The digital revolution in India has touched upon all aspects of business and entrepreneurship, so much so that technology has become an integral part of how human beings conduct themselves and related activities.
Insurance services in the subcontinent have, over this time, integrated their policies with technology to create unique digital products. It has paved the way for a new branch of startups called InsurTech companies.
The technological integration has helped improve various processes, like insurance agency onboarding and selling, to such an extent that these companies have been able to curate insurance policies based on the behavioral patterns of their clients.
They have grown to become a significant part of the larger fintech industry, where InsurTech companies constitute 8.18% of the $22 billion worth of capital in the fintech industry. This article examines some of the top Insurtech startups in India.
What is an Insurtech Company?
Insurtech is a mix of two words – Insurance and Technology. It means using technology like data analytics and machine learning in the insurance industry. This helps in underwriting, claims processing, and managing group insurance.
In India, insurtech companies provide digital platforms and mobile apps to buy policies and raise health insurance claims. Everything can be done online with no paperwork.
These companies are changing the old way of insurance by using new technologies to solve problems and meet customer needs.
Insurtech startups are making insurance:
Easy to access
Clear and transparent
Paperless
Customer-friendly
Fast and digital
This article looks at the top 10 insurtech companies in India in 2025 that are changing how insurance works.
The above graph shows the estimated market size of the InsurTech Industry in India in US billion dollars, with a great spike noticed in the market size from 2021 to 2025.
API-based integration, custom coverage for partners, scalable solutions
Digit Insurance
Startup Name
Digit Insurance
Founders
Kamesh Goyal, Sriram Shankar, Philip Varghese, Vijay Kumar
Founded In
2016
Headquarters
Bengaluru
Website
www.godigit.com
Insurance startups in India – Digit Insurance Website
This Bangalore-based startup provides various products like car insurance, travel insurance, house insurance, commercial vehicle insurance, shop insurance, trip insurance, fire insurance, and other small-ticket insurance. Till 2022, Digit Insurance has received more than $585.6 million through various funding rounds.
Some of the famous investors in the firm are TVS Capital Funds, Sequoia Capital India, and Wellington Management. They aim to simplify the entire process of insurance with the aim of helping even a 15-year-old kid comprehend the procedures involved. They stand out from other similar companies through their client-friendly policies.
For example, their insurance covers flight delays of 75 minutes and more, unlike the standard travel insurance that covers delays of 6 hours and more. Similarly, their “Pay as you Drive” (PAYD) facility will ensure that those who drive less will have to pay less.
Through their simple procedures and fewer T&Cs, and excellent customer service, they have earned the trust of their valuable clients, which has been fuelling their growth since the beginning.
They are the first digital general insurance in India. Launched in 2016, they have grown to cater to more than 50 million customers today. They have taken most of their operations online, reducing much of the offline paperwork.
Their journey has to be credited to their attention to detail and focus on quality over quantity. Their unique micro-insurance product called “Ola Trip Insurance,” which insured the passengers using the app, had been awarded the Golden Peacock Innovative Product. Amping up with data and tech, they further aspire to improve every aspect of insurance technology.
Top InsurTech Companies In India – PolicyBazaar Website
Catering to more than 9 million customers since its inception in 2008, they have been one of the most popular insurtech companies in the subcontinent. With an aim to reimagine insurance, Policybazaar has brought transparency into it by simplifying the entire procedure and putting an end to rampant misselling and policy breaches.
So far, they have sold more than 19 million policies by winning the trust of the people making it one of the best insurtech solutions provider in India. They aspire to bring in better coverage of health and financial policies in households in India. Reputed investing organizations like SoftBank, Temasek, Tencent Alpha Wave, PremjiInvest, etc, have invested in Policy Bazaar, vouching for its trust and quality.
Best InsurTech Companies In India – SecureNow Website
Founded by Abhishek Bondia and Kapil Mehta in 2011, they provide insurance solutions to small and medium-sized businesses. Through end-to-end InsurTech systems and a CRM software platform called PAM, they streamline various procedures, including right from issuing insurance and claiming.
They also have a mobile app for insurance services. They cater to more than 30,000 commercial establishments and settle over 1000 claims on a yearly basis.
Toffee Insurance
Startup Name
Toffee Insurance
Founders
Rohan Kumar, Nishant Jain
Founded In
2017
Headquarters
Gurgaon
Website
www.toffeeinsurance.com
Best InsurTech Company In India – Toffee Insurance
Realizing the importance of accessibility and availability of insurance, Toffee Insurance has ventured into the sector with the goal of curating insurance policies that suit the needs of its customers. They specifically focus on millennials by developing bite-sized insurance policies that cover the immediate lifestyle requirements of the fast-paced world.
They make use of the facilities offered by artificial intelligence and machine learning to make sense of behavioral and consumption data so as to provide better services to customers.
These insurance innovators further focus on transparency and fast services that will help realize their aim to create a novel world of insurance that thrives on innovative products woven to fit the client’s needs. With more than 99.1% of the claims approved, Toffee Insurance serves over 2 lack customers across more than 600 cities.
Coverfox
Startup Name
Coverfox
CEO
Sanjib Jha
Founded In
2013
Headquarters
Mumbai
Website
www.coverfox.com
Top InsurTech Companies In India – Coverfox Website
Launched in 2011, Coverfox is an InsurTech company that sells more than 360 products, including medical, automobile, bike, term, and travel insurance coverage across the subcontinent. Quickening the selling procedures, one of the major highlights of Coverfox is that they provide quotations to their customers instantly.
Further, their easy renewal, digitalized policy updates, and quick claims procedure further make the entire process hassle-free and attractive as far as the customers are concerned.
At a time when data privacy and security are greatly valued and are a matter of concern, Coverfox offers highly safe transactions and assures that the data is not sold to anybody, for that matter. They have won many accolades over the years for their commendable service over the Yeats including the best Insurtech startup award for the year 2022.
Top Insurance Startups in India – OneAssist Website
OneAssist is headquartered in Mumbai and is known to provide services related to the consumer-focused program. It has gained a good reputation in the last few years by providing coverage for data security and protection for electronics.
It has a partnership with many well-reputed firms like Amazon.com, Yes Bank, Axis Bank, etc. The primary goal of the firm is to provide a universal platform for customers to access and get their support and protection solutions from.
InsuranceDekho
Startup Name
InsuranceDekho
Founders
Ankit Agrawal · Amit Bhatia
Founded In
2016
Headquarters
Gurugram
Website
www.insurancedekho.com
Top InsurTech Companies In India – InsuranceDekho
InsuranceDekho is supported by CarDekho and is growing fast by combining both physical and digital ways to sell insurance. It is an online platform where people can compare and buy different insurance policies. They offer many types of insurance, like motor, health, and travel insurance. InsuranceDekho is popular because it is easy to use and makes buying insurance simple for customers.
Turtlemint Insurance
Startup Name
Turtlemint Insurance
Founders
Dhirendra Mahyavanshi · Anand Prabhudesai
Founded In
2015
Headquarters
Mumbai
Website
www.turtlemint.com
Top InsurTech Companies In India – Turtlemint
Turtlemint is a top insurance company in India that offers many types of insurance, like life, health, car, and bike insurance.
They also provide other financial services like loans and savings accounts. Turtlemint has a Financial Advisory Service to help you plan and reach your money goals.
The company is based in Mumbai and works in more than 20 cities in India. They offer different services to help people and families with their insurance and financial needs.
Symbo Insurance
Startup Name
Symbo Insurance
Founders
Anik Jain · Rahul Aggarwal · Abhishek Bondia
Founded In
2017
Headquarters
Mumbai
Website
www.symboinsurance.com
Top InsurTech Companies In India – Symbo Insurance
Symbo focuses on embedded insurance, which means they help retailers, direct-to-consumer brands, and online platforms offer insurance right when customers are buying something.
Symbo is a registered insurance broker and a tech company that works closely with retail and eCommerce businesses to add insurance options during the checkout process.
Their product easily fits into any brand’s sales flow, making it simple for brands to sell insurance to their customers.
Symbo has teamed up with many brands and insurance companies, and they have over 100 different product integrations.
Conclusion
The InsurTech industry in India is still at its nascent stage. With the digital community still coming to terms with the possibilities and issues with regard to technology and digitalization, it is likely that it might take some more time for the industry to boom.
However, there is no doubt about the fact that the future of the insurance industry in India is heavily anchored upon the foundations laid by technology. Despite being in its initial stages, the industry in India has thrived like no other. Companies aspire to be more client-friendly, custom-made, and paperless. How the industry has evolved over the years is indeed interesting, and it makes its future worth observing.
FAQs
How many InsurTech companies are there in India?
The total count of InsurTech companies in India is a highly debatable topic. As per the report published by Inc24, there are 300+ active InsurTech companies in India for the year 2022.
What is the difference between Insurtech and FinTech?
FinTech and InsurTech are the units of the same field. The major difference between them is that InsurTech mainly deals with insurance-related things and is on a smaller scale than FinTech which basically deals with financial-related concepts including topics like banks, financial planners, banks, etc.
How many unicorns are InsurTech?
According to the report published by Inc24, India has around 3 unicorns in the field of InsurTech named Acko, Digit Insurance, and PolicyBazaar.
How big is the InsurTech market?
The global InsurTech market was valued at USD 3.85 billion in 2021 and is estimated to reach USD 5.45 billion in 2022.
India is becoming theworld’s fastest-growing startup ecosystem with 118 Unicorn Startups, as of January 2025. In today’s world, unicorn startupsare not as uncommon as before; however, building a unicorn startup is not easy. It takes a lot of hard work, commitment, and perseverance throughout the startup’s journey to climb the ladder of unicorns, and the ones that have bagged the title of unicorns are discussed in this article.
Unicorn Startup consists of two words, “Unicorn” and “Startup”. Unicorn is a business term used to define a startup with a valuation of over $1 billion. The term was coined by a venture capitalist and a seed investor, Aileen Lee. On the other hand, Startups are privately owned companies typically at the early stages of their development.
Being hopeful and supportive of the unicorn culture of India, the Union Minister of State for Entrepreneurship, Skill Development, Electronics & Technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar said that India will see a 10X increase in its unicorn count, in the next 2-3 years, which will reach more than 1,000. The Indian government also mentioned that it expects the next wave of startup founders to come from the Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities of India.
The Indian startups have reportedly raised around $42+ billion in funding across 1,584 deals in 2021. The startup ecosystem of India, where 90,000+ new startups have been established since 2016, across 56+ different sectors in the country, has also managed to create over 4.5 lakh job opportunities in the country. This has even got a special mention from President Ram Nath Kovind in his Presidential address on 31 January 2022, where he emphasized the new opportunities that the startups of India are ushering in.
A Celebration for 100 Indian Unicorns
With Neobank Open achieving unicorn status, India became a country of 100+ unicorns. The first unicorn was seen in India in 2011, and after a decade, India crossed the mark of 100 unicorns. The boasting of 100 unicorns is not a regular affair, and this is why the startup ecosystem has been tossing in joy and swelling with pride for quite some time now. In the meanwhile, many distinguished founders also voiced their thrill and joy for such an achievement.
“Crossing the 100th unicorn milestone is a proud moment for the country and the entire startup ecosystem. This is just the beginning of a long journey,” said Sujeet Kumar, the cofounder of B2B marketplace unicorn Udaan.
Vamsi Krishna of Vedantu also relished the mood that the startup ecosystem is in, and said, “The rise of India as a global superpower is inevitable and entrepreneurs will be the ones driving it. 100 unicorns are just a start. We will soon become the startup capital of the world.”
Divya Gokunath, the cofounder of Byju’s and the wife of Byju Raveendran also said, “We became India’s 16th unicorn, just seven years after we started operations. The valuation did not matter to us, but the milestone did because it was one of the few at that time which put India on the map. Today, for the first 100 Indian companies which made it, it’s a mark that we are on a mission to create something of value and something from India for the world.”
The faster growth of companies and the sprouting of more unicorns is what India wishes for now. This means that the companies should definitely have to be more serious, and resourceful, and work with an integrated team of specialists to reach the unicorn milestone and beyond. It also means that the Indian startups should forget racial, gender and caste divides, and work with all of their strength, and resources. Here, what is striking among the present unicorns is the apparent gender divide. Yes, only 15% of the present unicorns of India have at least one female founder, while the remaining companies have no female as their founders. This certainly needs to improve to give the upcoming companies a fresh gear of growth. Though the situation is improving, for around 79% of the Indian unicorns with female founders were incorporated after 2011, it still needs to be given considerable thought and a whole lot of action.
Here we have listed 118 Indian Unicorn Startups, which is the total number of unicorns in India at present in 2025! Don’t miss out on the regular updates in this list by bookmarking the article.
The following table is sorted by the year startups are turned into a unicorn (Latest to oldest).
Abhay Singhal, Amit Gupta, Mohit Saxena, Naveen Tewari, Piyush Shah
Founded
2007
Investors
Lightbox, Softbank Group, Kleiner Perkins
Products and Services
InMobi Pulse, Mobile Marketing
Valuation
$12 billion (April 2021)
InMobi is a Bengaluru-based mobile advertising platform that helps in optimizing the ranks of the advertisements offered on mobile phones. InMobi was founded in January 2007 and has been the first unicorn startup of India and thus, a torchbearer of the unicorn league of Indian startups that followed. Glance, a subsidiary company of InMobi, has also turned a unicorn in 2020.
Ecommerce marketplace that offers over 150 million products
Valuation
$37.6 billion (July 2021)
Being the most favored eCommerce marketplace in India, Flipkart needs no introduction simply because the Big Billion Days are one of the most sought-after online events that millions of Indians look up to. Flipkart was among the first Indian unicorns that achieved the unicorn valuation during the 2011-2012 era after inMobi, which was the first Indian unicorn. With over 350 million users, and 150+ million products, which are distributed across 80+ categories Flipkart is a household for the Indian masses. This ecommerce giant was acquired by Walmart in 2018 for a whopping $16 billion, which helped it scale fast and easily. The Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal-founded company currently boasts of a valuation of over $37.6 billion and is the highest-valued Indian company, as of 2023.
BharatPe is an Indian digital payments app, merchant aggregator, and payments platform that encourages digital payments via QR and POS. It is not a government company but a private limited company that goes by the name, Resilient Innovations Private Limited. Headquartered in New Delhi, India, the company tripled its valuation to $2.85 billion and joined the unicorn club on August 4, 2021.
BharatPe Co-founder Ashneer Grover was recently engaged in a telephone controversy where he allegedly abused a Kotak employee. Grover was also infamously featured on various social media and news platforms several times due to his rash behaviour and his blunt remarks where he also said “naukri dhoond” to one of his fellow pitchers. Furthermore, he is also associated lately with a financial fraud concerning BharatPe along with his wife Madhuri and five others, the investigation of which is continuing, as per reports dated January 29, 2022. Ashneer is currently observing a mandatory leave of absence, as mentioned last by the company and its Board. Grover might not see his place back and is likely to get fired, mentioned sources close to the matter.
Steadview Capital, Tencent, Tiger Global Management, Falcon Edge
Products and Services
Dream11 sports platform
Valuation
$8 billion (November 2021)
Dream11 is an Indian fantasy sports platform, which brings a host of sports including but not limited to cricket, football, hockey, volleyball, handball, futsal, and rugby, for the Indian sports fanatics to delve into their favourite games. A homegrown sports platform, Dream 11, aims to help Indian sports enthusiasts to expand and showcase the sports knowledge they boast of!
Earlier in April 2019, Dream11 raised funding worth $60 million from Steadview Capital and others and joined the unicorn league of Indian startups. The last valuation of Dream11 was recorded at $8 billion, after the company completed an investment of $840 million in November 2021.
PhonePe is a digital payment and merchant aggregator platform that has already had a huge contribution to making digital payments smooth, fast, and easy for Indian customers and merchants. Founded in 2015 and headquartered in Andheri, Maharashtra, India, the company boasts of having the largest market share among the UPI apps. The company showed a huge potential for growth and has already achieved unicorn status before 2020. The company was acquired by Flipkart in April 2016 and has witnessed a considerable amount of growth since then. The PhonePe Business Model and “how PhonePe earns money?” is pretty interesting too.
