual funds and that too without any paperwork.

StartupTalky interviewed the Founders of Moneyfront to understand their venture better

Moneyfront – Company Highlights

Startup Name	Moneyfront
Headquarters	Mumbai
Founders	Mohit Gang, Anil Bang, And Puneet Mehta
Sector	Fintech
Founded	2015
Parent Organization	Moneymap Investment Advisors Private Limited
Website	moneyfront.in

Moneyfront – About
Moneyfront – Founders and Team
Moneyfront – History and Launch
Moneyfront – Business Model and Revenue Model
Moneyfront – Funding and Investors
Moneyfront – Tools Used
Moneyfront – Startup Challenges
Moneyfront – Future Plans
Moneyfront – FAQs

Moneyfront

Moneyfront – About

Headquartered in Mumbai (India), Moneyfront is a Robo-advisory platform to invest in mutual funds offering direct plans. It takes pride in three principles – paperless, simplified, and automated unbiased advisory. There is negligible awareness around the concept of direct plans despite being a client-friendly and hugely beneficial option to invest in. The company promotes this concept through technology and by offering transparent advice to clients wishing to invest in mutual funds.

Moneyfront offers financial advisory services via a comprehensive portfolio approach. Using a smart algorithm, it profiles the client and suggests the best direct plans custom-tailored for the investor’s persona.

“Our target customers are all existing investors in mutual funds who are currently investing through their banks or local distributors. We want to educate this base about differences between Regular Plans which they are currently getting and ‘Direct Plans’ which we offer being a registered Investment Advisor with SEBI,” quote the Moneyfront founders.

In September 2018, Niyogin Fintech, a platform that provides collateral-free credit to MSMEs, acquired a 50% stake in Moneyfront for Rs 12 Crore.

Moneyfront – Founders and Team

Mohit Gang, Anil Bang, and Puneet Mehta founded Moneyfront in the year 2015.

Mohit Gang, Anil Bang, Puneet Mehta — Moneyfront Founders

Mohit Gang is the CEO of the Money front. A management degree holder by education, Mohit is an investment expert and worked with Citibank and HSBC before starting Moneyfront.

Anil Bang is an expert in the finance domain. He started his career in ICICI bank and also worked with reputed global financial institutes like Morgan Stanley and Marshall Wace before joining Moneyfront. He has done extensive research on various national and global financial companies.

Puneet Mehta is a talented chartered accountant. He is a member of the ‘Financial Risk Management Program’ conducted by the Global Association of Risk Professionals. Puneet has worked with organizations like ICICI bank, Merrill Lynch, and Bank of America in various capacities in a career spanning 12+ years.

The founders are guided by the belief that a happy client is the best advocate.

At Moneyfront, everyone in the team has the freedom to express themselves freely. Each team member is empowered to take certain actions and contribute ideas for making the company leaner and swifter. The Moneyfront group takes client-feedback pretty seriously and acts on it effectively. It has a full compendium of feedbacks and keeps improvising based on client feedback and suggestions.

Moneyfront – History and Launch

Mohit, Anil, and Puneet were discussing their respective investments one day somewhere around the end of 2015. They came to the same conclusion a big slice of their returns was being decimated as distributors’ commission. They wanted to avoid this and maximize the returns. Moreover, they wanted to avoid the clutter of time-consuming paperwork. The concept of Moneyfront was the result of this discussion– completely paperless with an automated advisory for clients.

MoneyMAP Investment Advisors Private Limited is Moneyfront’s parent company. The name MoneyMAP was inspired by the founders’ names (MAP – Mohit, Anil, and Puneet). The name Moneyfront represents the company’s idea to keep the client’s interest and money at the forefront.

Moneyfront – Business Model and Revenue Model

As Moneyfront caters to Direct plans of Mutual Funds, it doesn’t take any commission from fund houses. Regulations disallow any incentive from product providers if the company registers itself with SEBI as an investment advisor. It is only permitted to charge a fee for the advisory. Moneyfront charges a flat fee of Rs. 1200 per client per year. Moneyfront also offers free services from time to time to first-time customers.

Moneyfront – Funding and Investors

The company was initially bootstrapped by the three founders. Moneyfront raised seed funding in 2017.

Moneyfront – Tools Used

Moneyfront uses a host of tools. For hiring, the Moneyfront team relies on online portals. It uses Google Sheets for updating and coordinating marketing efforts. The company is working on moving its servers to cloud-based platforms.

Moneyfront – Startup Challenges

The most challenging part for Moneyfront has been to deliver simplified options to clients. Moneyfront made a first-in-the-industry switch module with intelligent decryption that auto-reads clients’ existing portfolios. Moneyfront customers can simply upload their existing holdings and switch to direct plans without any paperwork in 5 clicks.

Moneyfront – Future Plans

The founders envision Moneyfront as a platform that simplifies the client’s investment journey, giving them holistic wealth solutions that are paperless, cost-effective, and comprehensively researched. Moneyfront is planning to include other wealth products soon and improve the platform’s technological sophistication. Moneyfront wants to establish itself as one of the biggest players in the Robo-advisory segment in the coming three years.

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then is not an Act, but a Habit.” I am also inspired by Madhushala from Harivansh Rai Bacchan – “Raah pakad tu ek chala chal, pa jayega Madhushala” (take one path and follow it diligently, and you shall reach your destination).

Moneyfront – FAQs

What is Moneyfront?

Moneyfront is a Robo-advisory platform to invest in mutual funds offering direct plans. It takes pride in three principles – paperless, simplified, and automated unbiased advisory.

Who are the Founders of Moneyfront?

Mohit Gang, Anil Bang, and Puneet Mehta founded Moneyfront in the year 2015.

How does Moneyfront earn money?

Moneyfront charges a flat fee of Rs. 1200 per client per year. Moneyfront also offers free services from time to time to first-time customers. Moneyfront caters to direct plans of Mutual Funds, it doesn’t take any commission from fund houses

Who is the Parent Company of Moneyfront?

Moneymap Investment Advisors Private Limited

June 23, 2021

CUBE WEALTH: The Incredible Wealth Management Journey for Your Investment Goal

Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by Cube Wealth.

It’s rightly said wealth preservation is as important as wealth creation. It takes great understanding and deep insights to strategically manage the wealth that you’ve created. And it’s not necessary that an individual can do it all on their own. Hence to extend professional wealth management services, Cube Wealth was founded by Satyen Kothari, who had previously founded Citrus Pay, which was acquired by PayU for $130 million in 2016.

