Healthquad Closes 2nd Fund At $162 Mn; Wiz Freight Sets Sail With $36 Mn In Series A; Agrostar Acquires Fruit Exporter Ini Farms; Delhivery Partners With Ajio & Google Cuts Racy Results By 30%

Here are the top headlines from the startup space.

FUNDING NEWS

Healthcare VC HealthQuad closes second fund at $162 mn

HealthQuad, a healthcare venture capital fund, has marked the final close of its second fund at $162 million. As per the firm, this is more than twice than its target size at launch.

Global biopharmaceutical MSD led the commitments from a pool of global financial investors, strategic institutions in pharma and healthcare, development financial institutions (DFI), funds of funds and large European conglomerates.

The firm, which counts Medikabazaar, Ekincare, Healthifyme and Qure.ai in its portfolio of invested companies, from its HealthQuad Fund-II will be investing in 10 to 15 young private companies across high-growth segments of the healthcare sector in India. The fund has already deployed $60 million across companies till date.

“The close of our second fund marks a significant step for HealthQuad as we continue to invest in one of the world’s most promising healthcare markets. India’s healthcare industry is compounding at ~20 percent growth rate and is likely to be a $372 billion industry by end of this year. The new-age innovative models are fuelling the rise of the Indian health-tech market which is growing at 25 percent annually and is poised to reach $21 billion by 2025,” said Charles-Antoine Janssen, Co-founder and Chief Investment Officer of HealthQuad.

Wiz Freight sets sail with $36 mn in Series A funding led by Tiger Global

Wiz Freight, a cross-border supply chain platform, has raised $36 million (Rs 275 crore) in the largest Series A funding round for a logistics startup in India.

The round, which is a mix of equity and debt, was led by Tiger Global with participation from Axilor Ventures, Foundamental, Arali Ventures, Stride Ventures and Alteria Capital.

With fresh capital, the company plans to accelerate its global expansion by launching operations in 15 countries across Southeast Asia, Middle East and Africa with Singapore and Dubai as headquarters by the end of 2022.

General Catalyst leads $13M Series A round in OneCode

OneCode, a platform to digitise the sales ecosystem, has raised $13 million in a Series A funding led by General Catalyst. Existing investors Sequoia Capital India’s Surge, Nexus Venture Partners, and Waterbridge Ventures also participated in the round.

The round also witnessed participation from angel investors like Vidit and Sanjeev from Meesho, Madhusudhan from M2P, Vikas Choudhary (President-Reliance Jio), DSP Family Office, and Reddy Futures Fund.

OneCode will use this capital to invest in hiring across functions and accelerate the product and tech development. The company will be expanding its presence to 100 additional cities and will increase the size of its agent network by 500 percent by 2025, it said in a statement.

“Trust deficit is the biggest problem in fintech adoption in India,” says Manish Shara, CEO, and Co-founder. “People are less trusting of traditional acquisition channels like websites and apps. This is exactly what we are solving. Our distribution network of trusted agents offers the much-needed assurance to customers as people rely heavily on their networks for recommendations, especially when it comes to critical financial services.”

The company claims to have seen 40x growth in agent base and generated more than 100cr in earnings for the agents since it was incepted.

Investors back InstaPreps by 7Classes

InstaPreps by 7Classes, a diagnosis-based AI edtech platform, has raised an undisclosed funding in a seed round from heads of a few global universities, CXOs and top executives at the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship.

The startup plans to utilise the funds to expand its app InstaPreps, ramp up its marketing activities, enhance its technology and add new features to current approach towards education, it said in a statement.

Currently, the firm has its downloads in 2500+ cities across the globe from India, UAE, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Philippines, Myanmar, Africa, United States, Iraq and Iran.

OTHER STARTUP NEWS

AgroStar acquires fruit exporter INI Farms in cash-and-stock deal

AgroStar, a digital farmer network and agri-inputs platform, has acquired INI Farms, an exporter of fruit and vegetable crops like bananas and pomegranates from India, for an undisclosed sum.

Though this 100 percent acquisition in a cash-and-stock deal, AgroStar will provide market linkage solutions for the domestic and export markets to its large network of farmers. In addition, INI Farms’ customer base of global retailers will get access to a wider basket of F&V products.