Byju’s is a Bangalore-based edtech platform. It is an online tutoring and coaching firm that started in 2011 and runs on a freemium model. Launched by Byju Raveendran, Byju’s is used by more than 15 million students all over the world and has over 900,000 paid subscribers. Byju’s Current valuation has reached 16.5 Billion USD. Know in detail about BYJU’s business and revenue model.
SoftBank Group, Tiger Global, Tencent, Matrix Partners, and DST Global
Products and Services
Mobile app, website, Vehicle for hire, Goods and food delivery, Mobile payment and digital wallet
Valuation
$6.5 billion (FY20)
Ola is an Indian ride-sharing company that was launched on 3rd December 2010. As of 2019, Ola has expanded to over 1.5 million drivers across 250 cities. Ola has also expanded its network into its first overseas market, Australia, and New Zealand in September 2018. Ola began its operations in the UK introducing auto rickshaws.
SoftBank Group, Didi Chuxing, Greenoaks Capital, Sequoia India, Lightspeed India, Hero Enterprise, Airbnb, and China Lodging Group.
Products and Services
OYO Rooms, OYO Hotels & Homes
Valuation
$9 billion (July 2021)
OYO is among the top travel startups in India. Founded by 21-year-old Ritesh Agarwal in 2013, India’s largest hospitality startup comprises budget hotels. The startup works in liaison with existing hotels and offers travellers vacant rooms at a cheaper price. OYO rooms start at a nominal price of Rs 999. Besides bulk renting hotels, they have also invested in their own properties as well.
Norwest Venture Partners, Naspers, Accel, SAIF Partners, Meituan-Dianping
Products and Services
Food delivery
Valuation
$5.5 billion (July 2021)
Swiggy is one of the most valuable online food ordering and delivery platforms. Swiggy was founded by Nandan Reddy, Sriharsha Majety, and Rahul Jaimini in 2014. In early 2019, Swiggy expanded into general product deliveries, under the brand name Swiggy Stores. Swiggy today has more than 5,000,000 mobile application installations.
Zomato is an Indian food delivery startup restaurant aggregator. Zomato was founded by Deepinder Goyal and Pankaj Chaddah in 2008. Zomato primarily provides concrete information, menus, and user reviews of the restaurants. Along with this, Zomato also has food delivery options from partnered restaurants in the selected cities. The pandemic was dangerous indeed for everyone, and it is almost as dangerous to the food tech companies as it is for every other individual and business, if not more. The food delivery unicorn, Zomato also fought the pandemic hard and thrived.
Freshworks offers innovative customer engagement software for a diverse range of businesses of varying sizes and kinds. Founded in 2010 in Chennai, the company now has its headquarters in San Mateo, USA, the products which help provide a 360-degree view of the customers. The Saas products brought in by FreshWorks are designed to be used instantly. Besides, they are easy to use, and also offer quick returns on investments.
Freshworks attained the prestigious unicorn club of the Indian companies in July 2018, thereby becoming the first unicorn startup belonging to the Saas market that the country has seen. Now, increasing the customer engagement and the retention rate for Saas companies is not as difficult as it was earlier
Moglix is an Asia-based B2B E-commerce company that was founded by Rahul Garg in 2017. The company has its headquarters in Singapore and head offices in India. The startup ambitions to digitally change the chain of manufacturing areas in India. Moglix wants to digitize and seriously change every component of the delivery chain, and B2B commerce which is unorganized and increases options to seriously change the grant chain via technology.
Moglix, presently serves the manufacturing sector, institutional clients (B2B), and private clients (B2C). The automotive sector, metals and mining, and FMCDs are the best three sectors they cater to. The platform provides Industrial products and services such industrial products and services such as Safety equipment, Electrical and Lighting products, Cleaning and Laundry products, Office Supplies, and Industrial Tools, among others. Moglix is one of the most trusted eCommerce sites for industries as it is known to deliver world-class services worldwide. So far the company has 150,000 industry essential products from 30 different categories and 25,000 SME clients.
upGrad is an online coaching program for all students opting for higher education. Partnering with some of the top universities of the world, upGrad brings a wide range of industry-ready courses including Bachelor’s degrees, MBA, Data Science, Machine Learning courses, and more. The company has grown to attain unicorn status on August 6, 2021, with the help of a $185 million fundraising.
Prosus & Nasper, Sierra Ventures, Helion Venture Partners, Helion Venture Partners, Tiger Fund
Products and Services
Booking tickets for shows, movies, flights, hotels, holidays, buses, trains, etc.
MakeMyTrip is one of the top online travel companies in India that was founded by Deep Kalra in 2000. The company has its headquarters based in Gurgaon and is known for its services such as booking holiday packages, hotel reservations, movies or even booking tickets for everyday traveling through fights, buses, trains, cars, etc. MakeMyTrip is currently operating in 14+ cities around the world with over 30 franchise stores and in 28 cities in India alone. The MakeMyTrip route planner feature allows its user to access basic information on over one million routes across India.
Steadview Capital, Fidelity, TPG Growth, Hero Corporate Service Private Limited
Products and Services
Cosmetics, skin & wellness products, etc.
Valuation
$2.3 billion (June 2021)
Nykaa is a leading cosmetic-based eCommerce platform that was founded in 2012 by Falguni Nayar. Nykaa has its headquarters based in Mumbai, Maharashtra, and is known for its app and website that sells a wide range of cosmetics, skin, and wellness products. The company also has over 26 offline stores across India and became a Unicorn startup in 2020. The platform has a huge range of 200,000 products from 2000 national and international brands, as of 2020. Many Bollywood actresses like Alia Bhatt and Katrina Kaif have been the brand ambassadors of Nykaa.
Intel Capital, Wellington Management Group, Inventus Capital Partners, Softbank Group True North and IDG Venture Partners
Products and Services
Life, Health, Motor, travel insurance, etc
Valuation
$2.4 billion (July 2021)
Policybazaar is one of the most well-known and trusted insurance companies in India. The company was started in 2008 by Yashish Dahiya, Alok Bansal, and Avaneesh Nirjar. The company initially started out as an insurance comparison website, but later on started providing different types of insurance plans like Life insurance, Health, Motor, and even Travel. Policybazaar.com is currently the largest insurance company in the country and is also popular in UAE. Policybazaar has both a website and an app, which allows its users to compare financial services from the top insurance options. Here’s knowing how Policy Bazaar witnessed an overwhelming growth via its marketing strategies.
CoinDCX is an Indian cryptocurrency exchange aggregator based in Mumbai. The company specializes in crypto-enabled financial services. CoinDCX aims to develop financial services without any borders to enable a simpler and seamless flow of capital powered by impregnable security. CoinDCX raised $90 mn in Series C funding to emerge as a unicorn. Thus, the company became India’s first cryptocurrency unicorn.
Mastercard, Lone Pine Capital, Flipkart, Temasek, Sequoia
Products and Services
POS devices and software solutions
Valuation
$5+ billion (Marh 2022)
Pine Labs is an Indian merchant platform, equipped with financing and last-mile retail transaction technology, which helps merchants and institutions receive their payments via easy and secure POS apps and devices. Pine Labs collaborated with the New-York based financial services giant, Mastercard in January 2020, and shortly after it attained unicorn status. It was the first company to have turned unicorn in 2020.
Highradius
Startup Name
Highradius
Industry
Fintech, AI, Saas, Software
Founder
Sashi Narahari
Founded
2006
Investors
Tiger Global, D1 Capital Partners, ICONIQ and more
Products and Services
AI-based order-to-cash and treasury management software
Valuation
$3.1+ billion (March 2021)
Highradius is an AI-powered, data-driven fintech enterprise software as a service (Saas) platform that extends autonomous software for smooth and easy management of order to cash (O2C), treasury, and record to report (R2R). Headquartered in Houston, Texas, US, Highradius claims to be the world’s number 1 data-driven AI software platform that helps “lower DSO, optimize working capital, fast-track financial close, and improve productivity.”
Raising $125 mn right at the start of 2020, Highradius turned into India’s first unicorn company in 2020 in a Series B funding round led by ICONIQ Capital, along with some of its existing investors like Susquehanna Growth Equity and Citi Ventures.
Zetwerk emerges as a B2B marketplace for manufacturing items. The online marketplace based out of Bengaluru connects large manufacturing companies with vendors and suppliers, who help them get various components of industrial tools and machinery that they require from time to time. The company joined the unicorn club on August 20, 2021, and became India’s youngest billion-dollar company.
Chanakya Hridaya, Rajesh Yabaji, Ramasubramaniam B
Founded
2015
Investors
Trifecta Capital Advisors, Sequoia, Accel, InnoVen Capital
Products and Services
Trucks, logistics and transportation services for shippers and fleet operators
Valuation
$1.02 billion (August 2021)
BlackBuck is a truck aggregator and one of the largest truck aggregators operating in India that aims to solve the transportation and logistics problems of countless Indians. Today, BlackBuck boasts of being the largest trucking network in India that is equipped with freight and fleet management technology platforms. Blackbuck entered the unicorn club on July 23, 2021, after it raised $67 mn as part of its Series E funding round at a valuation of $1.02 bn.
The company currently has a collection of 12,00,000+ trucks and extends its services to over 2000 locations with 15,000+ happy clients.
Lightbox, Toyota Tsusho, SevenTrain Ventures, Integrated Capital
Products and Services
Marketplace for used cars, bikes, scooters and other merchandise
Valuation
$1.2 billion(August 2021)
Droom is a marketplace for used cars, bikes, scooters, and other automotive, along with other products and merchandise. Powered by cutting-edge data science technology, the company helps its customers to buy and sell automobiles and other products seamlessly.
Droom has around 600K automobiles and dominates with a massive 80% market share of the automobile transactions online, Droom is India’s largest automobile platform online and is counted among the biggest E-Commerce companies in the country.
OfBusiness or OFB Tech, as it is often referred to, is a raw material procurement and credit platform for SMEs. The company focuses primarily on the manufacturing and construction industries. OfBusiness leverages state-of-the-art technology to integrate the same into the buying behaviors of the SMEs. This way it makes better products available at better prices and in the right timelines.
Internet, Mobile Apps, Social Media, Social Network
Founder
Ankush Sachdeva, Bhanu Pratap Singh, and Faris Ahsan
Founded
2015
Investors
Lightspeed Venture Partners, Tiger Global Management, Twitter Ventures, SAIF Partners, Shunwei Capital, and Xiaomi
Products and Services
Social Networking and Regional Contents
Valuation
$3.7 Billion (December 2021)
ShareChat is an Indian video-sharing social networking service, developed via Mohalla Tech Private Limited in the year 2015, established by Ankush Sachdeva, Bhanu Pratap Singh, and Farid Ahsan. The company is headquartered in Bengaluru, Karnataka.
ShareChat App acts as a content consumption and sharing platform solely in Indian vernacular languages, which caters to over 1.17 billion wifi customers of India. The company offers features such as messaging, sharing different kinds of media, tagging, etc. ShareChat enabled user-generated content creation on its platform, permitting customers to share their very own posters and innovative content. The company also has 400 plus employees and more than 50 million creator communities. The company went on to raise $500 mn from investors, which increased its valuation to $3 billion.
Verse Innovation
Startup Name
VerSe Innovation
Industry
Content, Technology, Social Media, Internet
Founders
Umang Bedi, Virendra Gupta
Founded
2007
Investors
Google, Sequoia Capital, Microsoft, ByteDance, B Capital and more
Products and Services
Powers Josh, Dailyhunt with technological support and expertise
Valuation
$5 billion (April 2021)
VerSe Innovation is the parent company of the leading vernacular news aggregating platform, Dailyhunt. Headquartered in Bengaluru, Verse Innovation is a local language technology platform that is currently powering two of the leading names among the Indian applications – Josh and Dailyhunt and boasts of an amazing reach of over 300 million users.
VerSe Innovation has raised funds close to $100 mn in December 2020 from a clutch of investors including Google, Microsoft, Falcon Edge’s Alpha Wave Incubation, Sequoia Capital India, Sofina Group, and others to enter the coveted club of unicorn companies in India. With this, Verse became the 10th Indian startup to attain the unicorn valuation in 2020.
B Capital, Prosus, Temasek, Think Investments, Tiger Global, A Velumani, etc.
Products and Services
Online pharmacy services, medicines, healthcare products, diagnostic test, etc.
Valuation
$5.6 billion (JuOctoberne 2021)
PharmEasy is an online healthcare delivery platform that was founded by Mikhil Innani, Dharmil Sheth, and Dhaval Shah in 2015. The company has its headquarters in Mumbai Maharashtra and is currently the leading online healthcare aggregator in India. Besides selling medicines online, the platform also helps connect patients with the closest local pharmacy and diagnostic center based on their medical needs. It delivers medicines in over 1000 plus cities and across 22,000 pin codes. PharmEasy claims to have delivered more than 1.5 crore orders and has over one lakh medicines available on its website.
MyGlamm (The Good Glamm Group)
Startup Name
MyGlamm
Industry
Cosmetics, Beauty, Marketplace
Founder
Darpan Sanghvi, Priyanka Gill
Founded
2015
Investors
Prosus, Warburg, Trifecta, Amazon and more
Products and Services
Beauty and cosmetics products marketplace
Valuation
$1.2+ billion (November 2021)
MyGlamm is a direct-to-consumer (D2C) beauty and cosmetics startup that extends an e-commerce marketplace with a wide range of products for stylists, beauticians, and others. The Mumbai-based D2C brand combines technology with content and social media in order to help the customers to shop for their preferred products along with gaining rich, personalized content and tutorial from the experts.
MyGlamm has turned into a unicorn company when it raised $150 mn in funding from Prosus Ventures and others on November 9, 2021. MyGlamm was the 34th Indian startup to turn a unicorn in the year 2021 and the 76th Indian company overall to enter the coveted club of unicorn companies of India.
Rentpay, CRED Stash, Store, Credit Card Payments and Cred Pay
Valuation
$2.2 billion (April 2021)
CRED is an upcoming Fintech startup that was started by Kunal Shah in 2018. The company has its headquarters in Bengaluru, Karnataka, and is known for its app that allows users to make credit card payments and even get rewarded. Besides rewards, CRED also gives its customers access to a wide range of additional services such as credit and a premium catalog of products from top brands. So far the platform has over 5.9 million users and has processed about 20% of all credit card bill payments in the country. CRED services are divided into five major products which are CRED RentPay, CRED Cash, CRED Pay, CRED Store, and CRED Travel Store. The Cred Business and Revenue Model depends on the app, its customers, and the business partnerships it sees.
Meesho is a popular Indian social ecommerce company that was founded in 2015 by batchmates, Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal. The company has its headquarters in Bengaluru Karnataka. Meesho helps small and medium businesses or even individuals to start their online stores through social media apps like Facebook, Instagram, and Whatsapp. Meesho also has an online reselling website and app that allows people to sell their products without investments. So far it is known to have 2.6 million resellers across the country.
Meesho became a unicorn on April 6, 2021, after raising $300 mn in funds in a funding round that was led by Japan’s Softbank Corp. Group. Know more about Meesho Business Model & Revenue Model.
professionals for cleaning, beauticians, masseurs, carpenters, etc
Valuation
$2.8 billion (June 2021)
Urban Company is said to be Asia’s largest home services company as it is an all-in-one platform that helps users find professionals for different home services. The platform has its headquarters in Gurgaon and offers professional home cleaning services to beauticians, masseurs, and even carpenters. Urban Company was founded in 2014 by Abhiraj Bhal, Varun Khaitan, and Raghav Chandra, while the platform currently has served over 5 million customers across India, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Sydney, and Singapore. As of 2021, it is also known to be the UAE’s largest home services company. Here’s knowing all about Urban Company’s business model, and the marketing strategies that Urban Company uses.