The startup was envisioned by the founder with a simple vision i.e.,’ Simplifying Wealth Creation for Busy Professionals.’ Cube Wealth provides comprehensive portfolio management solutions to help busy professionals achieve their goals through investments. The app helps individuals to invest in multiple asset classes including equities, mutual funds, P2P lending, gold, and even charitable investing to build a well-rounded portfolio.

Cube Wealth – Highlights

Startup Name	Cube Wealth
Headquarters	Mumbai
Founder	Satyen Kothari
Industry	Banking, FinTech, Wealth Management
Founded	2016
Parent Organization	Cube Consumer Services Pvt. Ltd.
Website	bankoncube.com

About Cube Wealth and How it Works
Cube Wealth – USP
Cube Wealth Founders and Team
Cube Wealth – Work Culture
How was Cube Wealth Started
Cube Wealth – Name, Tagline and Logo
Cube Wealth – User Acquisition
Cube Wealth – Business Model and Revenue Model
Cube Wealth – Startup Challenges
Cube Wealth – Competitors
Cube Wealth – Funding and Investors
Cube Wealth – Growth
Cube Wealth – Future Plans
FAQs

About Cube Wealth and How it Works

Cube Wealth is a subscription-based automated wealth technology application that works on the concept of disciplined long-term wealth creation. So the basic idea is to simplify access to quality investments for professionals. The biggest convenience that Cube Wealth brings for its members is having their entire portfolio managed under one mobile application & being managed by money managers with decades of experience. Cube Wealth gives each consumer access to services that were only available to High Net worth Individuals to date. Users pay no charges for India investments, and can start with as little as Rs 5,000 in SIPs.

A non-refundable 1% transaction fee from retail investors and 2% from institutional investors is charged on the loan amount disbursed. This is deducted from the first EMI. There are no additional fees to invest in P2P lending through Cube.

Cube Wealth’s interests are aligned with their customers. The company follows a disciplined approach to advising clients based on their needs & investment timeframe. The Cube Wealth application has a search function that any user can try based on their ability to take risks and timeframe to see the best options for them. All the options are shown in a normalized fashion with the same elements of risk, timeframe, return rate, liquidity, etc. All the mentioned parameters make it simple for users to compare and pick a product that is ideal for them.

Cube Wealth provides access to all of the curated asset options and dedicated Wealth Coach to each of the members. Non-members can download the app for free and get one free wealth consultation. This application gets industry-standard commissions from the asset managers.

It’s our promise to our customers that we will not sell you anything based on the commission we get – rather, it will be based on what is right for you. says the founder of Cube Wealth.

At Cube Wealth, they advise all their customers that before investing in anything they should set up an emergency fund in cash and cash equivalents. As anyone with expertise in the industry would say that the commission earned is so small that even the costs for processing the transaction are not covered in most cases. But Cube Wealth recommends this as step one because it is the right thing to do in your investing journey.

At Cube Wealth, the investors get four magic ingredients:

A dedicated Wealth Coach: The investor gets a dedicated Wealth Coach who will provide personalized guidance on how to think about finances based on the life stage, risk tolerance, and existing investments.
Top Tier Investment Managers: This app gives access to top money managers in India who have over 10+years of experience in creating wealth for Ultra-rich and have managed over $2 billion. Cube Wealth has hand-selected these managers based on their track record and quality.
One Simple App: One app to simplify, track and automate all the investments. One can invest & manage wealth creation in a few simple steps.
Holistic portfolio management: The Wealth Coach assigned to the individuals will do a detailed portfolio analysis to create the best portfolio to be invested in.

Cube Wealth – USP

In this era of data explosion, there are a lot of applications helping an investor to invest in certain specific investments & which impact the overall portfolio for the investor. Cube Wealth’s USP is simplifying the wealth creation process to make it available for everyone, and to handle the entire lifecycle of the investments from short term savings for a wedding or an MBA next year to long term savings for retirement or buying a house.

Cube Wealth – Founders and Team

Satyen Kothari is one of the most successful names in the Indian fintech industry. With notable achievements on his name, Satyen is the Founder and CEO of Cube Wealth. But Cube Wealth is the second brainchild of this brilliant entrepreneur, the first being Citrus Payments. Citrus Payment’s overall strategy, user experience, product placement schemes, and strategic alliances drove the company to a valuation of $100 million in 4 years. All in all, he’s a genius serial entrepreneur.

Satyen Kothari, founder cube wealth — Satyen Kothari, founder Cube Wealth

In a short span of 18 years, Satyen Kothari has successfully started companies in multiple segments and industries including areas of marketing automation, social e-commerce, and strategy/design consulting in Silicon Valley and India. Also, the man has a very enriched experience of working with start-ups and relatively larger companies like Intuit, First Data, Cisco, AOL, Yahoo, frog design & App.

This brilliant entrepreneur is also an angel investor. Satyen has invested in 14 companies, all in the versatile spaces of marketplaces, payments, solar, education, and payments. This serial entrepreneur has a Masters from Stanford University in technology, entrepreneurship, HCI, Computer Science and a BE in Computer Science and Engineering from Bombay University.

Cube Wealth – Work Culture

Cube Wealth team comprises of engineers, designers and customer journey experts. They currently have over 30 people in the team. There is a real culture at Cube Wealth of doing whatever it takes to get the job done and achieve the best outcome for the employees.

The Cube Wealth team discusses the ideas and talk about what is going on in their lives, in the world, in fintech, and at Cube. This team has no ranks, only roles. The daily lunch routine helps them establish this sense of equality. It’s this equality that makes the conversation free-flowing and rich. And yes, even the quieter engineers contribute! The Cube Wealth team knows one another well, has strong bonds and likes each other too. They generate ideas very organically as a team.

Our single biggest decision on our business was made at lunch thanks to a debate on who we thought we were, who our customers thought we were and who we wanted to be – Satyen quotes

How was Cube Wealth Started

It was 2016 and Satyen had just sold Citrus Pay, the last company that he had founded, for $130 million. Suddenly he was surrounded by all types of wealth and asset managers. He then realized that the wealthy have access to amazing financial advice and some fabulous asset managers.