This acquisition provides a scaled presence to AgroStar in the $300 billion+ agri output market, the firm said in a statement.

“AgroStar partnership provides us with a great opportunity to grow multi-fold with expansion into the entire agriculture output business and leveraging our strong supply chain capabilities,” said Pankaj Khandelwal, Chairman and Managing Director, INI Farms.

In December 2021, AgroStar raised $70 million in its Series D funding round from Evolvence, global asset manager Schroders Capital, Hero Enterprise, and UK’s development finance institution CDC, among other investors.

Microsoft launches Founders Hub platform to empower startups in India

Tech giant Microsoft has launched its ‘Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub’ in India — a platform that will support founders here at every stage of their startup journey, with access to over $300,000 in benefits including technology and tools from the tech giant and partners.

‘Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub’ is a new digital and inclusive platform for startup founders in India, the company said.

Announcing the initiative at a virtual briefing, the company said that the platform offers over $300,000 worth of benefits and credits, giving startups free access to the technology, tools, and resources they need to build and run their business.

Startups will also be able to gain mentorship and skilling opportunities with industry experts and Microsoft Learn.

Sangeeta Bavi, Director (Startup Ecosystem) at Microsoft India, observed that disruptive innovation in Indian startups is accelerating the country’s position to become one of the leading startups hubs of the world.

“Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub was created following extensive research and conversations with hundreds of founders who explicitly shared their need for access to a digital ecosystem that promotes opportunities and democratises innovation regardless of background, location, progress, or passions. We look forward to how our new offering will support more founders in Asia and provide access to the technology, and resources they need to build and run their business,” Bavi said.

Beyond access to technology, Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub aims to empower entrepreneurs to innovate and grow by connecting them with mentors who will provide them with industry, business, and technical support to guide them through their next business milestones.

IPO-bound Delhivery partners with Ajio to improve customer experience

IPO-bound logistics and supply chain startup Delhivery has partnered with Reliance-owned fashion and apparel marketplace Ajio to improve customer experience.

Under this partnership, Delhivery will launch a technology-based Quality Check Return Product (QC-RVP). The QC-RVP product enables Delhivery’s roughly 26,000 Last-Mile agents to perform stringent quality checks at the customer’s doorstep before returning the shipment to Ajio, the firm said in a statement.

It has successfully increased the re-saleablility of returned goods from 25 percent to 98 percent — boosting margins and reducing waste for Ajio. Additionally, it shortened the process of refund remittance to 24 hours from 8 days for the client, increasing customer stickiness and satisfaction, Delhivery added.

Through QC-RVP, Delhivery offers customers the option to customize their doorstep quality check process from a checklist of over 20 parameters. For Ajio these include image test, brand, quantity, color, and EAN among others.

“We have a long-standing partnership with Ajio as its logistics partner and are delighted to work with them to enhance the quality of their supply chain process. Our QC-RVP solution has resulted in a 130 percent jump in Ajio’s NPS (Net Promoter Score),” said Ajith Pai, COO, Delhivery.

Evenflow’s portfolio brand Rusabl grows 3x within a quarter

E-commerce aggregator Evenflow has announced that Rusabl, a sustainable brand in personal care, and home and kitchen that it acquired last year, has witnessed a three-fold jump in its sales in first quarter post its acquisition.

Rusabl was Evenflow’s second acquisition and the vision for the brand is to make it India’s most affordable sustainables brand cutting across the consumer lifecycle in home and kitchen, travel and essentials.

As per the firm, Kitchen alone is a Rs 10,000 crore market only in e-commerce and Rusabl is looking to ride that wave aggressively. The firm is now targeting to be a Rs 50 crore brand over the next 36 months.

“The way the brand is scaling gives us confidence to have extremely ambitious growth targets for it across platforms. We’ve managed to scale the brand keeping it profitable at 12 percent EBITDA, which in itself feels like a feat. We are targeting an 8x growth by March 2023 and are certain to achieve it.” says Utsav Agarwal, Co-founder and CEO, Evenflow.