Construction Materials, Infrastructure, and Heavy Equipment Rental
Valuation
$2.5 billion (August 2021)
Infra.Market is one of the best construction solutions companies and an online procurement marketplace that uses technology to provide an enhanced procurement experience. The company provides its services to the real estate and construction materials industry. The company was started by Souvik Sengupta in 2016 and has its headquarters in Thane, Maharashtra. Infra.Market specializes in manufacturing construction materials, infrastructure, and heavy equipment rental for all the sectors of a construction ecosystem. It caters to both institutional customers and the construction materials sector to build their projects. Infra.Market turned unicorn with a $100 mn funding on February 25, 2021
Insurance for Car, Health, employee, 2 Wheeler, 3 Wheeler, etc.
Valuation
$4 billion (May 2022)
Digit Insurance is one of the top general insurance companies offering health, car, bike, and travel insurance. The company was founded in 2016 by Kamesh Goyal, and has its headquarters in Bengaluru, Karnataka. The company is popular for Go Digit Mobile Insurance, a tailor-made mobile insurance that covers damages related to different mobiles or Smartphones such as accidental damage, etc. Digit Insurance was the first Indian Unicorn of 2021 and has been successful in achieving the feat in less than 4 years. Besides, Digit Insurance is one of the companies that are endorsed by Virat Kohli, who is the brand ambassador of Digit.
Innovaccer
Startup Name
Innovaccer
Industry
Healthcare
Founders
Abhinav Shashank, Kanav Hasija and Sandeep Gupta
Founded
2014
Investors
Steadview Capital, Dragoneer, B Capital Group, Mubadala Capital Microsoft Venture Funds.
Products and Services
Clinical Integration, Health Management, Big data analytics, Quality Reporting, Healthcare data platform
Valuation
$1.3 billion (February 2021)
Innovaccer is one of the top healthcare companies that is known for its top-notch healthcare services and products that are done through pioneering analytics and accurate data. Innovaccer was founded in 2014 by Sandeep Gupta and has its headquarters in San Francisco. It has head offices in India and America. Innovaccer products are available in over 500 locations and it also has more than 10,000 providers. The company has helped thousands of institutions, governmental organizations, hospitals, clinics, and healthcare organizations such as Mercy ACO, StratiFi Health, Catalyst Health Network, and Osler Health Network.
Innovaccer has turned into a unicorn after it received $105 mn of funding from Tiger Global Management on February 24, 2021. With this, Innovaccer also became the first health tech unicorn in India to turn unicorn.
Sequoia Capital India, Norwest Venture Partners, KKR, TVS Capital, Matrix Partners
Products and Services
Small Business Loans, Mortgage Loans, Home Loans, Property Loans
Valuation
$1.4 billion (March 2021)
Five Star Business Finance (FSBF) is one of the oldest Indian investment firms that was started by V.K Ranganathan in 1984. The company provides different kinds of loans like Small Business Loans, Mortgage Loans, Home Loans, Property Loans, among others. The company has been making strides in the financial industry over the last three decades. Five Star Housing Finance Private Limited which is the company’s subsidiary is designed to help its clients with small housing loans.
Stock broking services, direct mutual funds, IPO, ETF, digital gold
Valuation
$1 billion (May 2021)
Groww is one of the most popular online investment platforms in India. The company was started in 2017 by Lalit Keshre, Harsh Jain, Ishan Bansal, and Neeraj Singh. The company has its headquarters in Bengaluru, Karnataka, and has so far raised over $14 million as of April 2021. This mutual fund investments platform started out by offering wealth management and currently offers direct investments in mutual funds, stocks, digital gold, and exchange-traded funds, among others. The parent company of Groww is Nextbillion Technology.
Tiger Global Management Llc, Think Investments, Malabar Investments, Harbor Spring Capital, White Oak , Fidelity Management
Products and Services
Chatbots
Valuation
$1.4 billion (July 2021)
Gupshup is an upcoming Software company that provides services such as SMS, email, voice, and IP messaging. Gupshup company operates in India, America and UK and is known for its chatbox development services to retail and eCommerce companies. The company developed a smart messaging app called Teamchat and handles over 6 million messages every month. Gupshup is one of the first companies to launch the chatbot building platforms known as gupshup.io which currently offers its services to over 30,000 developers. The platform also has 30,000 chatbots across 22 different social media channels.
Eruditus is an Edtech platform headquartered in Mumbai. Founded in 2010, the company collaborates with the leading universities from across the globe in order to make executive education accessible globally. Eruditus Executive Education boasts of partnering with over 30 universities with a collection of more than 100 courses that extends to the students of around 80 countries. The company has recently turned into a unicorn with a $650 million fundraise as part of its series E funding round!
invoicing, taxes, SaaS metrics, accounting and customer management.
Valuation
$1.4 billion (April 2021)
Chargebee is a SaaS Company with its headquarters in San Francisco, California. The company specializes in providing subscription and recurring billing based SaaS and E-commerce services like invoicing, taxes, SaaS metrics, accounting and customer management. The company also supports over 100 currencies and numerous well-known payment gateways such as Stripe, Braintree, WorldPay and PayPal. The SaaS startup has gathered 3,000 customers most of whom are from America, Europe, and India.
cloud-native, API-first neo-banking and other Fintech services.
Valuation
$1.45 billion (May 2021)
Zeta is a financial technology company that provides a full-stack, cloud and API first neo banking services. The fintech company was founded in 2015 by Bhavin Turakhia and Ramki Gaddipati with its headquarters based in Los Angeles, California, and has head offices in India. It is known for its Omni stack that includes modern credit and debit processing, BNPL, banking, and mobile experiences. The company products are used by banks like RBL Bank, IDFC First Bank, and Kotak Mahindra Bank, along with 14000 corporates. So far Zeta has over 2 million users with over one million transactions per day.
Zeta is a budgeting app for couples. It integrates personal and shared accounts, which include bank accounts, loans, and credit cards. Connect your account immediately for automated updates or manually add an account to manage it yourself.
You can see your joint incomes, expenses, and financial savings in one place. It lets you create more than one budget for private and shared expenses. Plus, you can set precise monetary goals for you and your partner, such as saving for a holiday or placing up an emergency fund.
BrowserStack is a cloud net and mobile testing platform, which is used by two million developers in around a hundred thirty-five countries. The product’s price proposition is to assist groups to fasten up launch cycles and develop websites and mobile app that work seamlessly on any user interface. The aim is to limit the time, price, and protection overhead related to testing.
More than 25,000 world corporations use BrowserStack, which includes Microsoft, ING, MasterCard, Dow Jones, Garmin, National Geographic, Volvo, NRK, HubSpot, Walt Disney, and AngularJS. BrowserStack has offices work in San Francisco, Mumbai, Dublin, and is privately held and backed by Accel.
Paytm Mall, Paytm Payments Bank, Paytm Money, Gamepind, Paytm Smart Retail, Payment system, Mobile payments, Online shopping
Valuation
$16 billion (June 2021)
Paytm is one of the biggest unicorn startups in India. It is among the largest digital payment service providers in India with a market share of 11.63% and is currently in the third position in the list of top UPI apps in India, as recorded in June 2021. The fintech startup is famous for its payment gateway service, which helps consumers to make seamless payments to the seller from their bank accounts. Paytm entered the unicorn club in 2015. Paytm’s valuation was over $7 billion, and it has now increased to $16 billion in 2020.
Paytm Mall is a B2C model inspired by China’s largest B2C retail platform TMall. Paytm Mall was launched by Paytm in 2017. Launched in 2016, as a hyperlocal offline-to-online (O2O) business, Paytm Mall turned unicorn in 2018 on raising half a billion from Softbank and others.
Kite, Coin, Console, Varsity, Equity Trading, Currencies and Commodities Trading, Mutual Funds and Bonds
Valuation
$2 billion (June 2021)
Zerodha is an Indian fintech startup that offers retail and institutional broking, currencies and commodities trading, mutual funds, and bonds. The Company was founded in the year 2010 in order to achieve the goal of breaking all the barriers traders and investors face in India. Zerodha is headquartered in Bangalore and has a physical presence in several major Indian cities.
In Dec 2020, Zerodha was the largest retail stockbroker in India by active client base and contributes upwards of 15% of daily retail volumes across Indian Stock Exchanges. Zerodha entered the unicorn club in July 2020 with a self-assessed valuation of about $1 billion. This valuation was based on the ESOP buyback exercise the company undertook valuing each share at more than four times the book value of ₹700 per share. Know why is Zerodha not raising funds for its operation?
Disruptive pricing models and in-house technology have made Zerodha the biggest stockbroker in India in terms of active retail clients. Over 5+ million clients place millions of orders every day through our powerful ecosystem of investment platforms, contributing over 15% of all Indian retail trading volumes.
ReNew Power Limited is an Indian renewable energy company. It is an independent power producer which was founded by Sumant Sinha in 2011. ReNew Power has a pipeline of close to 1400 MW solar and wind projects. It has a current valuation of $8 billion, which makes it one of the most valuable startups in India in 2021.
Hari Menon, V.S. Sudhakar, Vipul Parekh, Abhinay Choudhari and V.S. Ramesh
Founded
2011
Investors
Alibaba, CDC Group, Ant Financial, Intel Capital, and Berkshire Hathaway
Products and Services
Grocery Delivery
Valuation
$1.85 billion (March 2021)
BigBasket is India’s largest online grocery store which was founded by Hari Menon, V.S. Sudhakar, Vipul Parekh, Abhinay Choudhari, and V.S. Ramesh in 2011. BigBasket founder Hari Menon is one of the most revered entrepreneurs, who deserves a place among the top entrepreneurs of India. It has gained popularity among the Indians and receives over 100,000 orders per day. BigBasket has also launched 3 new businesses BB Daily, BB Instant, and BB Beauty. Here’s something that might interest you – JioMart VS BigBasket: Top Contenders Of Online Grocery Market
Udaan is a B2B e-commerce platform that provides a wholesale product solution to different vendors in all categories. It was founded by Sujeet Kumar, Amod Malviya, and Vaibhav Gupta in 2016. Udaan is a B2B (Business to Business) marketplace for trade that is working for connecting retailers, wholesalers, traders, and manufacturers using technology as the main tool. Udaan turned a startup unicorn in 2018, which is just after 2 years and 2 months since it was launched in 2016. It is thus, the first startup to be called the fastest unicorn.
SoftBank, Tiger Global, Ratan Tata, Hyundai Motors, Matrix Partners, Tiger Global and The Munjal Family.
Products and Services
Electric two and tree wheeler vehicles
Valuation
$5+ billion (January 2022)
Ola Electric is a brainchild of Ola which is currently one of the largest ride-hailing companies. Ola Electric is a tech mobility startup that provides transit services. Besides that, the company also offers a platform to work with driver-partners, vehicle manufacturers, and battery companies and also advance into making future technology for daily mobility. The company was founded in 2017 by Ankit Jain and Anand Shah and had its headquarters in Bengaluru, Karnataka. Ola Electric is also known to be the fastest unicorn after Udaan.
Lightspeed Ventures, Tiger Global, Twitter, India Quotient,
Products and Services
MOJ and Sharechat
Valuation
$3.7 billion (December 2021)
Mohalla Tech is a software company that was founded by Ankush Sachdeva, Farid Ahsan and Bhanu Singh in 2015. The company has its headquarters in Bengaluru, Karnataka, and is known for its platforms – MOJ and Sharechat. Mohalla Tech designs and develops social media platforms for sharing various quotes, videos, images, and news content. Currently, Moj and Sharechat are known to have a combined user of 340 million. According to some reports, an average user will spend over 34 minutes on the MOJ platform every day, which also gets 4.5 million views every day.
TPG, Chrys Capital, Premji Invest, Elevation Capital, MegaDelta and Vertex
Products and Services
Baby and Kids Products
Valuation
$2 billion (March 2021)
FirstCry is one of the top E-commerce companies for Baby and Child products. The company was founded by Supam Maheshwari, Amitava Saha, Prashant Jadhav, and Sanket Hattimattu in 2010, with its headquarters based in Pune, Maharashtra. Currently, the company has 380 plus stores across the country and also has a hospital contact program that helps in reaching out to more than 70,000 new parents every month. Firstcry has over 100,000 plus baby, kids, and new mom products from more than 1000 international and national brands.
Temasek, Falcon Edge Capital, KKR, Bay Capital, and Chiratae
Products and Services
Eyewear, opticians
Valuation
$4.32 billion (April 2022)
Lenskart is a leading eyewear company that was started by Peyush Bansal, Amit Chaudhary, Sumeet Kapahi in 2010. The company has its headquarters in Faridabad and has manufacturing facilities in Delhi, Zhengzhou (China). The company is known to manufacture over 300,000 eyewear every month, as it has more than 500 stores in over 70 cities across India. Besides having a huge range of eyewear it also offers its users branded contact lenses and sunglasses.
And this is not the end of the story. There are many new entrants to this unicorn club. Multiple startups strive hard to reach the top 10 unicorn startups but only a few make it to the top. India is the third-largest startup ecosystem in the world. It can be said that India is the future of great startups.
Grofers is an Indian online supermarket that helps in the home delivery of food, grocery products, and essentials. Founded in 2013, Grofers started with groceries and gradually expanded to a whole list of categories that includes beauty products, household care, baby care, and more. The company is now a unicorn with a $120 million fundraising round from the food aggregator, Zomato. Grofers was rebranded to Blinkit after a rebranding attempt on December 13, 2021.
A subsidiary company of inMobi, Glance is an artificial intelligence platform that offers customized lock screen content to the owners of the smartphones of the present. The company was founded in 2019 as a subsidiary of inMobi, a Bengaluru-based mobile ad network, and turned unicorn on December 22, 2020. Its parent company had already become a unicorn company back in 2011.
Google, Alphawave, Microsoft, Sequoia Capital, Falcon Capital
Products and Services
Dailyhunt app
Valuation
$1 billion (March 2021)
Dailyhunt is an Indian content and news aggregator services platform that helps its users access updates on trending topics along with online news, books, and magazines. The company is popular for offering content in 14 different local languages for a wide variety of Indian readers. The company raised around $100 million from Google and Microsoft and Falcon Edge’s Alpha Wave to become India’s first tech unicorn focused on vernacular content on December 22, 2020.
Accel, Norwest Venture Partners, Steadview Capital, Tiger Global Management
Products and Services
Salon software, spa software, med spa software
Valuation
$1.5+ billion
A cloud-based software platform for spa and salon services of the country, Zenoti was founded in 2010 with its headquarters in Bellevue, Washington, United States, and Hyderabad. Zenoti has been since the day it was founded and is now used by over 10,000 customers and has already established its presence in 50+ countries. With a fundraise that amounted to $160 million, the company entered the unicorn club on December 15, 2020.
Cars24 website/app, cars buying and selling service
Valuation
$1.6 billion (July 2021)
Cars24 is an online marketplace that encourages the buyers and sellers of used cars and helps them to buy and sell automobiles online without any hassles. Via an AI-enabled pricing algorithm, Cars24 displays the appraisal price along with the market price of the vehicles. Furthermore, it also arranges appointments for vehicle inspection, thereby making the selling process as transparent as possible.
The Gurgaon-based company, Cars24 was founded in 2015 and has already become a unicorn on November 24, 2020, with the $200 million Series E funding round led by Yuri Milner’s DST Global fund, Exor Seeds, Moore Strategic Ventures, and more. The company was valued at over $1 billion when assessed in November 2020.
RazorPay is a digital payment gateway that enables businesses and individuals to process, receive and disburse payments smoothly and securely. Razorpay accepts a wide range of the latest payment devices and platforms to improve the customer’s payment journeys online.
RazorPay is among the last year unicorn companies in India, which joined the unicorn club of Indian startups on October 11, 2020, when the company raised around $100 million. The company was valued at around $3 billion in April 2021.
Gaurav Munjal, Hemesh Singh, Roman Saini, Sachin Gupta
Founded
2015
Investors
Temasek Holdings, Dragoneer Investment Group, Softbank, Facebook, Sequoia Capital
Products and Services
Courses and classes
Valuation
$3.44 billion (August 2021)
Unacademy is an Indian unicorn Edtech company based in Bangalore, which climbed to unicorn status on September 2, 2020, thereby becoming the second e-learning startup to achieve the status.