In recent years, there has been a steep rise in the number of people looking to invest in assets such as mutual funds, equities & other instruments. With this surge in the numbers, also came in a lot of companies providing misleading investment advisory services & instruments which resulted in people losing their money due to the incompetence of the advisors. Also, the investors were given wrong advice. All this was because the best of advisors were only limited to a particular set of HNWIs and UHNWIs.

After speaking to hundreds of senior professionals & entrepreneurs, he realized that
a) People are mis-sold investment products
b) They don’t have access to quality money managers & assets
c) They don’t have time to research & build their portfolio

“How do I make the same quality of advice and access to the same top-performing asset managers possible for everyone?” was the thought that germinated the Cube Wealth seed in Satyen’s mind.

Satyen felt a strong sense of injustice because he always needed this quality of advisory but only the very rich could access them. And he wanted to change that. He had also discussed it with investors from Singapore, US & Japan about the product & need for high-quality products & services to the large & aspirational middle class in India.

Cube Wealth – Name, Tagline and Logo

The name ‘Cube’ was picked because it is a simple yet multi-dimensional and visualizable physical object. In wealth management, a lot of dimensions determine the result of returns. And yet at any time, only one side of that complex equation matters to the user – the money that an investor may be saving to buy a house, or to park extra money for the long term. Cube focuses on that singular aspect that matters to each customer while handling all the other dimensions of the problem space elegantly.

Cube Wealth – User Acquisition

From the beginning of the Cube Wealth application, the team has focused on maintaining the 3i approach internally: Integrity, Intensity & Intelligence, which is always about being transparent & providing the highest value to the customers.

Every customer of Cube Wealth gets only the best of investment managers from around India. The team does a thorough due diligence of each investment manager who is impaneled on Cube Wealth. They look at their investment thesis, past performances, leadership teams, assets under their management, investor support processes and many more such attributes. Last but not least, the team researches and tests every investment with their own money and handpick the top-performing advisors.

Cube Wealth was Initially only available to members on an invite-only basis. This helped them to create a strong referral base & spread the Cube Investment Philosophy. The team had majorly used channels such as Linkedin, Twitter, and PR. The whole process was catered towards providing the complete portfolio experience to users.

The most important factor which helped Cube Wealth distinguish themselves in the market was the exemplary customer service experience which helped them retain & acquire new users. They have a two-staged model in place for customer service:

A dedicated Wealth Coach
Dedicated Whatsapp group with our leadership team

For every customer, the idea is to help them build an ideal portfolio for wealth creation with both short term & long term assets. Cube wealth does a complete portfolio analysis for the customers & understand their detailed requirements before providing any allocation advice. After this, it comes to step one. They ensure that all the investor’s money is parked only in high-quality assets that are mapped to their goals. Lastly, they also have a function to automate regular investments via the Cube Wealth’s Super SIP feature. All these steps are critical – analysis, quality recommendations, and disciplined regular investing – to place the customer on track towards a healthy and wealthy financial future.

After acquiring the first hundred customers, Cube Wealth doubled its efforts towards referrals, press releases & spreading awareness on social media. The fundamental strategy is to provide maximum value to the customers who use the Cube Wealth application.

Cube Wealth – Business Model and Revenue Model

Currently, Cube Wealth has not worked out a fully functional revenue model. the reason being that all the users can avail the services for zilch cost. Also, the personal fund manager advice service is issued to the users without any additional charges.
The company is currently earning commissions from funds when an investor commits to a long-term plan of around ten years.

“Since we have just started, we are focusing on creating the habit among users to invest, and we teach them how and where to put their hard-earned money to build a rounded portfolio,” Satyen said.

Cube Wealth – Startup Challenges

The biggest challenge in the current wealth management sector is the Human-centric processes, time is taken in KYC, and due diligence is a few of the factors which do not allow fund houses to focus on small retail investors. Also, with multiple advisors & multiple investment products, people tend to often overlook the value of the investment portfolio as a whole.

For solving these problems, Cube Wealth has The Triangle Strategy.

The Triangle Strategy Followed by Cube Wealth

The base of the triangle is the Cube Wealth app, which is an automated investment platform. It helps investors get easy access and analysis to all the asset classes in their existing portfolio, in one place.

In the digital era, when it comes to investment, the human element is important.
And Cube Wealth have catered it through phone service teams, WhatsApp groups, as well as teams sitting in five different cities as of now.
Adding top-tier SEBI-registered advisors and RBI-registered asset providers that help guide every user on the right portfolio for their needs, cash flow, current investments, and risk appetite.

Cube Wealth – Competitors

There are applications like Paytm Money and ET money operating in the same market. But Cube Wealth is different from these competitors. The reason being these two companies mainly focusing on mutual funds and mostly catering to first-time investors.

Cube Wealth – Funding and Investors

The company raised USD 2 million in October 2018 in its Series A round from a handful of investors, including Singapore-headquartered venture fund Beenext, Japan-based Asuka Holding, and the US-based 500 Startups.

On june 1st 2020, it announced mid-series funding of $500,000 led by Satyen Kothari, founder of Cube Wealth. Other participants in this round include Singapore-based venture fund Beenext and Japan-based Asuka Holding.

Date	Stage	Amount	Investors
21st October 2018	Series A round	$2 million	Beenext, Asuka Holding and 500 Startups
1st June 2020	Mid Series	$500,000	Satyen Kothari, Beenext, Asuka Holding

The funds have been used to grow & scale the company in India’s top cities like – Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai, and Pune—and also expand to Europe and America to tap the Non-Resident Indians there.

Cube Wealth – Growth

Currently Cube Wealth has offices in Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore, Chennai & Hyderabad. Cube has effectively simplified and automated the lives of members across 26 cities and 5 countries in their journey of wealth creation and management.

Cube Wealth is trusted by many senior professionals from companies like Google, Amazon, Microsoft, IBM, Deloitte, KPMG, & many more.

They have partnered with top wealth advisors in the country like Purnartha, Wealth First, Ambit, Alchemy, Motilal & Oswal among others.

Cube Wealth – Future Plans

The company currently curates 17 investment options for its users, who can start investing with as little as INR 15,000 (USD 200) to as high as a few crores (one crore is 10 million rupees, or about USD 150,000).