BNPL platform Simpl launches ‘Pay-in-3’ feature

Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) platform Simpl has launched Pay-in-3 option to allow consumers to split their bills in three instalments.

‘Pay-in-3’ comes with a host of value-added features that enable spend management while combining transparency, speed, ease of use, and best of all, a smooth payment experience, the firm said in a statement.

“With Pay-in-3, consumers can conveniently split their current payments into 3 tranches, at no extra charges. We believe this option will help strengthen the trust factor between merchants and their end customers, enabled by intelligent machine learning decisioning at the backend,” said Nitya Sharma, Co-Founder & CEO, Simpl.

This facility is made available with several merchants, including Healthkart, Beast Nutrition, Villain, Paaduks, Pawfectlymade, Urbancart, Crossbeats, Flatheads, Athletive, Auravedic, Superkicks, Tupperware, Bums on the Saddle, Bluetokai Coffee, Headphone Zone and Zlade.

Agritech startup Samunnati looks to add 20 percent more talent in 2022

Samunnati, an agri-value chain enable has announced its plans to strengthen leadership and talent in 2022. This is in alignment with the startup’s plan of doubling down on its offerings across the agri value chain to impact 1 in every 4 farming households by 2027.

Samunnati at present has over 611 employees, out of which 25% are women and intends to bolster it further by adding 20% more talent in 2022 with close to 100 open positions across functions, it said in a statement.

The company said its growth has been on a strong upward trajectory over the last 18 months and it has clocked a Rs 10,000 crore Gross Transactional Value mark across its agri commerce and agri finance business.

One Moto India opens first Experience Hub in Hyderabad

EV brand One Moto India has announced the launch of its first experience hub in Hyderabad, Telangana.

The experience hub by the brand is aimed at allowing customers to experience the products, technology, and encompasses more knowledge on the aggressively progressing EV lifestyle. The hub will be managed by MCube Automotives, the firm said in a statement.

The Experience Hub will have dedicated zones to aesthetically exhibit the technology, products, and components. Additionally, the digitally enabled hub will also have the provision to innovatively present the rich history of the brand through interactive digital centre.

Avaya and ALE enter into strategic partnership to accelerate customers’ transformation to Cloud

Avaya, a solutions provider to enhance and simplify communications and collaboration has partnered with Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise, an international provider of communications, networking and cloud solutions.

Through this strategic partnership, the firm aims to extend the availability of Avaya’s OneCloud CCaaS composable solutions to ALE’s global base of customers while also making ALE’s digital networking solutions available on a global basis to Avaya customers.

Avaya will also offer ALE Digital Age Networking solutions to its customers, covering the full spectrum of enterprise wired and wireless connectivity technologies with advanced cloud platform services, leveraging the latest in IoT analytics, digital workflow, secure mobility, AI for network automation, it said in a statement.

Construction management firm Powerplay registers 40X Y-o-Y growth

Powerplay, an end-to-end construction management application, has seen 40x growth in its active businesses and a 100x growth in OS businesses in 2021.

As per the firm, the average time spent on its app by each user of an active business amounts to 26 minutes per day, whereas in the OS business segment, the same number is 40 minutes per day.

The firm claims to have managed one percent of the total construction of India, worth Rs 7,000 crore, materials worth Rs 1,100 crore and 250,000 labour force in a single day.

Powerplay has previously secured funding of $5.8 million from Accel Partners, Sequoia Surge and India Quotient. By the end of 2022, the company aims to reach 1 million active construction businesses globally.

Mivi forays into home audio segment with soundbars

Homegrown consumer tech startup Mivi has forayed into the home audio products category with two soundbars — a 2.2 channel 60W and a 100W soundbar — which will be priced under Rs 5,000 at launch.

As per the firm, the soundbars are designed taking the Indian consumers preferences and needs into consideration and are built with a bass-heavy profile.

“We are thrilled to expand our product line with the upcoming soundbars, which will entirely be manufactured in our Hyderabad manufacturing plant. We believe that this is another step towards revolutionising the Indian consumer tech market and will be launching more such products soon,” said Midhula Devabhaktuni, Cofounder and CMO, Mivi.