Founded in 2015, Unacademy offers educational content for competitive examinations and other video lectures, some of which are also freely accessible for students. With the latest fundraise where the company received $440 million, Unacademy is now valued at $3.44 billion, as of August 2021. Here’s a List of Startups Acquired by EdTech Giant Unacademy
Postman raised $150 million in June 2020 to turn into a unicorn. The API development environment is used by around 6 million developers worldwide across 200,000 companies located globally. Postman serves as a platform that makes it easy for developers and enterprises to build, test, and debug their APIs.
With a valuation of $5.6 billion, as per the reports in August 2021, after the company received funding of around $225 million, Postman is presently acknowledged as the most valued Saas startup in India.
CitiusTech
Startup Name
CitiusTech
Headquarters
Princeton, New Jersey, United States
Industry
Healthcare Technology
Founders
Jagdish Moorjani, Rizwan Koita
Founded
2005
Investors
Baring Pvt. Equity Asia, Bain Capital
Products and Services
Consulting, Digital & Product Engineering, Data & Analytics
Valuation
$2.4 billion (May 2022)
CitiusTech is a major technology service and solution provider for the healthcare industry. CitiusTech boasts of having over 4000 professionals worldwide. With its workforce, the company aims to empower the healthcare and life sciences companies with reassuring consultation and digital technology services and drive clinical value chain excellence across integration and interoperability, data management, data science, performance management, and more.
CitiusTech was acquired by Baring Private Equity Asia, after the Hong Kong-based company signed a definitive agreement on July 12, 2019. This deal has valued the company at a little over a billion dollars, thereby granting its entry into the unicorn club of Indian companies.
As per the news dated May 5, 2022, Bain Capital has bought 40% of the stakes of CitiusTech from Baring Private Equity Asia, as the latter sold half of its tech to the American private investment firm. Apax Partners and Fujitsu of Japan were the other contenders for the stake. The 40% stakes of CitiusTech were valued between $960 mn to $1 bn, which has successfully catapulted the valuation of CitiusTech to around $2.4 bn, as of May 2022. The other 40% stakes of the firm are with Baring, while the remaining stakes are held by the company’s founders.
B Capital Group, Ignition Partners, Eight Roads Ventures
Products and Services
Contract Management Software
Valuation
$2.8 billion (March 2021)
Icertis is designed as a powerful AI-enabled contract management platform that promises ultimate compliance and aims to reduce the risks involved in it. Being an enterprise contract management platform, Icertis extends easy solutions to hard contract management issues.
When the company raised $80 million in March 2021, at a valuation of $2.8 billion, Icertis was declared as the second most-valued startup unicorn of India. The company turned into a unicorn even before that in 2020.
Druva
Startup Name
Druva
Headquarters
Sunnyvale, California, United States
Industry
Software, Cloud Data Services, Cloud Security, Saas
Sequoia Capital India, Viking Global, Indian Angel Network
Products and Services
Data protection solutions
Valuation
$2 billion (April 2021)
Druva is an Indian enterprise software platform that is designed to protect and manage enterprise data across endpoints, data centers, and cloud workloads. Built on AWS, Druva offers a Saas platform that extends superior data resiliency options, which is infinitely scalable, for the companies operating across the globe.
The India-based Saas company headquartered in the US is one of the earliest companies of India that turned into a unicorn. Druva attained unicorn status in 2019.
Rivigo is a logistics platform empowered by the latest technologies that extend effective transport services for a wide range of industries including clothing, eCommerce, automotive, automobiles, and more. The company was founded in 2014 in Gurgaon, Haryana, and was valued at $1.05 billion when it turned unicorn in September 2019.
Polygon or Matic Network, as it was named previously, is a Bengaluru-based blockchain startup that was founded as a result of the infamous RBI ban of cryptocurrencies that came in April 2018. Founded by Jaynti Kanani, Sandeep Nailwal, and Anurag Arjun, Matic Network focussed on solving the “scalability and usability issues, without compromising on decentralization”. It was on February 9, 2021, that Matic was renamed into Polygon.
Polygon is already a unicorn when last reported in May 2021 and is currently valued at over $10 bn, as of February 2022. The market capitalization of its native MATIC token has crossed the $20 billion mark once in December 2021.
MindTickle is a sales readiness platform founded in 2011, which helps in onboarding, product training, coaching, and ongoing readiness. The company offers a vital sales solution to the fast-growing startups to prepare their sales team in a scalable and effective way. MindTickle was founded in 2011 and turned a unicorn on August 6, 2021, with the influx of $100 mn in Series E funding led by Softbank Vision Fund II.
Bhavesh Manglani, Kapil Bharati, Mohit Tandon, Sahil Barua, Suraj Saharan
Founded
2011
Investors
FedEx, Fidelity, Steadview Capital, Tiger Global management
Products and Services
Cargo and freight services
Valuation
$4 billion (June 2021)
Delhivery was founded in 2011 in Gurgaon, Haryana, as a logistics and supply chain startup that aims to provide seamless transportation, warehousing, freight, and order fulfillment services. Delhivery Pvt. Ltd. turned unicorn back in 2019 where it raised around $413 million and was valued at $1.5 billion.
Billdesk is a company conceived in 2000 as IndiaIdeas.com Ltd., which helps Indian customers pay their bills safely and easily. Powered by the latest advancements in the electronic medium, BillDesk offers its customers better ways to organize and manage their payments online. Billdesk has already achieved unicorn status in 2018 when it mopped up nearly $300 million in a fundraising round led by Visa.
The company is currently acquired by PayU, a Prosus-owned company headquartered in the Netherlands via a deal worth $4.7 billion, one of the biggest deals in the Fintech range of India.
Mu Sigma was founded in 2014 as a data analytics services platform that offers data analytics services along with developing decision support system tools and software for Fortune 500 companies. Mu Sigma offers a range of services including market measurement, product/customer segmentation and profiling, prospecting, RFM analytics, and more. It was in 2016 when Fortune declared Mu Sigma a unicorn company.
Info Edge
Startup Name
Info Edge
Headquarters
Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India
Industry
Enterprisetech
Founders
Sanjeev Bikhchandani
Founded
1995
Investors
Temasek Holdings, Lightbox
Products and Services
Employment, Education, Real estate, Matrimonial service
Valuation
$6.6 Billion (May 2023)
Info Edge, founded by Sanjeev Bikhchandani in 1995, is a technology-driven Indian internet company offering a wide range of online services in sectors such as recruitment, matrimony, real estate, and education. The company is well-known for its flagship platforms, including Naukri.com for jobs, Jeevansathi.com for matrimonial services, 99Acres.com for real estate listings, and Shiksha.com for educational resources.
The company attained a valuation of over $1 billion in 2014 and became an elite member of the Indian unicorn club.
Sai Srinivas Kiran G, Shubh Malhotra, Shubham Malhotra
Founded
2018
Investors
Sequoia, Moore Strategic Ventures, Legatum Capital
Products and Services
EGaming platform
Valuation
$2.3 Billion (September 2021)
Mobile Premier League, now if the name rings a bell, then you’re right! MPL is another fantasy gaming and esports platform from India after Dream11 that has turned unicorn. The Sequoia Capital and Moore Strategic Ventures-backed startup was founded in September 2018, just 3 years ago by Sai Srinivas Kiran G and Shubh Malhotra, which emerged as the second gaming unicorn from the subcontinent.
Sequoia Capital, Tiger Global Management, Lightspeed
Products and Services
Professional networking platform and job portal
Valuation
$1.1 Billion (September 2021)
Apna is a leading professional networking platform that helps the rising workforce of India stay updated in terms of professional requirements and recruitment and grab them anytime and anywhere. Apna is currently available across 28+ cities in India for students and blue-mand gray-colored working professionals to get the best communities and land jobs.
The Series C round was on September 15, 2021, where Apna raised around $100 million from investors like Tiger Global, Sequoia, and others and turned into a unicorn within just 21 months of its foundation. This makes Apna the fastest unicorn in India.
Vamsi Krishna, Pulkit Jain, Saurabh Saxena, and Anand Prakash
Founded
2011
Investors
Coatue, Tiger Global Management, WestBridge Capital, Accel Partners
Products and Services
Online tutoring, courses and classes
Valuation
$1 Billion+ (September 2021)
Vedantu is an Edtech platform that offers online e-learning courses and classes to empower real-time personalized learning experiences. Vedantu believes in bridging the gaps between a student and his/her tutor to enjoy the benefits of real-time one-to-one teaching. Vedantu can help students pursue online tuitions for Maths, Physics, Chemistry, English, French, Hindi, Social Studies, German, Computer Science, and more.
Vedantu raised $100 mn via its Series E round led by ABC World Asia, Coatue, Tiger Global, WestBridge, and others on September 29, 2021, and became the 27th Indian unicorn of 2021 and the 69th unicorn startup in the country.
Bertelsmann, Mayfield Fund, Vertex Growth Fund, 3one4 Capital
Products and Services
Meat, fish, eggs packaging and delivery services
Valuation
$1 Billion+ (October 2021)
Licious was founded in 2015 and headquartered in Bengaluru as a Direct-to-consumer brand that offers fresh meat, eggs, fish, and seafood, which the customers can order online to receive the same at their doorsteps. The meat industry in India is largely unorganized and Licious is born out of the sole aim of organizing this sector and delivering fresh, trustworthy, delicious meat and fish to the house of the Indians.
The company raised $52 million in its latest funding round led by IIFL AMC’s Late Stage Tech Fund, emerging as the 29th Indian unicorn company of 2021 so far, and the first unicorn from the D2C segment, as of October 5, 2021.
Paradigm, Ribbit Capital, Sequoia Capital, Tiger Global Management
Products and Services
Cryptocurrency exchange platform
Valuation
$1.9 Billion (October 2021)
CoinSwitch Kuber is hailed as a cryptocurrency exchange platform that encourages users to buy and sell cryptocurrencies via their platform, ensuring secure and convenient transactions. The company supports a wide list of over 100 cryptocurrencies from which the customers can buy cryptos at the best rates, through a range of payment options.
CoinSwitch Kuber turns into India’s 30th unicorn startup in 2021 so far. The company raised a Series C funding round worth $260 million on October 6, 2021, led by a16z (Andreesen Horowitz) and Coinbase Ventures to join the coveted club of the unicorn companies. CoinSwitch Kuber boasts of being the second crypto unicorn of India, which crossed the 1 billion dollar mark in less than 2 months after CoinDCX was hailed as the first crypto unicorn of the country in August 2021. CoinSwitch Kuber is reportedly valued at $1.9 billion on October 2021, which is higher than what CoinDCX announced in August, which was $1.1 billion.
Rebel Foods, also termed Faasos Food Services Pvt. Ltd., is a food delivery platform of India that takes care of the food delivery requirements across the country, delivering food products at the doorsteps of the customers. Besides, the company also boasts of a huge network (over 450) of dark kitchens that operates in over 10 countries. Rebel Foods currently serves over 10,000 Indian customers, the numbers of which are jumping rapidly.
The Indian cloud kitchen and food delivery startup becomes the 31st unicorn of India in 2021. Rebel Foods has raised $175 million via its Series F funding round led by the investors like Qatar Investment Authority, Coatue and Evolvence, and more, to be valued at $1.4 bn, as of October 7, 2021.
Sequoia Capital India, HDFC Bank, LeapFrog Investments
Products and Services
Cars, Used cars retailing services
Valuation
$1.2 billion (October 2021)
CarDekho is a leading name in the used car retailing space. Headquartered in Gurugram, Haryana, CarDekho helps users browse through a wide selection of cars and select one that fits them in all aspects. The platform of CarDekho is equipped with the relevant details about the car, along with other detailed specs, experts’ reviews, comparisons, and more. All of these further ease the selection process of the car models and are some of the reasons that have contributed to the rising popularity of the company.
CarDekho has turned into a unicorn following its recent Series E and Debt financing rounds dated October 13, 2021, and led by LeapFrog Investments. The company has successfully raised around $200 mn and $50 mn respectively, with the last funding rounds that it saw. With the recent funding, CarDekho becomes the 33rd unicorn and the 3rd unicorn startup in the used car retailing space in India so far in 2021.
Sequoia Capital India, Hindustan Media Venture, Abu Dhabi Investment Authority
Products and Services
Digital payments platform
Valuation
$1 billion (October 2021)
MobiKwik is a Fintech company founded in 2009 as digital payments platform that offers phone-based payment options along with the facility of a digital wallet for its users. Headquartered in Gurgaon, MobiKwik is one of the trusted names in the digital payments space that also provides payment gateway and other financial services.
MobiKwik turned unicorn on October 12, 2021, after the conclusion of its secondary ESOP sale round led by Mathew Cyriac, former Head of Blackstone India.
Insurtech, Insurance, Health insurance, Auto insurance
Founders
Ruchi Deepak, Varun Dua
Founded
2016
Investors
Munich Re Ventures, Amazon, General Atlantic, Multiples Alternate Asset Management Private Limited
Products and Services
Car, bike and health insurance products
Valuation
$1.1 billion (October 2021)
Acko is a digital insurance provider of India, dubbed as the first insurance startup that efficiently processes car, bike, and health insurance without any paperwork. Furthermore, Acko also possesses the license, which allows the company to underwrite and distribute bite-sized insurance products.
Acko raised around $255 million in its Series D round led by General Atlantic and Multiples Private Equity and turned a unicorn on October 27, 2021. The unicorn insurance provider is the 34th Indian company to join the unicorn club in 2021 and is currently valued at $1.1 bn.
CureFit
Startup Name
CureFit
Headquarters
Bengaluru, India
Industry
Healthcare, wellness
Founders
Ankit Nagori, Mukesh Bansal
Founded
2016
Investors
Temasek Holdings, Accel, Tata Digital, Zomato, Axis Bank
Products and Services
Nutrition products, Consultation services for mental and well-being
Valuation
$1.5 billion (November 2021)
CureFit is a health and fitness company that extends online and offline experiences to bring in adequate nutrition, foster physical fitness, and mental well-being via improved yoga and meditation, medical and lifestyle care consultation.
The Bangalore-based fitness brand turned unicorn on November 10, 2021, in a deal where the foodtech giant Zomato sold its fitness facility arm Fitso for $50 mn and infused another $50 mn in CureFit. This helped Zomato own 6.4% shares in CureFit, worth $100 mn. As a result of the cross-selling, CureFit joined the unicorn club of Indian startups as the 36th company to turn unicorn in 2021 and the 77th company overall among the Indian startups.
Mensa
Startup Name
Mensa
Headquarters
Bengaluru, India
Industry
Financial services, Venture capital
Founders
Ananth Narayanan, Pawan Kumar Dasaraju
Founded
2021
Investors
Alpha Wave Incubation, Norwest Venture Partners, Accel, Falcon Edge Capital
Products and Services
finance, working capital
Valuation
$1 billion+ (November 2021)
Brands’ aggregator and roll-up firm, Mensa has been founded by former Myntra CEO and Medlife cofounder, Ananth Narayanan and Pawan Kumar Dasaraju. Mensa Brands stands as an investment firm that strives to partner with entrepreneurs to build digital brands and scale them. The company embraces a Thrasio-based model via which it invests working capital and picks up equity in other D2C startups, thereby scaling the presence of the brands online. The platform that Mensa offers helps in driving growth, product, merchandising, technology, supply chain, product, and access to global markets, which eventually lets the founders get lucrative financial exits along with transforming their business through a stable and successful partnership.
Mensa raised $135 mn in a new Series B funding round led by Alpha Wave Ventures (Falcon Edge Capital) on November 16, 2021, and has joined the coveted club of unicorn companies in India. The company turned unicorn within just 6 months since it started its operations, thereby emerging as the fastest Indian startup to turn unicorn.