The investment portfolio on Cube Wealth’s mobile app includes mutual funds, stocks, equity, and peer-to-peer (P2P) investments, among others. Recently, the company has also made stocks listed in the US and other countries, such as Apple, Microsoft, Starbucks, and a few others, available for Indian investors who can put a maximum of USD 250,000 into non-Indian stocks every year.

In the near future, they plan to monitor & add more efficient investment products to help users have a complete portfolio.

FAQs

What is Cube Wealth?

Cube Wealth is a digital wealth management service provider that offers busy professionals investment options through its app along with expert advice to achieve their investment goals.

Is Cube Wealth app safe?

The Cube Wealth app is safe and reliable for mutual fund investments.

Is Cube Wealth free?

There are no additional fees to invest in P2P lending through Cube.

Who is the founder of Cube Wealth?

Satyen Kothari is the Founder and CEO of Cube Wealth.

What is the cube wealth charges?

Cube wealth charges 1% transaction fee from retail investors and 2% from institutional investors on the loan amount disbursed.

June 19, 2021

Fruzzante – Farm-Grown Fruit Wine

Wine market in India is still in its infancy. The annual per capita consumption of wine is very low as compared to many European countries. Drinking wine is not a part of Indian tradition. As such negative public and religious opinions have prevailed regarding wine, in the Indian society for many years. But with globalization and with a huge segment of Indian population becoming more educated and financially strong, the demand for wine in India is increasing.

We have interviewed co-founder of Fruzzante, Mrs. Priyanka Save to know more about this unique wine business.

Fruzzante – Highlights

Startup Name Fruzzante

Headquarter Bordi, Maharashtra

Founders Priyanka Save & Nagesh Pai

Industry Wine Manufacturing

Founded 2010

Fruzzante – About
Fruzzante – Industry Details
Fruzzante – Founders
Fruzzante – The Idea
Fruzzante – Name and Logo
Fruzzante – Product
Fruzzante – Revenue Model
Fruzzante – Customer Acquisition
Fruzzante – Challenges
Fruzzante – Growth
Fruzzante – Funding
Fruzzante – Competitors
Fruzzante – Future Plans
Fruzzante – Advisors and Mentors
Fruzzante – Awards and Recognition
Fruzzante – Conclusion
Fruzzante – FAQ’s

Fruzzante – About

While most of the wine in India and around the world is made of grapes, Fruzzante, a brewery in Bordi, Maharashtra has given an interesting twist to the beverage by manufacturing wine with the Indian local fruit, chikoo. Fruzzante is the solitary producer of chikoo wine.

The mission of the company is to make quality wines from chikoo and other fruits like pineapple and mango and break the stereotype in the wine industry where wine is primarily made from grapes only.

The company’s vision is to aid the chikoo farmers by providing them with the dire acknowledgment that they deserve.

Our journey began from the grassroots and will forever be respectful of that.

Fruzzante – Industry Details

According to the India Wine Market Overview (2018-2023) report, Indians are becoming aware of the health benefits of wine. As such, the Indian wine market has grown with a CAGR of more than 25% in the past five years.

A recent report by Dataessentials, revealed a 39% increase in the inclusion of beer and wine-based cocktails in menus. For instance, combinations of gin and sparkling wine with a melon slice or rum with prosecco and fruit juices are gaining popularity. Keeping in view this shift in consumption patterns and preferences in alcohol beverages, producers will have to come up with complex flavors and preparation methods. Many varieties of drinks such as ‘smoked’, ‘toasted’, or ‘pickled’ are being introduced to cater to the younger demographic.

Also with wine consumers becoming more health conscious and concerned about calories, bloating and headaches, producers are on a lookout for healthier ingredients like vegetables and fruits. According to Priyanka, India has the prowess to compete on a bigger scale in the wine industry.

The mismatch in production will steadily level up within the next few decades which makes it an interesting market to be a part of.

Fruzzante – Founders

Priyanka Save & Nagesh Pai | Co-Founders, Fruzzante

Priyanka Save and Nagesh Pai are Co-founders of Fruzzante.

Mr. Shrikant Save has been helping the company reach out to the export market. Fruzzante also has a bunch of sales staff and creative support team as well.

Fruzzante – The Idea

Priyanka has childhood memories associated with the chikoo orchards of Dahanu-Gholvad in Maharashtra. In 2004, a seed borer disease sever ely affected the chikoo plantations. The chikoo market was hard hit due to this disease and the farmers had to cut off their plantations. The market acceptance of the fruit was severely affected. Priyanka’s family owns Hill Zill resort in Bordi, 25km away from Dahanu and they thought of reviving the chikoo market. Their initial idea was to process chikoo in a packageable form. But products made from dried chikoo failed to attract customers. Again, chikoo juice was highly perishable. Finally owing to the fermenting nature of the fruit, it was decided to start making wine with chikoo. They visited numerous wineries in India as well as overseas to acquire precious knowledge about perishability, extraction, fermentation, storage and packaging. After all the research the brewery was set up in the family’s resort in Bordi.

Fruzzante – Name and Logo

We wanted a name to indicate both fruit and fizz. Hence the name Fruzzante.

Fruzzante logo is a stamp that indicates quality consciousness which is their priority when manufacturing a product.

Fruzzante Logo

Fruzzante – Product

Fruzzante wine is the world’s first and only producer of a cider-style alco beverage made from chikoo extracts. It is also the only company producing fruit-based and non-grape bottled products in the wine category that is currently commercially available. Its products are both vegan and gluten-free which makes it a healthy choice as well.

Fruzzante Products

Apart from chikoo cider wine, Fruzzante has released other variants in the vegan beverage range made in cider style including Pineapple, Mango, and Spice Garden (Cinnamon, Ginger, and Honey with chikoo). They also have a sparkling white wine made from star fruit blended with grapes under the brand name JIWA and a premium honey dessert wine or mead under the brand name ARKA i.e, aka the Fruzzante beer.

Fruzzante – Revenue Model

Fruzzante prices their wines at an affordable INR 255 for 330 ml. The cost is also considering the 100% Excise duty applicable on the product, unlike grape wines that are duty-free in Maharashtra. 20% VAT is also applicable, unlike grape wines where 16% rebate is applicable. The company has approached state governments several times to treat all fruit wines as equal and be given the same benefits as grape wineries enjoy. However, it awaits an answer on the same.