Skill-Lync provides job offers to 1000+ Engineers in FY 2021-22

Edtech startup Skill-Lync has partnered with 50 corporates and provided job offers to more than 1000 Indian engineering students in FY 2021-22, it said in a statement.

Some of the key partnerships that Skill-Lync had last year include Cyient, Renault-Nissan Technology Business Center India, TATA Elxsi, Expleo, Verolt and Segula Technologies, among others.

As per the firm, through these partnerships it has offered job opportunities to young students as well as advanced professionals across various engineering domains such as mechanical, electrical, civil, computer science and electronics. Partners like Cyient & RNTBCI have also taken up upskilling programs for their employees in the domains of Electric Vehicles, Autonomous Vehicles, and Embedded Systems, the firm added.

In Q4, FY 22, Skill-Lync has enrolled students from more than 38 countries for its programs, including geographies such as U.S., UK, Germany, Australia, Canada among others.

86 percent hiring managers find it challenging to hire & retain talent: Scaler Report

As many as 88 percent of recruiters face increased challenges in hiring and retaining skilled employees across sectors. The already inflated tech recruitment market is creating new recruiting challenges due to increased opportunities and salaries, as per a report by edtech startup Scaler.

The report highlighted that 72 percent recruiters witness increasing offer declines and no-shows in this competitive landscape. While 56 percent of recruiters believe that there is a shortage of skilled and experienced candidates, 49 percent are facing the challenge of inflated salary expectations because of the inflated talent market.

Organisations across edtech, the internet, and IT offer an average increment of 50-75 percent to their employees. While 40 percent of MNCs are extending a 30-50 percent hike, 25% of MNCs have also witnessed an increment of up to or more than 100 percent, the report added.

About 83.5 percent of respondents revealed that the average time taken to fulfil open positions has increased significantly, resulting in longer recruitment cycles. The number of open positions taking more than a month to be filled has also increased by 12 percent. This increase in turn-around-time results in decreased organisational productivity, high hiring costs and increased stress on other employees.

The survey also revealed that employee referrals and LinkedIn are the most common channels, with approximately 90 percent of recruiters utilising these platforms. Job listing platforms and recruitment consultants are also prominent channels, with around 70 percent of recruiters using them.

“Over the last six months, the attrition rate at India’s IT majors has spiked dramatically to touch a range of 20-30 percent per annum. The increasing proliferation of startups and global talent competition contributes to the existing challenges. India is now home to over 91 unicorn startups, and more than $39 billion has been invested in Indian startups in 2021 alone. On the other side, MNCs are aggressively setting up capability centres in India, which are expected to hit 500 by 2025 and effectively pull in thousands of skilled professionals every year. If we fail to address this grave skill-gap issue now, the trend of high attrition rates and inflated salaries will only amplify in the coming years,” said Abhimanyu Saxena, Co-founder, Scaler and InterviewBit.

GLOBAL TECHNOLOGY & STARTUP NEWS

Google cuts racy results by 30 percent for searches like ‘Latina teenager’

When US actress Natalie Morales carried out a Google search for “Latina teen” in 2019, she described in a tweet that all she encountered was pornography. Her experience may be different now.

The Alphabet unit has cut explicit results by 30 percent over the past year in searches for “latina teenager” and others related to ethnicity, sexual preference and gender, Tulsee Doshi, head of product for Google’s responsible AI team, told Reuters.

Doshi said Google had rolled out new artificial intelligence software, known as BERT, to better interpret when someone was seeking racy results or more general ones.

Beside “latina teenager,” other queries now showing different results include “la chef lesbienne,” “college dorm room,” “latina yoga instructor” and “lesbienne bus,” according to Google.

“It’s all been a set of over-sexualized results,” Doshi said, adding that those historically suggestive search results were potentially shocking to many users.

The search giant has spent years addressing feedback about offensive content in its advertising tools and in results from searches for “hot” and “ceo.” It also cut sexualized results for “Black girls” after a 2013 journal article by author Safiya Noble raised concerns about the harmful representations.

Google added that in the coming weeks it would use AI called MUM to begin better detecting of when to show support resources related to suicide, domestic violence, sexual assault and substance abuse.