Tiger Global Management, General Atlantic, Trifecta Capital, BEENEXT
Products and Services
Peer-to-peer property listings platform
Valuation
$1 billion+ (November 2021)
NoBroker, as the name states, is designed on the concept of building a brokerage-free real estate platform, which will take care of the entire journey of a customer from choosing a house, listing it, securing a home loan, contacting the packers and movers, opting for painting and other services and more. Founded by Akhil Gupta, Amit Kumar Agarwal, Saurabh Garg in 2014, NoBroker is based in Bengaluru and is currently hailed as a unicorn.
NoBroker is, in fact, India’s first proptech (property tech) startup that has achieved a unicorn status on November 23, 2021. The company is the 38th Indian startup to emerge as a unicorn in 2021. The unicorn valuation of the company was disclosed after it raised around $210 Mn in its Series E funding round on the same date.
Tiger Global Management, General Atlantic, Trifecta Capital, BEENEXT
Products and Services
Used car listing and selling platform
Valuation
$1.7 billion+ (November 2021)
Spinny is a used-car buying platform that is powered by new-age technologies and enables reliable and hassle-free transactions in used cars. Founded in 2015 in Gurgaon, Haryana, India, Spinny is built on a full-stack business model with the aim of making the process of buying used cars simple and transparent and ultimately helping the customers to buy cars that match their aspirations.
Spinny has turned unicorn after it received its Series E funding round of $248 million (Rs 1,849 crore), as of November 24, 2021. The company received an investment of Rs 739.7 crore each from Tiger Global and Abu Dhabi Growth Fund, while the remaining funds poured in from Somerville SPV and Aveni Spinny. Spinny is now officially the fourth Indian startup from the used car space to join the unicorn club, where Droom, CarDekho, and Cars24 have already joined earlier.
Upstox is a fintech company that offers innovative investment solutions for users, including securities brokerage and stock trading services. Based in Mumbai, Maharashtra, the company extends equity trading opportunities for retail investors via the platform, promising their clients to be benefited from their cutting-edge trading platform that brings in the best-in-class services.
Upstox turned unicorn with the recent fundraising round led by Tiger Global Management, as of November 25, 2021. The company agreed to allot around 18761 Series C preference shares at an issue price of Rs 98,608 in order to raise the sum of $25 million (Rs 185 crore) from Tiger Global. Upstox has raised the recent funds at a post-money valuation of an estimated $3.4 bn, which pushes it past its rival Groww, which was recently valued at $3 bn in October 2021. Upstox thus became the 40th unicorn startup in India in 2021.
Slice is a financial startup based out of Bengaluru, India that focuses on payment cards/credit cards, and extends them to their target audiences, mostly comprising Gen Z and millennials.
Slice has mopped around $220 mn in the recent funding round dated November 29, 2021, led by Tiger Global and Insight Partners to achieve a unicorn valuation. The series B round that Slice witnessed included participation from Flipkart co-founder Binny Bansal and Checkout co-founder and CEO, Guillaume Pousaz, along with a list of existing investors that includes Sunley House Capital, Moore Strategic Ventures, Anfa, Gunosy, Blume Ventures, and more. Slice is currently the 41st Indian startup unicorn of 2021.
Pristyn Care
Startup Name
Pristyn Care
Headquarters
Haryana, India
Industry
Healthtech, Health care
Founders
Harsimarbir (Harsh) Singh, Dr. Garima Sawhney and Vaibhav Kapoor
Founded
2018
Investors
Tiger Global Management, Hummingbird Ventures
Products and Services
Healthcare services
Valuation
$1.2 billion (December 2021)
Pristyn Care is a healthcare startup founded in September 2018, which is designed to disrupt elective surgery procedures. Headquartered in Gurgaon, Haryana, India, Pristyn Care believes in leveraging cutting-edge technology and advanced procedures to simplify medical care and surgery experiences.
The startup successfully raised $84 Million on December 7, 2021, via new funding round, Series E, led by Sequoia Capital, Tiger Global, Hummingbird Ventures, Epiq Capital, QED, and others to enter the unicorn club of Indian startups. With its unicorn valuation, the health tech startup from Gurgaon has turned to be the fourth startup to achieve the feat in its space in India after Innovaccer, PharmEasy, and CureFit.
Founded in 2021, GlobalBees is a Thrasio-style startup focused on acquiring other companies, especially startups, and scaling them with adequate funds and resources to extend joyful product experiences. GlobalBees can also be considered as the venture arm of FirstCry.
GlobalBees has already been in talks ever since it raised $150 mn in India’s largest Series A funding round. Furthermore, the company has become a unicorn when it again raised around $111.5 mn in a mix of equity and debt round of Series B led by a clutch of investors including FirstCry, SoftBank, Premji Invest, Chiratae Ventures, Trifecta Capital, and others.
Beauty, baby care, skin care, body care products and more
Valuation
$1.1 billion+ (December 2021)
Founded in 2016, Mamaearth is a personal care brand that was established as an organic alternative to the baby, hair, face and skincare products in the market. Headquartered in Gurgaon, Haryana, Mamaearth extends the best organic products for babies and their mothers.
Mamaearth turned unicorn after the latest funding round that it raised on December 28, 2021, worth $80 million led by Sequoia Capital. Gurugram-based organic skincare, haircare, and body care brand, Honasa or Mamaearth became the first unicorn in India in 2022.
Fractal Intelligence is a Mumbai-based analytics startup founded in 2000 by Ramakrishna Reddy, Pranay Agrawal, Srikanth Velamakanni, Nirmal Palaparthi, and Pradeep Suryanarayan and is currently headquartered in New York, US. Primarily established as a strategic analytics partner to the most sought-after Fortune 500 companies globally, Fractal empowers every human decision by bringing analytics, AI, and other cutting-edge technology to the decision-making process.
Fractal Analytics currently has its presence across 15 countries including the United States, UK, Ukraine, and India. The company has recently turned unicorn by raising $360 million from a fundraising round led by TPG Capital, and Apax Partners, as per the reports dated January 5, 2022. Fractal is one of the leading players in the AI space with Qure.ai, Crux Intelligence, Theremin.ai, Eugenie.ai and Samya.ai as its flagship products. It is also important to note that Fractal is the second Indian unicorn of 2022.
LEAD School is a Mumbai-based edtech company that helps bring in improved marketing and academic solutions for educational institutions to transform their school education in India. Founded in 2012 by Smita Deorah and Sumeet Mehta, LEAD School helps digitize and transform private schools to help them serve students from varying economic backgrounds better.
LEAD School turned unicorn on January 13, 2022, thereby becoming the first Indian edtech startup to achieve a unicorn valuation in 2022. LEAD raised a funding round worth $100 mn today, led by GSV Ventures and WestBridge Capital to attain unicorn status. The Deorah and Mehta-led startup has thus become the third unicorn startup in India in 2022.
Darwinbox has been founded by Chaitanya Peddi, Jayant Paleti and Rohit Chennamaneni as a cloud-based Hr technology product, which serves as an end-to-end HR software that helps enterprises automate the entire employee lifecycle. The HR software that the company provides the organizations, helps them manage all of their HR requirements including recruitment, payroll, employee engagement, talent management, and people analytics across the employee life cycle under one platform.
Darwinbox has already served 1.5 million employees across 650+ organizations from over 90 different industries. The company claims to be the third-largest HRTech platform after SAP and Oracle. The growing HR Tech platform has raised $72 million in its Series D funding round from TCV on January 25, 2022, to attain the unicorn club of Indian companies. The unicorn valuation obtained by Darwinbox has made it the first Indian Saas unicorn of 2022 and the fourth unicorn overall that the country has seen this year.
DealShare
Startup Name
DealShare
Headquarters
Bengaluru, Andhra Pradesh, India
Industry
Ecommerce, Grocery
Founders
Rajat Shikhar, Sankar Bora, Sourjyendu Medda, and Vineet Rao
Founded
2018
Investors
Tiger Global, Alteria Capital, Alpha Wave Global, Innoven Capital and other
Products and Services
Grocery and other consumer products via its ecommerce business
Valuation
$1.62 billion+ (January 2022)
DealShare is a social eCommerce startup based in Bengaluru. Founded in 2018 by Rajat Shikhar, Sankar Bora, Sourjyendu Medda, and Vineet Rao, DealShare boasts of having multi-category consumer goods that are available at affordable prices.
DealShare has turned into a unicorn, as per the reports dated January 27, 2022. The Bangalore-based grocery and essentials delivery eCommerce platform have raised $130 million via a Series E funding round led by Tiger Global, Alpha Wave, Kora Investment, and others for this recent round in funding.
ElasticRun
Startup Name
ElasticRun
Headquarters
Pune, Maharashtra, India
Industry
Ecommerce, Logistics, Transportation
Founders
Sandeep Deshmukh, Saurabh Nigam, Shitiz Bansal
Founded
2015
Investors
Softbank, Kalaari, Prosus, Innoven, Norwest Venture Partners and more
Products and Services
Online system, logistics and transportation support
Valuation
$1 billion+ (February 2022)
ElasticRun is an eCommerce logistics and transportation-based startup headquartered in Pune, Maharashtra, which is designed to serve as an online system that will empower the eCommerce and distribution industry of India by improving the reception of orders from customers and the dispatch of delivery drivers.
In a recent round of funding dated February 8, 2022, ElasticRun has raised over $300 million from SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Goldman Sachs with some of its existing investors including Prosus Ventures. At the conclusion of the fresh funding round, the company posted a post-money valuation of $1.44 bn. ElasticRun was just valued at $400 mn during the last round that it saw in April 2021, thereby implying that the valuation of the company saw a 3X rise. With this round, the Kirana commerce platform becomes the 6th unicorn startup in India in 2022.
Trifecta, Saint Gobain, Bessemer Venture, Helion Venture, Kharis Capital, and more
Products and Services
Interior Design solutions
Valuation
$1.44 billion+ (February 2022)
Built with an aim to connect individuals with designers, services, and products, Livspace is an interior designing startup that works as an omnichannel home interior and renovation platform. Headquartered in Bengaluru, Livspace helps homeowners to find pre-created looks for rooms, kitchens, and storage areas on the platform. Furthermore, Livspace also extends the opportunities to its customers to choose and buy the designs they want, along with further options for customization.
The Anuj Srivastava and Ramakant Sharma-led startup raised $180 Mn in a Series F funding round led by American investment giant KKR & Co. and other existing investors of Livspace including Jungle Ventures, Venturi Partners, Ingka Group (Ikea), and Peugeot Investments. This has lifted the valuation of Livspace to $1.44 bn. With the unicorn valuation that Livspace attained with the funding round dated February 8, 2022, the company witnessed a 2X jump in its valuation since December 2019, when it was valued at $500 million. The company became the 7th Indian unicorn in 2022 and is the 50th unicorn since January 2021.
Founded by Supam Maheshwari and Amitava Saha, Xpressbees is an eCommerce logistics platform that extends reliable delivery solutions to its partners along with customized delivery solutions. Headquartered in Pune, India, the company offers a wide range of delivery and logistics-oriented services including comprehensive last-mile delivery, reverse logistics, payment collection, drop shipping, vendor management, cross-border services, fulfilment services, and more. Furthermore, Xpressbees also boasts of bringing in tailored software solutions to clients.
Xpressbees is the 8th unicorn company in India, which raised $300 million worth of funds in its latest Series F funding round led by Blackstone Growth, TPG Growth, and ChrysCapital on February 9, 2022. The funding round via which it raised the funds that will support the next phase of business growth of Xpressbees also saw participation from its existing investors including Investcorp and Norwest Venture Partners.
Uniphore
Startup Name
Uniphore
Headquarters
Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India and Palo Alto, California, USA
Industry
AI, Saas, Software
Founders
Ravi Saraogi, Umesh Sachdev
Founded
2008
Investors
IIFL, Sorenson, March Capital, Chiratae Ventures and more
Products and Services
auMina and akeira and other software products
Valuation
$2.5 billion+ (February 2022)
Uniphore is a Conversational Automation platform founded by Ravi Saraogi and Umesh Sachdev in 2008. The customer service platform developed by Uniphore is powered by AI and automation technologies the vision of which is to bridge the gap between people and machines through voice. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, Uniphore extends first-rate customer service to global businesses and helps them benefit from the integrated suite of software products for conversational analytics, assistance, and security that Uniphore provides. auMina and akeira, two proprietary AI solutions are already developed by Uniphore in the speech analytics and virtual assistant verticals.
Uniphore raised $400 million in a Series E round led by NEA, March Capital, and others to become the eighth unicorn of India in 2022, as per the reports dated February 16, 2022, at the end of which the company was valued at $2.5 billion.
Hasura
Startup Name
Hasura
Headquarters
Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
Industry
Software
Founders
Rajoshi Ghosh and Tanmay Gopal
Founded
2017
Investors
Greenoaks, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Vertex Ventures and more
Products and Services
GraphQL development platform
Valuation
$1 billion+ (February 2022)
Hasura is a Bengaluru-based GraphQL development platform that has built its platform with an aim to boost web application development. The Rajoshi Ghosh and Tanmay Gopal-led startup plan to do this by reducing the roadblocks, thereby making data access easy for the frontend and full-stack developers. The platform turned into an open-source platform in July 2018 and since then developers from around the world have used Hasura to help themselves build the data layer for modern applications.
This developer-focused tooling products platform turned into a unicorn on February 22, 2022, thereby becoming the 10th Indian startup to enter the coveted unicorn club in 2022. It raised a funding of $100 million to obtain unicorn status in its Series C funding round.
CredAvenue
Startup Name
CredAvenue
Headquarters
Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India
Industry
Fintech, Finance, PaaS
Founders
Gaurav Kumar and Vineet Sukumar
Founded
2017
Investors
Dragoneer, B Capital Group, Insight Partners, Sequoia Capital and more
Products and Services
CredLoan, CredCo-Lend, Plutus
Valuation
$1.3 billion+ (March 2022)
Termed as a complete corporate debt solution, CredAvenue is founded by Gaurav Kumar in 2017 and is designed as a fully integrated, unified digital platform, which helps investors discover, trade, execute and fulfil debt solutions for investors. Vineet Sukumar, who joined the startup in October 2020 also stands as the Founder and Director of CredAvenue.
CredAvenue turned into a unicorn on March 6, 2022, by raising $137 million worth of funds in a series-B round led by Insight Partners, B Capital Group, and Dragoneer. The company is currently valued at over $1.3 billion, which is more than double the valuation of CredAvenue that was measured in September 2021. The Chennai-based debt marketplace startup becomes the 11th Indian startup to attain unicorn status in 2022.
Baskar Subramanian, Srinivasan KA, Srividhya Srinivasan
Founded
2008
Investors
Accel, Mayfield, Premjiinvest, Emerald Media and more
Products and Services
Cloud solutions for broadcasting
Valuation
$1 billion+ (March 2022)
Founded in 2009, by Baskar Subramanian, Srinivasan KA, Srividhya Srinivasan, and originally headquartered in Bengaluru, Amagi is a media-tech and broadcasting startup that helps target TV advertisements geographically. As a Cloud Saas technology provider, Amagi offers a mix of media and innovation to bring services that are powerful, cost-effective, and result-oriented, thereby making a way for a new TV-media advertising platform.
Amagi raised $95 million in funding on March 16, 2022, led by Accel and a clutch of existing investors like Norwest Venture Partners and Avataar Ventures, which helped it attain a unicorn valuation. With this funding round, Amagi becomes the 12th Indian startup to enter the unicorn club in 2022. It is also presently hailed as one of the highest valued media tech companies in the world.
Started as Boomerang Commerce, founded by Guru Hariharan, CommerceIQ is an omnichannel management platform that is currently headquartered in Palo Alto, California, US. Founded in 2012, CommerceIQ uses cutting-edge technologies including Machine Learning and Automation to multiply e-commerce sales.
CommerceIQ raised $115 million in its Series D funding round dated March 21, 2022, led by Softbank to turn a unicorn. This funding round made CommerceIQ the 13th unicorn that India has seen so far in 2022 and the second Indian company to turn unicorn by a funding round led by SoftBank after ElasticRun.