Fruzzante – Customer Acquisition

Acquiring the first 50 customers came rather easy. The winery being a part of a 30-year-old family owned resort, they started with giving winery tour to all room guests. A lot of appreciation along with business came along as the winery tour activity got more and more popular.

Fruzzante – Challenges

The initial challenge was that regarding the nature of the raw material, chikoo. There were problems with high pH levels, uneven ripening, and low shelf-life. The fruit is immensely dissimilar to fruits like grapes which ripen naturally and harvest easily. It rather requires controlled environments, and hence the Company resorted to ripening in chambers that control the natural ripening process as opposed to non-organic means. The benefit was uniform ripening and hence better quality of juice, thereby resulting in a quality product.

Fruzzante Wine manufacturing Plant

Fruzzante also faced several challenges in terms of processing the fruit. But Priyanka and Nagesh being experienced mechanical engineer, they were able to handle the issue efficiently. They created conducive environments with the use of impeller pumps and fermentation tanks on north facing stilt levels (least sun exposure) to ensure less cooling and power savings. The further implementation of automatic temperature- controlled systems, cooling jackets, and ozonators helped maintain hygienic and sterile conditions.

There were also challenges in packaging the highly perishable fruit, which was eventually solved with the help of a fully automatic bottling filling machine. This enabled appropriate and efficient rinsing, filling, and capping of the bottles. Therefore, the bottling along with the air-conditioned storage facility helps maintain comfortable temperatures for product storage. With all the challenges the Company faced, it hasn’t relinquished or compromised on the stance of placing quality before anything else; a vital element in any process.

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Fruzzante – Growth

Fruzzante has made its products available in Mumbai, Pune, Nagpur and soon will expand the market in Kolhapur too. Many associate a sense of pride with the product which they feel is their biggest achievement.

In order to reach out to more customers, Fruzzante envisions working with several other fruits while maintaining quality standards.

In today’s market, consumers are looking for authenticity in their products because they are being bombarded with adulterated products.

Fruzzante, therefore, strives to represent honest producers who understand the need of the market and bridge the gap through authentic, unadulterated, and tested products. As a home-grown brand, they bring the traits of understanding, compatibility, and reliability to the table.

Fruzzante – Funding

Fruzzante has not raised any funding from institutional investors, however it has taken a financial loan from a bank to set up the plant and machinery.

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Fruzzante – Competitors

Fruzzante is unique in the sense that it is the only fruit-based non-grape bottled product in the cider-style beverage category currently available commercially. Its products are both vegan and gluten-free which makes it a healthy choice. Hence, it does not have any direct competitors in its niche. However, on a broader scale of wine manufacturing, it is competing against Chateau Indage, Grover Vineyards, Sula Vineyards and Sankalp Wines among others.

Fruzzante – Future Plans

Fruzzante wishes to diversify their product range further. Their expansion plans include working with several other fruits in the near future. It will also be tying up with B2B trade companies in the state of Maharashtra, which they believe will enable them to form a consolidated network in the state and enable them to traverse into other parts of the country as well.

Fruzzante – Advisors and Mentors

Mr. Dominic Rivard and Mr. Ajit Balgi are the guiding light behind Fruzzante venture.

Rivard is an award-winning winemaker and cider specialist in Canada. Mr. Rivard owns the Bulwark Ciders and Red Barn Winery in Nova Scotia. Mr. Balgi is instrumental in brand building and is consulting the company.

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Fruzzante – Awards and Recognition

Certain highlights or milestones along our journey fed our beliefs and strengthened our hope.

Fruzzante won the silver medal at “Drink Outside the Grape” challenge 2017 held in the United States. Fruzzante competed against 145 global wines and ciders and emerged as a winner. However, its biggest milestone continues to remain in bringing the chikoo market back on the map.

Team Fruzzante acknowledges the contribution of the farmers towards the making of the brand. As such, the company mentions the Warli tribe on the labels of each product. In addition, the proceedings from the sale of the special “Starfruit Jiwa” flavor of the drink are contributed for the well being of the tribe, as a mark of respect and remarkable achievement in bringing the chikoo market back to life.

Fruzzante – Conclusion

Fruzzante co-founders Priyanka Save and Nagesh Pai always wanted to explore the potential of farm-grown fruits. This led them to open a business in farm grown fruits in India. Fruzzante offers ciders of different fruits like a pineapple, mango, starfruit and chikoo ciders. These ciders are gluten-free and are made using perfectly ripe fruits. When the fruits are ripe, they are collected from the farms, the juices are extracted and are further diluted with water without any added sugar.

Fruzzante – FAQ’s

What is Fruzzante?

Fruzzante, a brewery in Bordi, Maharashtra has given an interesting twist to the beverage by manufacturing wine with the Indian local fruit, chikoo.

What is the Company’s Mission?

The mission of the company is to make quality wines from chikoo and other fruits like pineapple and mango and break the stereotype in the wine industry where wine is primarily made from grapes only.

Who is the Founder of Fruzzante?

Priyanka Save and Nagesh Pai are Co-founders of Fruzzante.

What are different products of Fruzzante?

Fruzzante has released other variants in the vegan beverage range made in cider style including Pineapple, Mango, and Spice Garden (Cinnamon, Ginger, and Honey with chikoo).

June 9, 2021

Startup Name	Fruzzante
Headquarter	Bordi, Maharashtra
Founders	Priyanka Save & Nagesh Pai
Industry	Wine Manufacturing
Founded	2010

SportVot Startup Story – Digital TV for Local Sports Talent

Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by SportVot.

SportVot has made streaming sports tournaments a one-click process with the use of smartphones. It is a digital TV for local sports talent and emerging leagues in India. SportVot provides a platform for sport bodies to stream their games online, local sports talent to show their skills, make them more marketable and helps them get discovered by a network of scouts/coaches as well as connect the fans to their local heroes.

Founded by Siddhant Agarwal, Shubhangi Gupta and Yash Bhagwatkar in 2019, SportVot has managed to build its presence in local areas by covering 5000+ games across 56 different sports, profiling 20,000+ athletes in just 12 months!

StartupTalky interviewed Shubhangi Gupta (Co-founder & CMO, SportVot) to get an insight on the Startup Story of SportVot. Also get a glance on SportVot Revenue model, funding, growth, marketing strategies and more in this article ahead!

SportVot – Company Highlights

Startup Name	SportVot
Founding Team	Founder – Siddhant Agarwal (CEO), Co-founders – Shubhangi Gupta (CMO), Yash Bhagwatkar (COO)
Founding Year	2019
Headquarters	Mumbai
Sector	Sports Media Technology

About SportVot
SportVot – Sports Media Industry Details
SportVot – Founders and Team
SportVot Ideation – How it Started?
SportVot – Products/Services offered
SportVot – Name Meaning and Logo
SportVot – Business Model and Revenue Model
SportVot – Startup Launch
SportVot – Challenges Faced
SportVot – Marketing Strategy
SportVot – Growth and Current Status
SportVot – Funding and Investors
SportVot – Competitors
Tools used by SportVot
SportVot – Recognition and Achievements
SportVot – Future Plans
SportVot – FAQs

About SportVot

SportVot is a digital TV for local sports talent and emerging leagues in India. Grassroots or local sports tournaments have a longer recall and emotional value with kids, parents and their friends and family. But unfortunately broadcasting them via traditional media platforms is not an economical fit for both the Sports bodies and media houses, leaving about 94% of the ecosystem uncovered.

SportVot with its technology and services has made broadcasting economical and easily accessible to these sports bodies. SportVot provides a platform for sport bodies to stream their games online, local sports talent to show their skills, make them more marketable and helps them get discovered by a network of scouts/coaches as well as connect the fans to their local heroes.

“There are around 10m athletes and 100k tournaments worth streaming in India, we want to grow from 150 to 1000 tournaments in the next one year (by 2022) and unearth more hidden talent in the country” says Shubhangi Gupta, Co-founder & CMO, SportVot

SportVot – Sports Media Industry Details

In India, there are approximately 10 million aspiring/emerging athletes (U-19), and around 100k+ semi-professional/ professional tournaments that takes place annually. But most athletes do not get access to the right set of tools and platforms to showcase their talent. This results in a lack of transparency in talent discovery which in turn increases the number of dropouts in the Indian Sports Ecosystem.

The sports media revenue in the Asia Pacific is estimated to grow to up to USD 6.6 billion by the end of 2024. Out of this, 40% is estimated to be through the OTT/digital channels. These estimated numbers are across the super-premium level. Currently, there are more than 10 Billion Impressions on local sports content scattered over YouTube, Facebook, and other social media platforms. There can be see an increase in demand & engagement for local sports content with limited supply available. In India, sports as an industry is scattered and disorganized, SportVot has been strategically designed to create unique IPs and generate revenue from this fragmented sports economy.

SportVot – Founders and Team

SportVot Founder – Siddhant Agarwal (CEO), SportVot Co-founders – Shubhangi Gupta (CMO) and Yash Bhagwatkar (COO)

SportVot Founders and CEO — (L-R) Yash Bhagwatkar, Siddhant Agarwal, Shubhangi Gupta – **SportVot Founders**

Siddhant Agarwal | Founder & CEO

Siddhant has 8 years of experience building software and technology products. He has Worked with Oracle and Cashcare in the past. Built Thisgameweek, the first cross geography real money multi currency fantasy gaming platform, operational in India and Africa, partnered with Nazara games (largest mobile gaming platform in India) for publishing the game across geographies. Exited it in late 2018. Currently, at the helm of SportVot since January 2019.

Yash Bhagwatkar | Co-Founder & COO

Yash has 3 years of operational experience, with 2 years of corporate operations at Accenture. He has spearheaded the sports operational network of broadcasters, content creators, sports talent, and data collectors in Maharashtra, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Delhi.

Shubhangi Gupta | Co- Founder & CMO

Digital marketing and Branding executive with around 4 years of experience. She has developed around 40+ brands including some marquee brands. She also had 2 other startups in the past. One named EthKnits, a handicraft online boutique, and Nite Owls, a small Digital Marketing agency specializing in startups.

SportVot Ideation – How it Started?

Siddhant and Yash being a passionate sports lover, they used to work on cricket & football analytics together and also had their own YouTube show named The Free Hit Project. A couple of months into their show, they kept interacting with a couple of sports enthusiasts and saw the need of more sports coverage beyond the regular International Football and Cricket leagues. A lot of upcoming talent came to them to make their cricket performance reports to help them get better placements. That was the beginning of the idea of SportVot’s core product and vision of the company. To create a technology to cater to the grassroots sports.

SportVot – Products/Services offered

With the rise in penetration of 4g and affordable smartphones, high speed internet is available to everyone at a reasonably low price. SportVot has made streaming sports tournaments a one click process with use of the hardware that you all possess i.e. your smartphone, thus reducing the dependency on the use of external hardware and software. The SportVot ecosystem enables these tournament organizers and clubs to make their tournaments fully digital right from streaming, instant highlights, scoring to fixture management. This, in turn, makes these games and the athletes participating in them more marketable and discoverable to a wider audience.

SportVot – Name Meaning and Logo

The SportVot team wanted to keep the name Indian friendly.

“We were just joking about the fact that how Indians say namak shamak, kal wal, etc. So we came up with SportVot, with the intention that we may not just limit ourselves to sports but other talent as well at some point in time.” Shubhangi added.

SportVot – Business Model and Revenue Model

Currently, the primary sources of revenue of SportVot are – direct income from streaming services and advertisements/sponsorships. Pay per view has been tested at very low scale on a pilot basis. They basically get paid to acquire its own consumers.

SportVot – Startup Launch and Marketing Strategy

The first 100 users of SportVot were via streaming DSO games and building a sports community on social media channels. The team made sure to put relevant content to build the community on Whatsapp, Instagram and Facebook. With the help of that, SportVot kept growing and its name became more evident in the sports community.

Apart from community building, SportVot received incredible partnership opportunities with Barcelona Academy Delhi for live streaming their annual Asia Pacific Cup in January 2020. It also covered some esteemed games like Rajasthan Basketball League, Yuva Sena Kabaddi League, etc.

The main marketing strategy of SportVot that helped the company a lot was building a sports community for all kinds of sports. It now has a good fan base on its digital platforms, who are loyal and keep approaching the platform for more content.

SportVot – Challenges Faced

Figuring out the camera set up for live streaming at low cost was a challenge. Not every tournament organizer can afford expensive set up and a lot of the team’s time went in research and development for the right set of tools required to make this process cheap and easy.