Alpha Wave, LLC, Matrix, Capital Management, Tiger Global, Norwest and more
Products and Services
Financial Services
Valuation
$1 billion+ (March 2022)
Oxyzo is a credit solutions provider, working as the lending arm of the unicorn industrial goods and services procurement platform, OfBusiness. Founded by Asish Mohapatra, Ruchi Kalra, with a deep understanding of the SMEs’ business trends, Oxyzo aims to transform small and medium-scale enterprises into something bigger in terms of operations, revenue, and profit margins.
In the latest Series A funding round that Oxyzo witnessed on March 23, 2022, where it received $200 million from a clutch of investors including Alpha Wave Global, Tiger Global, Matrix Partners, Norwest Venture Partners, and more, the company turned unicorn. This was the first external round of investment that Oxyzo received that has made it attain unicorn status. Owned by OfBusiness, Oxyzo is the second unicorn of the group. Raising such a large amount in the Series A round, Oxyzo has also been recorded as the first Indian startup to do so to date.
Games 24×7
Startup Name
Games 24×7
Headquarters
Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Industry
Gaming, Fantasy Sports
Founders
Bhavin Pandya, Trivikraman Thampy
Founded
2006
Investors
Malabar Investment and more
Products and Services
Gaming platform
Valuation
$1 billion+ (April 2022)
Games 24×7 is India’s leading scientific gaming company. Founded by Bhavin Pandya and Trivikraman Thampy, on June 1, 2006, headquartered in Mumbai, Maharashtra, Games 24×7 offers real money skill gaming, daily sports fantasy games, and casual gaming for its users.
The leading games platform recently turned unicorn on March 30, 2022, by raising $75 mn of funds led by Malabar India Fund and is currently valued at $2.5 billion. Tiger Global was an existing investor who also took part in the same funding round. Games 24×7 is currently hailed as India’s 99th unicorn company, as per the reports dated 30th March 2022.
Open is a neobanking startup that was founded in 2017 and is headquartered currently in Bangalore. Ajeesh Achuthan, Anish Achuthan, Deena Jacon, and Mabel Chacko were the minds behind the foundation of Open.
The neobanking culture is rapidly influencing the Indian banking and financial system and Open has been one of the major players in this growing culture. Open is currently powering 2.3+ million SMEs and processing over $30 billion in annualized transactions, which is certainly huge. This neobanking startup has put another feather in its cap by raising $50 mn in its Series D round on May 2, 2022, and turning into a unicorn, led by IIFL, Temasek, 3one4 Capital, and Tiger Global. With this, Open has seized the title of being the 1st Indian unicorn from the neobanking space and the 16th unicorn that India has seen so far in 2022.
It is also important to note here that Open has resumed India’s unicorn streak, which showed an unprecedented pause towards the end of March 2022, after Games 24×7 achieved the unicorn status.
Tutoring, Study materials for Classes 6-12, and Live Courses for them and for the other entrance examinations like JEE, NEET and more
Valuation
$1.1 billion+ (June 2022)
PhysicsWallah is an edtech company founded by Alakh Pandey in 2016, where Prateek Maheshwari. It offers online and offline courses and study materials for engineering and medical entrance examinations like JEE and NEET along with various entrance and state board exams. Video lectures, live classes, test series, and dynamic exercises are some of the main services that PhysicsWallah offers.
PhysicsWallah had last seen the Series A funding round, which was the maiden fundraising round that poured $100 mn into the startup. This round was led by Westbridge and GSV Ventures and helped the bootstrapped startup turn into an Indian unicorn company on June 7, 2022, thereby making PhysicsWallah the 101st Indian unicorn. PhysicsWallah, which was valued at $1.1 bn post the infusion, is currently hailed as the second bootstrapped Indian company that turned a unicorn. PhysicsWallah belongs to the edtech space that is seeing a huge upheaval after the unwinding of the country post-pandemic. Losses rage the edtech sector now, and layoffs are the new normal for the Edtech space in India.
Blume Ventures, Kedaara Capital, PremjiInvest, Goldman Sachs and more
Products and Services
Ecommerce platform for cosmetics and beauty products including haircare, skincare products and more
Valuation
$1.1 billion+ (June 2022)
Purplle is an Indian multi-brand beauty retailing online marketplace that was founded in 2011. Founded by Rahul Dash and Manish Taneja, Purplle is an online store that offers a wide range of products spanning numerous categories like fragrances, cosmetics, hair and skincare, and more.
The Mumbai-headquartered D2C cosmetic ecommerce brand turned unicorn on June 7, 2022, by raising $33 mn of funding from South Korea-based Paramark Ventures and its existing investors including Kedaara Capital, Blume Ventures, and PremjiInvest.
LeadSquared
Startup Name
LeadSquared
Headquarters
Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
Industry
Saas, Technology
Founders
Nilesh Patel, Prashant Singh, and Sudhakar Gorti
Founded
2011
Investors
WestBridge Capital, International Finance Corporation, Gaja Capital and more
Products and Services
Marketing Automation, Field Force Automation, Self-serve Portal, Sales Execution CRM, Sales Performance Suite
Valuation
$1 billion+ (June 2022)
Raising $153 mn in its Series C funding round from WestBridge Capital and others, LeadSquared turned unicorn, thereby becoming the 103rd Indian unicorn, as of June 21, 2022. With this latest funding in its arsenal, LeadSquared is planning to invest more in its business in India and North America. It is also looking to foray into the APAC and EMEA regions ahead, and would also fund some acquisitions. Besides, it is also looking to increase its workforce, and might even double its headcounts in the next 18 months.
LeadSquared was founded by Nilesh Patel, Prashant Singh, and Sudhakar Gorti in 2011, and is currently headquartered in Bengaluru. New Jersey, Philippines, South Africa, Australia, and Indonesia are some other territories where the company has seen its expansion to date. As a company, LeadSquared offers solutions for end-to-end sales, marketing, and onboarding automation, making these processes easy for its customers. LeadSquared already has 2,000+ customers, which belong to a variety of industries, including education, BFSI, healthcare, real estate, automotive, hospitality,and more. Some of its customers include biggies like Byju’s, Godrej Housing Finance, Olx, Dunzo, Practo, Kotak Securities, Amazon Pay, NIIT, Uni,and more.
OneCard
Startup Name
OneCard
Headquarters
Pune, Maharashtra, India
Industry
Financial Services, Credit card challenger
Founder
Vaibhav Hathi, Rupesh Kumar, Anurag Sinha
Founded
2018
Investors
Sequoia Capital, Ocean View Investment, QED Holdings, Matrix Partners, Hummingbird and more
Products and Services
Metal credit cards, Visa credit cards, OneScore
Valuation
$1.3 billion (FY22)
OneCard was founded in 2018 by Vaibhav Hathi, Rupesh Kumar, and Anurag Sinha, and is a subsidiary of FPL Technologies. Being an Indian startup from the credit card challenger space, OneCard competes with companies like Slice, Karbon Card, Uni Card, and more. OneCard rolled out its first mobile metal credit card in 2020, which it offers as a service along with Visa credit cards in partnership with numerous banks, and OneScore, a digital credit score checking platform that helps users check their credit scores without paying anything and without even any spams. OneCard currently extends its services in 12+ states across India.
OneCard turned unicorn after it raised $100 mn in funds via its Series D funding round led by Temasek, Sequoia Capital, QED Holdings, Matrix Partners, Hummingbird, and others, on June 13, 2022. With this fundraising round, OneCard is now valued at around $1.3 bn, thereby turning into the 104th Indian unicorn in 2022. Its total funding now crossed $225 mn, as of July 14th, 2022. After Slice, OneCard is now the second unicorn Indian startup in the credit card challenger space now.
5ire
Startup Name
5ire
Headquarters
London, England, UK
Industry
Blockchain Network
Founder
Pratik Gauri, Prateek Dwivedi, and Vilma Mattila
Founded
August 2021
Investors
SRAM & MRAM, GEM Global Yield LLC SCS (GGY), Launchpool, Sanctum Global Ventures
5ire is a London-based 5th generation Layer-1 (L1) blockchain network founded by Pratik Gauri and Prateek Dwivedi, who are of Indian origin, and with the help of web3 financier Vilma Mattila, in August 2021. 5ire aims to build a space in the web3 revolution, just like Google did in the case of web1 revolution and Facebook revolutionised the web2 space, mentioned the company CEO Pratik Gauri. The name “5ire” came from the idea of the 5th industrial revolution.
5ire raised $100 mn in Series A funding from UK-based conglomerate SRAM & MRAM at a valuation of $1.5 Bn to be listed as the 105th unicorn of India.
Shiprocket
Startup Name
Shiprocket
Headquarters
New Delhi, India
Industry
Ecommerce, Logistics, Supply Chain Management
Founders
Gautam Kapoor, Saahil Goel, Vishesh Khurana and Akshay Ghulati
Founded
2017
Investors
Tamesek Holdings, Lightrock, Bertelsmann, Moore Strategic Ventures
Products and Services
Ecommerce Logistics and Shipping Software, Courier Delivery App
Valuation
$1.2 billion (August 2022)
Shiprocket was founded in 2017 by Gautam Kapoor, Saahil Goel, Vishesh Khurana and Akshay Ghulati. The startup is a developer of an eCommerce shipping and enablement application and is headquartered in New Delhi. The platform makes use of a machine learning-based data engine to recommend the best courier service for a business and select a courier company. Apart from this, it offers benefits like packaging, warehousing, printing shipping labels, and tracking orders from a single panel. This helps the merchants and sellers to manage the deliveries smoothly.
The Zomato-backed logistics startup has become the 106thunicorn startup in India after raising $33.5 million from Temasek Holdings and Lightrock raising its valuation to $1.2 billion. This makes it the 21st Indian startup to turn unicorn in 2022.
Tata 1mg (formerly 1mg) was founded in the year 2015 by Prashant Tandon, Gaurav Agarwal, and Vikas Chauhan. The startup is headquartered in Gurugram, Haryana. It is an online drug delivery platform that intends to make healthcare more accessible and affordable. The platform is known to offer medicines and other healthcare products, lab tests, and online consultations from healthcare professionals. All this makes it a one-stop solution for all of the customers’ healthcare needs.
The Tata-owned health tech platform has become the 107th unicorn startup in India after raising $40 million in an internal round of funding led by Tata Digital, raising its valuation to $1.25 billion.
Molbio Diagnostics
Startup Name
Molbio Diagnostics
Headquarters
VERNA, Goa, India
Industry
HealthTech, MedTech
Founders
Chandrasekhar Nair, Sriram Natarajan
Founded
2010
Investors
Temasek Holdings, Motilal Oswal Private Equity
Products and Services
Medical Diagnostics, TB Diagnostic Tools, RT-PCR
Valuation
$1.53 (September 2022)
Molbio Diagnostics is a manufacturer of molecular diagnostics. The company was founded by Sriram Natarajan and Chandrasekhar Nair and is headquartered in Verna, Goa. It operates as a platform that specializes in providing affordable diagnoses for tuberculosis and other infectious diseases.
After raising $85 million from Temasek and existing investor Motilal Oswal Alternates, Molbio Diagnostics became India’s 108th unicorn startup in September 2022 and the first unicorn startup from Goa, increasing its valuation to $1.53 billion.
Zepto was founded by Kaivalya Vohra and Aadit Palicha, both Stanford students who decided to drop out of the university to pursue entrepreneurship. The startup was founded in 2021 and is headquartered in Mumbai. It is a quick commerce platform designed to deliver groceries to your doorstep within 10 minutes, ensuring convenient access to essential food items.
Zepto became India’s first unicorn in 2023 after a long 11-month unicorn drought. The startup raised $200 million in a Series E funding round led by StepStone Group with participation from Goodwater Capital and existing investors in August 2023. This funding round increased Zepto’s valuation to $1.4 billion, making it an exclusive member of the unicorn club.
Krutrim
Startup Name
Krutrim
Industry
Research Services
Founder
Bhavish Aggarwal
Founded
2023
Investors
Matrix Partners India and others
Valuation
$1 billion (January 2024)
Krutrim is an artificial intelligence startup launched by Ola founder and Chairman Bhavish Aggarwal in 2023. Krutrim AI is a part of the Ola group and is committed to building the entire AI computing stack for the future. It aims to provide an advanced AI computing stack for India, including infrastructure, cloud services, foundational models, and AI-powered applications. By offering a comprehensive AI computing stack tailored for the Indian market, Krutrim aims to empower consumers, startups, enterprises, and scientists with cutting-edge technology.
India’s own AI, Krutrim AI, raised $50 million at a valuation of $1 billion in a funding round led by Matrix Partners India and others. This not only makes Krutrim India’s first unicorn of 2024 but also represents a historic achievement as India gets its first artificial intelligence unicorn, marking it as Bhavish Aggarwal’s third unicorn startup.
Real-Time Credit Decisioning, Analytics, Onboarding Automation, SME Lending Solutions, and More
Valuation
$1 billion (March 2024)
Perfios Software Solutions is India’s leading B2B fintech software company. Headquartered in Bangalore, Perfios specializes in credit decisioning, analytics, and onboarding automation. Their core data platform seamlessly aggregates and analyzes both structured and unstructured data, providing tailored solutions for the BFSI sector. Perfios empowers financial institutions to make informed decisions while enhancing customer experiences across the banking, financial services, and insurance sectors.
Perfios raised $80 million from Teachers’ Venture Growth (TVG), the late-stage venture and growth investment arm of Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan. This deal has raised Perfios’ valuation to $1 billion, making it a unicorn startup in India.
Porter
Startup Name
Porter
Headquarter
Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
Industry
Logistics, Transportation
Founder
Pranav Goel, Uttam Digga, Vikas Choudhary
Founded
2014
Investors
Tiger Global Management, Vitruvian Partners
Products and Services
Two-wheelers, Trucks, Packers and Movers, Porter for Enterprise, Courier Service
Valuation
$1 Billion (May 2024)
Porter is an online logistics marketplace that simplifies truck booking for businesses. They offer mini trucks and tempo rentals based on date and location, with real-time tracking for efficient logistics management.
Founded in 2014 by Pranav Goel, Uttam Digga, and Vikas Choudhary and headquartered in Bengaluru, Porter has disrupted logistics with its on-demand marketplace for LCVs, bikes, and specialised services like Enterprise and Packers & Movers.
Porter became the third unicorn startup in India in 2024 following a recent friends and family round, during which individuals purchased shares from the company’s employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) at a valuation of $1 billion. This came after a successful funding round in 2021, where Porter raised $100 million from investors like Tiger Global Management and Vitruvian Partners.
RateGain
Startup Name
RateGain Travel Technologies Limited
Headquarter
Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India
Industry
SaaS, Travel Technology, Hospitality Solutions
Founder
Bhanu Chopra
Founded
2004
Investors
Pinebridge Global Funds, Troo Capital, ICICI Prudential MF, Kotak Mahindra Life Insurance
Products and Services
Hotel Distribution, Hotel Booking Engine, Travel-Intent, Competitor Pricing Intelligence
Valuation
$1 Billion
RateGain Travel Technologies Limited is a SaaS company in the travel and hospitality industry. It offers solutions for hotels, airlines, online travel agents, and more. Founded in 2004 by Bhanu Chopra, RateGain operates in over 100 countries.
In 2024, RateGain became the only listed company to reach unicorn status in India, with a valuation of $1 billion. Headquartered in Noida, Uttar Pradesh, the company helps businesses grow revenue through acquisition, retention, and wallet share expansion. It was one of the six companies that entered the Indian startup unicorn club in 2024.
Rapido
STARTUP NAME
Rapido
Headquarter
Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
Industry
Transportation, Mobility Tech
Founder
Aravind Sanka, Pavan Guntupalli, Rishikesh SR
Founded
2015
Investors
WestBridge Capital, Nexus Venture Partners
Products and Services
Bike Taxi Service, Auto Rickshaw Services
Valuation
$1 Billion (July 2024)
Rapido is India’s largest and fastest-growing bike taxi app service. Headquartered in Bengaluru, Rapido offers two-wheeler ride services with transparent fares, making intra-city travel and last-mile connectivity affordable and fun. The platform also includes app-based auto rickshaws and delivery services, quickly expanding into various transportation solutions.