SportVot – Growth and Current Status

In just 12 months, SportVot has managed to build its presence in local areas of Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Kerala and Delhi by covering 5000+ games across 56 different sports, profiling 20,000+ athletes, and building a strong community of more than a million sports enthusiasts on its digital channels. This passionate sports community of tier 2, tier 3 and rural areas of India helps the team to get more brand sponsorships which in turn assist these unique sports talent, and even tournaments, to get more support and visibility.

SportVot – Funding and Investors

SportVot recently raised AUD 25,000 from StartupBootCamp in an accelerator programmer. Prior to this, SportVot received INR 25,00,000 as Friends and Family round.

SportVot Funding Details is as follows –

Date	Stage	Amount	Investors Name
September 2019	Friends & Family	INR 21 Lakhs	Ashay Pradeep Bandivadekar
September 2019	Friends & Family	INR 4 Lakhs	Rakesh Murarka
June 2021	Accelerator Programme	AUD 25,000 (~ INR 14.2 Lakhs)	StartupBootCamp

SportVot – Competitors

SportVot has no direct Indian competitors in this domain yet. Some indirect competitors of SportVot are Overtime, Pitchvision, Dfocus.

Tools used by SportVot

Airtable, Gsuite, Slack are tools used by SportVot to run the startup.

SportVot – Recognition and Achievements

SportVot received recognition from local and political event organizers for streaming events at very low cost.

SportVot – Future Plans

SportVot wants to expand to more geographies in India and work on interesting features on the app to promote talent discovery. There are around 10m athletes and 100k tournaments worth streaming in India, SportVot wants to grow from 150 to 1000 tournaments in the next one year and unearth more hidden talent in the country.

SportVot – FAQs

What is SportVot?

SportVot is a digital TV for local sports talent and emerging leagues in India. SportVot provides a platform for sport bodies to stream their games online, local sports talent to show their skills, make them more marketable and helps them get discovered by a network of scouts/coaches as well as connect the fans to their local heroes.

Who founded SportVot?

SportVot Founder – Siddhant Agarwal (CEO), SportVot Co-founders – Shubhangi Gupta (CMO) and Yash Bhagwatkar (COO)

Who are the competitors of SportVot?

SportVot has no direct Indian competitors in this domain yet. Some indirect competitors of SportVot are Overtime, Pitchvision, Dfocus.

How does SportVot make money?

Primary sources of revenue of SportVot are – direct income from streaming services and advertisements/sponsorships. Pay per view has been tested at very low scale on a pilot basis. They basically get paid to acquire its own consumers.

May 24, 2021

Marico – An FMCG with a Positive Impact on The Entire Business Ecosystem

Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by Marico.

The consumer goods market is a group of stocks and companies that deal with goods purchased by individuals and households rather than by businesses and industries. Food manufacturing, baked goods, garments, drinks, vehicles, and electronics are also part of this industry.

Marico Limited is a leading consumer goods company in India, offering a wide range of food, beauty, and wellness products and services. Marico has offices in over 25 countries across Asia and Africa, with its headquarters in Mumbai, Maharashtra, India.

Marico – Company Highlights

Company Name	Marico Limited
Headquarters	Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Industry	Consumer goods
Founded	2 April 1990
Founder	Harsh Mariwala
Products	Personal care, Skin care, Convenience food
Areas Served	Worldwide
Website	www.marcio.com

Marico – Latest News
About Marico and How it Works?
Marico – Vision and Mission
Marico – Founder and History
Marico – Name, Logo and Tagline
Marico – Products
Marico – Business Model
Marico – Revenue and Growth
Marico – Key Financial Metrics
Marico – Investments
Marico – Acquisitions
Marico – Competitors
Marico – Challenges Faced
Marico – Future Plans
Marico – FAQS

Marico – Latest News

As of January 2021, Marico was adopting a digital-first approach for premium foods.

Marico, a major Consumer goods business, is aiming for a bigger share of the food market. Marico wants to increase revenue from its food sector to INR 500 crore in FY22, up from less than INR 200 crore the previous fiscal. Sanjay Mishra, COO of Marico, spoke about the company’s renewed emphasis on the men’s grooming market, as well as strengthening the company’s premium product range and introducing “mass products with differentiation.”

“The big picture is that we want to be present in the foods segment, in the premium as well as mass categories. For the premium segment, we are going to adopt a digital-first approach. This calls for doing multiple things including creating new categories and tapping categories that are huge in the digital space. We started by prioritizing Saffola Fittify and Coco Soul as digital-first brands to see the response we got. Over time, we have learnt that there is a demand for these categories, but at this time, the market size is very small in the country. Hence, we are focusing on creating categories digitally,” said Sanjay Mishra, COO of Marico.

About Marico and How it Works?

Marico Limited is a leading consumer goods company in India, specializing in food, beauty, and wellness. Marico has a presence in over 25 countries across Asia and Africa, with its headquarters in Mumbai. It nurtures leading brands in hair care, skin care, edible oils, nutritious foods, hygiene, male grooming, and fabric care, among other categories. Marico’s goods are a part of millions of people’s everyday lives all over the world.

Parachute, Parachute Advansed Livon, Set Wet, Mediker, Saffola, Nihar Naturals, and Revive are some of the famous Indian household brands. Parachute, HairCode, Ingwe, X-Men, Caivil, Isoplus, Code 10, Hercules, Black Chic, and Thuan Phat are among the foreign brands that have been localized to meet the fashion needs of international customers.

Marico – Vision and Mission

Every member of the Marico family has a vision of long-term growth and prosperity while also attempting to have a positive impact on the entire business ecosystem. They collaborate to improve the lives of all of their stakeholders, including consumers, investors, members, and society at large.

The corporation has always taken steps to minimize negative environmental impacts while focusing on the common benefit of the people. It inspires people to contribute to society in every way they can. Marico claims that businesses and social organizations can improve their economic and social values through creativity and innovation. Instead, it is one of the company’s core principles.

Marico – Founder and History

Harsh Mariwala entered his family’s company, Bombay Oil Industries, in 1971, and by 1974, he had imagined an FMGC market for coconut and refined edible oils in smaller consumer packs, and had established a national distribution network for Parachute. And it was then that the first blue bottle of parachute oil appeared in Harsh’s invention.

Marico was born on April 2nd, 1990. Marico also released another haircare product, Hair & Care, a non-sticky hair oil, in the same year. Sweekar sunflower oil has also become a household name.

In 1992, Marico relocated its headquarters from Masjid Bunda Bazar to upscale Bandra. The business transitioned from being an exporter to an international marketer in 1992, when it opened its first overseas office in Dubai.

Marico – Name, Logo and Tagline

Marico’s tagline says, “Marico – make a difference”. The firm has always taken steps to minimize negative environmental impacts while focusing on the common benefit of the people.

Company Logo of Marico

Marico – Products

Hair Oil

Nihar Naturals Sarson Kesh Tel
Nihar Naturals Shanti Amla Badam Hair Oil
Parachute Advansed Deep Conditioning Hot Oil
Parachute Advansed Aloe Vera Enriched Coconut Hair Oil
Parachute Advansed Coconut Hair Oil
Parachute Advansed Jasmine Hair Oil
Hair & Care Fruit Oils
Nihar Naturals Coconut Hair Oil

Coconut Oil

Parachute Coconut Oil
Nihar Naturals Coconut Oil
Nihar Naturals Uttam Coconut Oil

Hair Serum

Livon Silky Potion Hair Serum
Hair & Care Silk n Shine Hair Serum

Anti-Hairfall

Livon Hair Gain Tonic
Parachute Advansed Ayurvedic Hair Oil
Parachute Advansed Ayurvedic Gold Hair Oil
Parachute Advansed Scalp Therapie Hair Oil

Male Grooming and Styling

Parachute Advansed Men’s Hair Cream Range
Set Wet Beard Styling Gel
Set Wet Deodorants
Set Wet Styling Gel

Wellness

Saffola Oils
Saffola Aura – Olive & Flaxseed Oil
Saffola Masala Oats
Saffola Multigrain Flakes

Skincare

Parachute Advansed Body Lotion

Marico – Business Model

The Marico business model is centered on focused growth across all of its brands/and territories, which is powered by constantly enhancing customer value propositions, market expansion, and expanding its retail presence. The model ensures Marico’s presence in niche / ethnic Indian product or service categories where traditional MNCs are weak.

Marico is a well-managed company that has created a stimulating work environment that empowers employees, facilitates teamwork, and encourages innovative ideas. Marico has risen to become one of the few profitable Indian FMCG companies over the years as a result of this.

Marico – Revenue and Growth

Marico Ltd posted a 13 percent increase in profit in the December quarter compared to the same period the previous year, despite rising raw material prices.

The company’s earnings beat analysts’ expectations, owing to strong growth across most of its portfolio. For the three months ended December 31, the manufacturer of Parachute coconut oil and Saffola edible oil posted a net profit of INR 307 crore, up from INR 272 crore the previous year.

In response to increasing prices, the company implemented selective price hikes in its main Parachute brand during the quarter. In India, Marico posted strong demand across 95 percent of its portfolio, suggesting that consumer sentiment is improving.

“In the India business, the company witnessed robust demand trends across more than 95% of its portfolio amidst steadily improving consumer confidence and a declining covid-19 graph. Traditional trade led the growth as the company took concerted efforts to drive excellence in execution. The company also continued to operate at reduced distributor inventory levels. Among the alternate channels, e-commerce witnessed augmented growth and modern trade also recovered sequentially to end flattish on a year-on-year basis,” the company said in a filing to the exchanges.

Marico – Key Financial Metrics

Financial Metric	2019-20	2018-19
Total Income	3504.00	3489.00
PAT Margin	-7.86	36.88
Equity Share Capital	93.03	93.03
Asset Turnover Ratio	5.61	7.14

Marico – Investments

Date	Organization Name	Round	Amount
Apr 18, 2018	Revofit	Corporate Round	–
May 18, 2017	Beardo.in	Funding Round	₹500M

Marico – Acquisitions

Acquiree Name	About Acquiree	Date	Amount
Beardo.in	Beard is an official brand manufacturer of natural ordinary oils or incompatible products to bearded man.	Jul 1, 2020	–
Isoplus	Isoplus, a hair styling brand in South Africa.	Jul 28, 2017	₹360M

Marico – Competitors

Top competitors of Marico :

Hindustan Unilever
Procter & Gamble
Dabur
Advantice Health
Emami
Gillette India
Bajaj Consumer
Colgate

Marico – Challenges Faced

Marico faced an extreme challenge from Unilever at a critical juncture in its growth path. Back then, it was no secret that Parachute, Marico’s coconut hair oil brand, was the single largest contributor to the company’s portfolio. With the aim of wresting the market away from Parachute, Hindustan Unilever launched and began vigorously advertising their own brand Nihar.

HU’s aggressiveness was evident in its promotional campaign, which outspent Marico at every turn and drowned Marico out in the media with its deafening voice. Then came some alarming news from the field, with Marico salespeople reporting “green walls in retail stores.” Nihar was a green brand, while Parachute was a blue one. For Mariconians, visions of green walls became nightmares.

Explaining Marico’s strategy, Sameer Satpathy, Head of Marketing, said, “Our strategy has always been to focus strongly on brands; investments in brands in terms of what is correct for the brands, which builds long term preference for the brand. So, we fundamentally keep doing that and I believe that it is more important not only during times of slowdown, but also when there is a boom.”

Marico – Future Plans

Marico’s most aggressive strategy is in the food industry. It recently introduced honey, which it says is one of the purest in the world, as part of the Saffola brand. With Covid-19 still raging, Gupta says that people’s eating habits have been reorganized into three categories: health and hygiene, nutritional immunity, and ready-to-cook foods or between-meal snacks.

Marico does not yet have critical mass in health and hygiene, and has made its foray into the immunity room with honey.

Fortunately, 80 to 90 per cent of our portfolio consists of items of daily consumption where we can grab market share. And there is also a huge opportunity to quickly get scale in others so that they become a significant part of our portfolio,” says Gupta of the immunity-giving foods the company plans to launch.

Marico – FAQS

What does Marico do?

Marico Limited is a leading consumer goods company in India, offering a wide range of food, beauty, and wellness products and services.

Who founded Marico?

Harsh Mariwala is the founder of Marico.

Is Parachute a product of Marico?

Yes, Parachute oil is Marico’s product.

What companies do Marico compete with?

Top competitors of Marico are Hindustan Unilever, Procter & Gamble, Dabur, Advantice Health, Emami, Gillette India, Bajaj Consumer and Colgate.

May 21, 2021