Founded in 2015 by Aravind Sanka, Pavan Guntupalli, and Rishikesh SR, Rapido raised $120 million in a Series E funding round in July 2024, led by WestBridge Capital. This funding round boosted Rapido’s valuation to over a billion, making it a unicorn startup in India.
Ather Energy
Startup Name
Ather Energy
Headquarters
Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
Industry
Automotive, Electric vehicles, Motor Vehicle Manufacturing
Ather Energy is a leading electric two-wheeler manufacturer in India, headquartered in Bengaluru. The company is known for its innovative and eco-friendly scooters, including the Ather 450 series and Ather Rizta, which feature advanced lithium-ion battery packs and digital management systems. Ather Energy’s products are designed to offer a cleaner, smarter mode of transportation.
Founded in 2013 by Tarun Mehta and Swapnil Jain, Ather Energy secured $71 million in a funding round led by the existing investor National Investment and Infrastructure Fund (NIIF) in August 2024. This funding round increased Ather Energy’s valuation to $1.3 billion, making it a unicorn startup in India.
Moneyview
Startup Name
Moneyview
Headquarters
Bengaluru, Karnataka, India
Industry
FinTech, Digital Lending, Personal Financial Management
Founder
Puneet Agarwal, Sanjay Aggarwal
Founded
2014
Investors
Accel India, Nexus Ventures, Tiger Global Management
Products and Services
Loans, Investments, Personal Finance Management Solutions, Smart Pay, Credit Tracker
Valuation
$1.2 Billion (September 2024)
Moneyview, a leading consumer lending platform, offers personalised financial products such as loans, credit tracking, investments, and personal financial management solutions. Headquartered in Bengaluru, the company enables users to access instant personal loans, track finances, and manage expenses through a seamless, paperless process.
Founded in 2014 by Puneet Agarwal and Sanjay Aggarwal, Moneyview became a unicorn startup in September 2024 after raising $4.6 million in a funding round from Accel India and Nexus Ventures, bringing its valuation to $1.2 billion.
Fleet Camera System, Driver•i One, Driver•i Hub-X, Driver Drowsiness with Driver Monitoring System (DMS) Sensor
Valuation
$1.34 Billion (January 2025)
Netradyne is a leading logistics AI startup, transforming fleet management with advanced technology. The company utilises artificial intelligence, machine learning, and edge computing to enhance driver safety by minimising accidents, identifying risky driving behaviours, and shielding drivers from false claims. Its flagship product, Driver•i, collects and analyses vast amounts of data to set new safety standards for commercial vehicles, helping businesses enhance safety, boost profitability, and build a driver-focused culture.
Founded in 2015 by Avneesh Agrawal, Netradyne became India’s first unicorn of 2025 in January after securing $90 million in a Series D funding round led by Point72 Private Investments, alongside Qualcomm Ventures and Pavilion Capital, bringing its valuation to$1.34 billion.
Former Indian Unicorn Companies
India has seen many unicorn companies to date and the above list containing is a testament to that. However, if you wonder about the total number of unicorns in India, then the numbers would be even more than what reflects in the list above because many of the unicorn companies in the country have either gone defunct or devalued thus, lost their unicorn status. Here’s remembering the prominent ones among them:
Quikr is a Bengaluru-based Indian online marketplace and classified advertising company that was founded in 2008 by Pranay Chulet. Quikr boasts of having its listings in over 1000 cities in India across a wide range of product categories including cars, mobile phones, household products, education, jobs, services, and more.
The online classified ads major was valued at over $1.5 billion on October 8, 2015. However, the company lost its unicorn status in February 2020.
Started as a social media instant messaging app, Hike Messenger was beyond a craze when it first launched. It was the time when Whatsapp was launched recently in India and was far from gaining the popularity that it is currently known for. Kavin Bharti Mitta, who was the founder and CEO of Hike, founded the company in December 2012.
Hike raised $175 million in a Series D funding round, which valued the startup at $1.4 billion in just under 3.7 years in August 2016, thereby becoming the then youngest startup in India to achieve the feat!
However, the company saw a massive drop in its revenue as Whatsapp rapidly rose to fame and dominated the market. The company tried some strategies to lift its brand value. It even tried a sticker-centric experience by rebranding itself as Hike Sticker Chat in April 2019. The company finally announced its shutdown on January 15, 2021.
ShopClues was founded by Sanjay Sethi, Radhika Aggarwal, and Sandeep Aggarwal in 2011 and has claimed to be India’s first and largest managed marketplace. It was once a promising company with over 2.5 crore listed products and 6,00,000+ merchants. Shopclues also turned into a unicorn back in 2016 and was hailed as the fourth unicorn startup in India. However, ShopClues has slowly and steadily collapsed from being a promising unicorn to an also-ran by the company and was finally sold to Singapore-based Qoo10 Pte Ltd at a valuation of just $70-100 million in an all-stock deal.
FAQs
What is the meaning of a Unicorn startup?
Startups with a valuation of over $1 Billion are known as Unicorns.
How many unicorn startups are there in India in 2024?
As of September 2024, there are 117 unicorns in India.
Which are the top Indian unicorns?
Some of the top unicorns that India boasts of today are:
Zomato
Nykaa
PolicyBazaar
OYO
Ola
Paytm
Swiggy
BYJU’S
FirstCry
Lenskart
Freshworks
Moglix
Nykaa
Swiggy
Pine Labs
BlackBuck
Which is India’s first unicorn startup?
InMobi, a Bangalore-based multinational mobile advertising technology company, founded in 2007 is the first to enter the unicorn club. InMobi became the first unicorn in 2011.
Is Nykaa a unicorn?
Nykaa entered the unicorn club in 2020.
Which country has the most unicorns?
The United States is at the top of the list with over 650 unicorns as of August 2023.
What is the obsession with unicorn startups?
Unicorn startups boast of their valuation, which has crossed the $1 billion mark, and are always at the edge of their gameplay. The companies grouped in as unicorns are forever in competition with each other, and always stand as inspirational figures for the rest of the startups and other budding companies.
How many companies turn unicorns?
Though startups are everywhere now around us, as per the recently conducted surveys, 9 out of every 10 startups fail. Therefore, being a successful startup and turning it into a unicorn is always difficult for startups. AngelList says that a venture-backed seed-stage startup has a 1 in 40 shot, which is equivalent to a 2.5% chance of achieving unicorn status today.
Is Zerodha a unicorn?
Yes, Zerodha entered the unicorn club in 2020 with a valuation of about $1 billion.
Which Indian startups became unicorns in 2020?
Pine Labs
FirstCry
Nykaa
Unacademy
Zerodha
Razorpay
Postman
Cars24
Dailyhunt
Glance, InMobi, and more.
Which Indian startups became unicorns in 2021?
BrowserStack
Moglix
PharmEasy
CRED
Meesho
Urban Company
Digit Insurance
Groww
Gupshup
Chargebee
Zeta
Infra.Market
Innovaccer
Five Star Business Finance
Licious
Vedantu and more.
How many startups turned unicorns in India in 2024?
As of September 2024, six startups turned unicorns including Krutrim, Perfios, Porter, Rapido, Ather Energy, and Moneyview.
What are the Indian companies that turned unicorns in 2022?
The Indian companies that turned unicorns in 2022 are:
Unbeknownst, the falling Indian currency 78 INR mark rate against the US dollar for the first time helped Indian marketers, that is, somehow created a smooth way to one step ahead in achieving the fifth-largest economy in India.
As we know to excel in the business challenges, startups must take necessary actions in evolving tech, a shift in consumer preferences by adopting new product strategies, and frame objectives according to economic policies.
Some Indian unicorns overcame the following challenges as they introduced indulgent, efficient, and customer-centric products. In this regard, India ranks as the third largest unicorn-producing country in the world, with 106 unicorns competing against the USA and China.
Indian Cities With Their Unicorn Count: A Total of 106 Unicorns
According to IMF sources, India has surpassed the UK in the final three months of 2021 to become the world’s 5th largest economy, following the USA, China, Japan, and Germany in 2022.
Known for being the key pillar of the Indian economy, India’s startup ecosystem is a kick start to GDP growth, whereby the country achieved the milestone of 100 unicorns in May 2022.
The above graph shows the countries with the maximum number of unicorns (2022) as per the data shown by Google
Bangalore
We immediately conjure up an image of the country’s IT hub whenever we hear “Bangalore”, don’t we? Bangalore, as we all know, is a happening city in India with many tech-based companies and growing career opportunities. Bangalore is home to 43 unicorns out of 106 in India.
The city has a nurturing ecosystem that is known for its IT sector and ability to build top tech brands. By leveraging talented fellows, adopting cutting-edge technology, connecting with opulent inventors, and collaborating with multinational R&D centers.
Thereby, established top-most brands in achieving the $1 Billion mark within a short span and ultimately contributed 37% of unicorns of the nation in terms of leading sectors as Fintech 20% and SaaS 12% contribution of unicorns. Bangalore has earned the title of the top city in India for producing unicorns across industries like e-commerce, logistics, and ed-tech.
In no doubt, Mumbai has earned the deserving title of ‘the city of dreams, a place where many entrepreneurs have started their careers. As is the case, Mumbai is the richest city in the country with a homeland of 72 billionaires living and contributing $310 Billion toward the GDP of the country.
It accounts for more than 70% of unicorns in Delhi, as they are based in the Gurgaon region. The city has opened various portals for opportunities. Second-largest information technology hub and third-largest financial hub in India, Gurgaon is home to a slew of multinational corporations.
Since it houses top IT companies and fortune 500 companies, the city has been nicknamed ‘Cyber city’. With 13% of the total unicorn percentage in India, Gurgaon stands third in unicorn production.
Startup Name
Industry
Founding Year
Unicorn Entry Year
Oxyzo
Fintech
2016
2022
Mamaearth
E-commerce Personal Care
2016
2021
Spinny
Automotive
2015
2021
Mobikwik
Fintech
2009
2021
OfBusiness
Building Materials
2015
2021
Droom
Marketplace- Automotives
2014
2021
BlinKit
E-commerce- Groceries
2013
2021
Urban Company
Home Services
2014
2021
CARS24
B2C E-commerce
2015
2020
OYO
Hospitality
2013
2018
Rivigo
Logistics
2014
2019
PolicyBazaar
Insurance company
2008
2018
Zomato
Foodtech
2008
2015
Tata 1mg
HealthTech
2015
2022
MakeMyTrip
Online Travel
2000
2010
ReNew Power
Renewable Energy
2011
2017
Pristyn Care
Healthtech
2018
2021
New Delhi
New Delhi is not only the capital of India but lately, reformed into a new startup capital of India. Moreover, India will become the 3rd biggest economy in the world in 2022, and Delhi has become a hotspot for several startups and unicorns around India as well.
Gurgaon and Noida are the most prominent hotspots. Delhi is now home to 10 unicorns, with an estimation of roughly 1 billion dollars. And as of 2022, Delhi-NCR has a market worth 46 to 56 million dollars. Moreover, Delhi is reported to have the most Indian unicorns in a short span, and its startup ecosystem is growing exponentially.
Approximately 12,000 startups, 30 unicorns, and a cumulative valuation of about $150 billion could be based in Delhi-NCR by 2025, making it one of the top 5 global startup hubs. Delhi NCR contributes roughly 6.6% to the Indian unicorns.
Startup Name
Industry
Founding Year
Unicorn Entry Year
BharatPe
Fintech Payments
2018
2021
Delhivery
E-commerce Logistics Services
2011
2019
Lenskart
E-commerce- Eyewear
2010
2019
ShipRocket
eCommerce shipping
2017
2022
GlobalBees
E-commerce Retail
2021
2021
Pune
One fine feature in unicorns at Pune is women leading the start-up culture. Pune has 3200 Startups, on the other hand, Mumbai has 3274 Startups, which may compete against each other in the future in a healthy way.
Moreover, the Sci-Tech Park (established by the Ministry of Science and Technology, Government of India, and the University of Pune in 1986) alone has 153 startups.
As a result of Pune’s exceptional position to support start-ups and its proximity to industry, IT, and the best academic institutions, international collaboration among start-ups has increased over the past few years. Pune’s contribution to unicorns is approximately 5.7% as of a recent survey.
Startup Name
Industry
Founding Year
Unicorn Entry Year
ElasticRun
E-commerce Logistics
2015
2022
XpressBees Logistics
E-commerce Logistics
2015
2022
FirstCry
E-commerce
2010
2020
Icertis
Saas- Contract Management
2009
2019
Druva Software
Saas- Data Management
2008
2019
OneCard
Fintech
2018
2022
MindTickle
Saas- Enterprise Software
2011
2021
Chennai
Since Chennai city has failed to invest enough in startups in the last ten years, speed has finally picked up now, with a new administration in place. In a recent study, Tamil Nadu has a well-rounded business ecosystem spanning sectors, particularly in the industrialization sector.
However, compared to Bangalore, Mumbai, and Delhi, it still struggles to fit in. Moreover, several experts are believed to turn Chennai from Tamil Nadu into i-Tamil Nadu Technology, a hub for technology and a better startup ecosystem. Chennai as well pitches in 6.7% of the Indian unicorn sectors to the economy.
Startup Name
Industry
Founding Year
Unicorn Entry Year
Five Star Business Finance
Financial Services
1984
2021
Uniphore Software Systems
SaaS- Conversational Automation
2008
2022
CredAvenue/ Yubi
Fintech
2017
2022
ChargeBee
Financial Services
2011
2021
Freshworks
SaaS – CRM
2010
2018
The above graph shows the aggregate value of Indian Unicorns in Billion US Dollars as per the source Iron Pillar India Tech Trends Volume IV Report
Noida
In addition to Delhi, Noida has also bagged the title of a prosperous startup hub. The city is now a gateway for various global corporations. The city might be from Uttar Pradesh but emerged just like Delhi NCR when it comes to an industrial and manufacturing hub.
Noida has wide roads, and expressways in addition to greeneries, and for this reason, Noida is at present an up-and-coming city with an impressive startup ecosystem.
Moreover, it is near the Industrial Development Authority, Delhi, which makes good connectivity to the capital city, access to profitable talent, and cost-effective operations. Meanwhile, Noida extends 3.8% of the Indian unicorn sector’s income to the economy.
Startup Name
Industry
Founding Year
Unicorn Entry Year
Moglix
B2B E-commerce
2015
2021
PhysicsWallah
Edtech
2016
2022
Pine Labs
Fintech
1998
2020
Paytm
E-commerce Finance
2010
2015
Paytm Mall
E-commerce
2017
2018
Hyderabad
When there is a discussion about startup cities, Hyderabad also needs to be mentioned. Even though not many of the startups have turned into unicorns here, the number of budding startups here is quite high.
In the span of 3 years, from 2019 to 2021, approximately 933 startups were created here. It is not wrong to estimate that some of the smartest startups have been based in Hyderabad. And when it comes to unicorn startups, Hyderabad is home to 3 unicorns in India.
Startup Name
Industry
Founding Year
Unicorn Entry Year
Darwinbox
SaaS- HR
2015
2022
Highradius
Fintech
2006
2020
Zenoti
Saas- Spa and Salon Services
2010
2020
The above graph shows the percentage of Indian Unicorns based on the different geography as per Iron Pillar India Tech Trends Volume IV Report
Goa
Goa is highly acknowledged for its natural component. However, the government there is keen on making it a startup destination across India. Undoubtedly, Goa is home to many small and large startup businesses. Apart from that, Goa is also home to health based unicorn startup named Molbio Diagnostic.
Startup Name
Industry
Founding Year
Unicorn Entry Year
Molbio Diagnostic
HealthTech
2010
2022
Jaipur
The Pink city of India also provides a suitable culture for numerous startups to grow in it. The Ecosystem of Jaipur Startups is ranked at 7th position in India and 212th position globally. Jaipur is now home to one Indian Unicorn company and has many more coming in the future.
Startup Name
Industry
Founding Year
Unicorn Entry Year
CarDekho
E-commerce Automotives
2007
2021
Conclusion
On the whole, India has over 106 unicorns, all segregated in cities like Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai, Gurgaon, Noida, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Goa, and Mumbai. So far, India has globally earned recognition for its unicorns, and this may be one of the reasons why India is ranked third in the world economy.
FAQs
Which Indian state has the most unicorns?
Karnataka is home to the maximum number of unicorns.
Which city has the most unicorns?
Bengaluru has the most number of unicorns.
Which country has the most unicorns?
The United States has the highest number of unicorns in the world with a tally of 865 unicorns followed by China with an account of 224 unicorns.
Which is India’s 100th unicorn?
The 100th unicorn of India is a neo-banking platform named “Open”.
Mr. Amit Ratanpal is an alumnus of Harvard Business School with over 20 years of experience across private equity, capital markets, asset management, and investment banking with large organizations like Birla Sun Life and ICICI Group. He has also set up various domestic and global funds, through which he invested and managed ~INR 300 Cr with multiple successful exits. Leveraging his experience and strengths, he co-founded BLinC with his partner RK Rangan, to support entrepreneurs and invest in EdTech and FinTech sectors in India.
Here is an excerpt of the interview withMr. Amit Ratanpal, Founder & MD, BLinC Invest on Indian Startup Ecosystem.
How was the year 2021 for you as an investor/VC?
It was definitely a high-momentum period as private investments touched new peaks and multiple unicorns emerged throughout the year from all sectors. 2021 was a milestone year for BLinC – we had successful exits, launched our INR 100 Cr BLinC Fund II, and also made our first investment from the Fund in an InsurTech company named Vital.
How often do you bet on the entrepreneurs and not on the ideas? And when/if you do that, what quality of the entrepreneur usually makes you do that?
As an investor, I always strive to find the perfect balance between the quality of the promoter and the scalability of the business idea. We at BLinC work very closely with the promoters of our portfolio company, and hence, alignment with the promoters plays a key role in our investment decisions. It is always great to work with experienced and honest entrepreneurs who are good at business execution, organization development, and fundraising.
What is a warning sign for you when investing in a startup?
I prefer investing in startups whose key management team is execution-focused and takes a hands-on approach to the business. Another red flag is when promoters do not have a clear understanding of what problem they are trying to solve for their customers and how significant it is.
What are some common biases you find in the Indian Startup ecosystem?
One of the most common biases in the Indian startup ecosystem is “growth over profitability”. Businesses today adopt a high-burn-high-growth strategy without focusing on profitability. However, high growth does not necessarily lead to profitable unit economics. On the other hand, there is a general bias towards funding entrepreneurs coming from top-tier educational institutions.
What are your views on the SharkTankIndia Episodes until now?
I believe the show will surely motivate all the aspiring entrepreneurs, which will further amplify the existing entrepreneurship wave in the country.
We are seeing many startups exiting with IPO, what’s your opinion on that? How is it going to change the ecosystem?
Exits, especially through IPOs, are a great sign of success for both entrepreneurs and investors. IPO exits also generate a good amount of liquidity for the investors, who can further invest in other startups in the ecosystem, thereby, improving the liquidity in the market. I believe this phenomenon is only going more prominent over the coming years. On the other hand, the increasing number of IPOs also serves to indicate the maturity of the investors in the market, especially with regards to the acceptance of new-age business models that are yet to turn profitable.
More than 42 unicorns in 2021. What do you think caused this wave? Is the valuation justified according to you?
It is the changing consumer mindset that has enabled these Unicorns to grow. Today’s consumer prefers convenience, is very open to try new products, and is less risk-averse than the consumer of the previous decade. Most of the unicorns have tapped into this changing consumer mindset to identify and solve unique problems for their customers. For example, Licious has completely changed the way consumers order meat. I believe the valuations are steep, and there is a bubble. However, like everything, good businesses always come at a higher price.
How can we support/enable entrepreneurs in tier2 and tier 3 cities?
Entrepreneurs in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities suffer from lack of access to quality resources. One of the most effective ways to fill this gap is to set up incubation centers in these regions in partnership with colleges, to provide access to top quality mentorship and industry experts.
What do you look forward to as an investor in the year 2022?
Budget 2022 has focused significantly on leveraging technology to penetrate deeper into the Tier-2 and lower cities in India. I expect technology-led businesses to gain significant market traction and attention from the investor community, giving rise to new unicorns in 2022. At BLinC, we are looking forward to deploying our Fund across various whitespaces identified through our internal research.
What are a few sectors you think would be hot in the upcoming year?
Education and Financial Services sectors have been very resilient through the pandemic. Companies in these sectors have a large potential to leverage technology to drive deeper penetration, and I expect these sectors to continue growing at an accelerated rate in the upcoming year.
One learning that you would like to share with founders who are looking to raise funds?
It is all about execution, prioritization, and defining the short-term and the long-term focus. Early-stage startups should have a detailed understanding of their target market, competitive landscape, and the target customers. It is critical to think from the customer’s perspective and solve at least one real pain point of the customers. It is important to consistently prioritize and make efforts to achieve the product development milestones and the targets of the business plan. While pitching to the investors, it is important to give comfort to the investors around your market understanding and your execution capabilities.
Ever heard of a unicorn? If you are imagining the beautiful mythical creature then you are wrong! Today’s generation has a different understanding of unicorns, thanks to Mr Aileen Lee, who popularized the term in 2013. So, what exactly is a unicorn? It is a private startup company that has a valuation of over $1 billion.
What is more shocking is that there are more than 900 unicorns across the world as recorded till December 2021. It makes you think the world is rich, isn’t it? Some of the former popular unicorns around the world are Facebook, Google, and Airbnb. Did it ring a bell? Well, it should! These unicorns later went on to become some of the largest companies in the world. We are here to look into the unicorns that are currently ruling the US.
Given below is a list of the top unicorns in the United States. We have curated a list of the best startup companies that have made a mark in the US market in a very short period.
SpaceX or Space Exploration Technologies Corp. was founded in 2002 by Elon Musk. Its headquarters are in Hawthorne, California. Musk founded SpaceX with the aim to reduce space transportation costs and to conduct the colonization of the planet Mars. The company has developed a liquid propellent rocket, a spacecraft, and an orbital rocket among its many products. It is on the verge of creating a mega constellation named Starlink for providing commercial internet services.
2. Stripe
Country- United States
Valuation- $95 billion
Unicorn Entry- 2014
Stripe Logo
Stripe is a financial services company that is headquartered in San Francisco. However, it also has another headquarter in Dublin, Ireland. Stripe usually works with e-commerce websites and mobile applications. One of its major achievements includes the introduction of Radar, an anti-fraud tool to block fraud transactions.
3. Epic Games
Country- United States
Valuation- $42 billion
Unicorn Entry- 2018
Epic Games Logo
Epic Games is a popular video game and software development company is headquartered in Cary, California. This unicorn was founded by Tim Sweeney in 1991. It was earlier named Potomac Computer Systems. Its first commercial video game release was ZZT in 1991. It is mostly known for developing the commercially available game engine, Unreal Engine. It is also used to power internally developed video games.
4. Instacart
Country- United States
Valuation- $39 billion
Unicorn Entry- 2014
Instacart Logo
This popular retail company operates both in the US and Canada. Instacart operates a grocery delivery service and a pickup service in both countries. The company’s services are offered through its web and mobile app.
5. Databricks
Country- United States
Valuation- $38 billion
Unicorn Entry- 2019
Databricks Logo
Databricks is a popular software company that was founded in 2013. The creators of Apache Spark created this unicorn with the aim of creating multiple open-source projects. Most of them spin around data science, data engineering, and machine learning. It mostly develops and sells cloud data platforms.
This financial technology company provides free mobile banking services owned and provided by Central National Bank or The Bankcorp Bank. It issues Visa debit cards to the account holders and they also get access to the online banking system. The company earns a majority of its revenue through the collection of interchange fees.
7. Fanatics
Country- United States
Valuation- $18 billion
Unicorn Entry- 2012
Fanatics logo
This popular American retailer unicorn, Fanatics was developed in 1995 and is headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida. It mostly deals with sports merchandise, equipment, and sportswear. Founded by Alan Trager, Fanatics proudly boasts of having connections with over 1080 product vendors and companies like Majestic, Adidas, Reebok, Nike, and more.
8. Gopuff
Country- United States
Valuation- $15 billion
Unicorn Entry- 2020
Gopuff Logo
This food delivery company operates not only in the US but also in England. Its headquarters are currently in Philadelphia. The unicorn boasts of operating in over 650 cities in the US. You will also be shocked to know that the company’s worth as of 2021 is $15 billion. It makes for a huge amount, isn’t it?
9. Plaid Technologies
Valuation- $13.4 billion
Unicorn Entry- 2018
Plaid Technologies Logo
This is also a fintech startup that is headquartered in San Francisco, California. It is responsible for building a data transfer network that is known to power Fintech and other digital finance products. The company also hosts a technology platform that enables the applications to connect with the bank accounts of the users. Apart from the US, Plaid Technologies also operates in the UK, Canada, Spain, France, Ireland, and the Netherlands.
10. Grammarly
Valuation- $13 billion
Unicorn Entry- 2019
Grammarly Logo
Who doesn’t know Grammarly? This popular cloud-based writing assistant has helped millions of users around the world correct their grammar and tone. It uses a special AI method to identify mistakes and search for an alternative for those words in the platform. It was initially released in 2009 and remains one of the most popular writing assistants in today’s world. Right from reviewing spellings, punctuation, grammar, engagement, and clarity, it looks for everything in content.
It is another popular eCommerce platform based out of the US. Users can shop from over 40,o00 independent brands through Faire’s website. It acts as a wholesale marketplace for both brands and retailers. It mostly helps the retailers find and buy unique merchandise as per their demands or requirements.
12. Brex
Valuation- $12.3 billion
Unicorn Entry- 2018
Brex Logo
This technology company deals in financial services and is headquartered in San Francisco, California. It not only offers cash management accounts but also business credit cards to other technology companies who require them. The cards offered by Brex are business charge cards and are issued by the Emigrant Bank.
13. JUUL Labs
Valuation- $12 billion
Unicorn Entry- 2017
Juul Labs Logo
It is an electronic cigarette company that was carved out of Pax Labs a few years ago in 2017. The electronic cigarette made by JUUL labs atomizes the nicotine salts that are derived from tobacco. Moreover, one-time-use cartridges are used to provide the products for the same. This popular company headquarters is in San Francisco. If you are not aware, JUUL even became the most popular e-cigarette in the US back in 2017.
Conclusion
With the advent of growing competition in the market, unicorns are striving hard and leaving no stone unturned to remain in the field. This is happening in every part of the world and the US seems to be leading the way here. Multiple unicorns have already reached heights of success while a few others have just entered the market. Only time will tell what lies in the fate of these non-mythical, real unicorns that are currently running for success and fame.
FAQ
How many unicorns are there in the United States?
There are approximately 487 Unicorns in the USA.
Which city has the most unicorns in the United States?
San Francisco has the most unicorns with a total count of 203 unicorns.
How many unicorns are there in the world?
As of January 2022, there are more than 1000 unicorns in the world.
The word “startup” has become a popular buzzword in recent years. Starting a business is the first step in building a profitable business. By default, a startup is a losing business until it becomes profitable. Cockroach Startups are the best kind of startups.
Cockroach startups are startups that have a profit-making goal. Since the market is drying up and investors are becoming more aware of this, 2021 is going to be a difficult year for startups.
In the same way as cockroaches, a cockroach-like startup persists in its efforts despite changing market conditions, environments, or investment scenarios. This group of people is capable of deciding where to spend money and where not to.
One that struggles and persists in spite of shifting market conditions and investment scenarios is called a “cockroach” startup. When it comes down to it, they’re the ones who have the knowledge and experience to know where to spend their money and where not to.
Why the name “Cockroach Startups”?
Cockroaches are disliked by most people. With good reason, too. Cockroaches are unattractive and can spread illness. So why the bizarre name?
Research says that cockroaches have been around for 320 million years, long before dinosaurs. In addition, cockroaches are endowed with the following traits:
The ability to survive on anything is unquestionable.
You might think of fruit or leather or paper or skin flakes or hair or dead insects or even soiled clothing when you think of these materials:
The growth of cockroaches is astronomical.
Only dies from lack of water after surviving a week without its head. Without food, they can last a month.
Expected to survive a nuclear detonation.
Let’s look at the similarities between cockroaches and cockroach startups. Cockroach Startups are characterized by the following characteristics:
Companies with a low salary and expense budget. In order to continue living, one must overcome obstacles.
The growth that is explosive.
In the absence of venture capital, long-term planning is impossible.
Constantly adapts to changing markets
Possibility of becoming cash-flow positive quickly
By having a real product or service, you can survive a nuclear war in business. The norm is to have a rock-solid revenue model and paying customers.
Cockroach startups are those that have a profit-making goal. Follow these 7 tips and techniques to create profitable cockroach startups.
1) You should limit the amount of money you spend on fixed assets
We made it a rule early on that anyone hired had to bring their own laptop to work. We were able to save a lot of money thanks to it. So, if you have 20 employees, you’ll be spending around Rs 7,00,000 on laptops. Based on usage, you’ll need to replace it at least every two years. Laptops will cost you approximately Rs 3,000,000 per year.
Alternatively, you could use that money to hire a valuable employee!
2) Charge money from the very beginning
Whatever you decide to make, you should start charging money from the very beginning. If you make your product free and a lot of people use it, you can worry about monetizing it later, according to a widely held belief. This is a problem for a lot of businesses. Your product’s true value cannot be tested when it’s free. As a user, you are more likely to accept a free offer because you have nothing to lose. A $1.99 item has now become a liability. No one is going to pay for a product if they don’t value it.
3) Non-technical founders should become more technical
Build it yourself if it’s something that’s really important to you! As a tech startup, your business relies heavily on technology to function effectively. It is your ability to improve and optimize the product that gives you a competitive edge. Many potential improvements are lost without a certain level of technical knowledge. If your business involves food, you must have a solid understanding of the subject. When it comes to technology, you’d better know a little bit about it.
4) Sell your vision and enthusiasm to potential employees, not just a higher salary to lure them in
A higher salary would not have attracted the best talent, despite the fact that it was an option. As a matter of fact, you should actually sell on our vision. Tell them that they’ll learn a lot if they come to work for your company.
People who were only here for the money were automatically filtered out, and dedicated people stayed.
5) Check to see if your business plan will generate revenue before you commit to it
It’s the same thing when you’re starting a coffee shop. As a business owner, your goal is to create a profitable entity that allows you to generate income on demand. Your business’s ultimate goal is to generate revenue. Profit is the goal of every sale you make. This is a bad business model if you lose money on every sale.
6) Don’t let money overshadow the product/service
It is impossible to ignore the importance of adding value. Great startups have always had value at their core. Startups that focus on providing excellent services or building products that people want to use are perfect examples of cockroach startups.
7) Time is more important than money
It has been said that Time is more valuable than money. Not to die, but to survive, to earn money, and to earn enough money to pay the bills is the goal of cockroach startups. In the next three years, a cockroach startup does not expect to be a big hit. They want to learn how to build businesses that will last for 10, 50, or 100 years instead of just a few short years. It takes a lot of learning to launch a new business venture. Learn new skills every day, from how to make minor improvements to understanding customer needs. Experiments should be used to measure profit growth if you’re already making money. Learning should be a priority for entrepreneurs. For more learning, simply increase the number of experiments when time is limited.
FAQs
What is a Cockroach company?
A cockroach startup is the one that keeps growing slowly in the forward direction just like a cockroach without being much affected by the changes in the market.
Is there difference between Cockroach startup and Unicorns?
Yes, Unicorn startups are the companies with valuation of more than $1 billion, whereas Cockroach startup believes in sustainable growth rather than valuation.
Are Cockroach startup or business less risky?
Yes, Cockroach startup are considered less risky as it emphasises on cost control.
Purbalee Dutta
Sarika Anand