Amazon gets rare ‘underperform’ rating on risks from higher expenses, inflation

Amazon has received a rare “underperform” rating from BNP Paribas Exane, with the French brokerage saying the e-commerce giant faces a bumpy ride ahead due to surging inflation and higher expenses.

Analyst Stefan Slowinski said investments during the COVID-19 pandemic to build fulfillment centers for faster deliveries and employee bonuses to keep its warehouses staffed in a tight US labor market may eat into the company’s margins.

He added that capital expenditure could grow in the mid-teens, initiating with a price target of $2,800.

Amazon’s shares were down about 1 percent at $3,354 in early trading in a weak broader market.

Of the 58 brokerages covering Amazon, 20 rate the stock “strong buy”, 36 “buy”, one “hold” and one “sell”, according to Refinitiv data. The median price target is $4,000.

Peers in the $1 trillion and larger club, Microsoft and Alphabet, have declined 6 percent and 1.6 percent, respectively. Apple has gained 0.8 percent and Tesla has added 4 percent.

Apple mulls more memory chip suppliers, including China: Report

Apple is exploring new suppliers for memory chips used in its iPhones, including a potentially first Chinese supplier, after a key Japanese partner had an output disruption, Bloomberg News reported.

Japan-based Kioxia Holdings Corp — a key supplier of flash memory chips to Apple — had reported a contamination last month at two of its manufacturing facilities, which the company said will result in reduced production.

Apple is now testing sample NAND flash memory chips by Chinese semiconductor company Yangtze Memory Technologies Co, the report said, adding that the iPhone maker has been discussing the tie-up for months.

EU regulators look to streamline antitrust rules

Regulators are looking to update rules, which target companies abusing their market power and those setting up illegal cartels, to make them more efficient, EU antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager said.

Under the rules, known as Regulation 1/2003 and in force since 2004, the European Commission has taken on Alphabet unit Google, Apple, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft and Intel and imposed billions of euros in fines.

The rules have also allowed the EU competition enforcer to go after car parts cartels, banks’ manipulation of financial benchmarks and other illegal price-fixing groups, putting the EU agency in the forefront of antitrust enforcement, as per a Reuters report.

The Commission wants to maintain its leading position, Vestager said.

“I’m announcing today that in the coming months we are going to launch an evaluation of Regulation 1/2003, the central plank of our antitrust enforcement framework,” Vestager told a conference organised by economic consultancy CRA.

“It is important that we hear the views of stakeholders concerning what has worked well, and where there is scope for more efficient and effective procedures and enforcement tools; making sure Regulation 1 is truly ‘fit for the digital age’,” she said.

Vestager said the updated rules would seek to make them more operational and useful to businesses.

Such procedural changes would relate to requests for information sent to companies, dawn raids, oral hearings where companies seek to defend their cases and the 10% cap on fines levied for breach of rules or non-compliance.

Tech workers urge companies to join Ukraine’s digital blockade of Russia

Microsoft President Brad Smith wrote to Ukraine’s leader this month with a clear message: despite Kyiv’s calls for it to sever all ties with Russia, the US software behemoth would continue doing business in the country with non-sanctioned clients, including schools and hospitals.

“Depriving these institutions of software updates and services could put at risk the health and safety of innocent civilians, including children and the elderly,” Smith said in the previously unreported March 14 letter, seen by Reuters.

Smith told President Volodymyr Zelenskiy that Microsoft was “mindful of the moral responsibility” to protect civilians. However, he said the company was discussing with US, British and EU governments whether “to halt any ongoing services and support” in Russia and would move “in lockstep with their sanctions and other economic goals.”

Asked about the exchange, spokespeople for both Microsoft and Ukraine said a constructive dialogue was underway about actions to support the country.

The decision by some leading Western business technology makers — including Microsoft, German software multinational SAP SE and US giant International Business Machines Corp — to maintain operations or staff in Russia despite Ukraine’s appeals have angered their workers in several countries.

Small groups of employees at Microsoft, SAP and IBM have called for management to withdraw fully from Russia in the wake of its invasion of Ukraine, according to comments seen by Reuters on internal discussion forums and interviews with 18 workers familiar with the companies, who sought anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.

EV startup Faraday Future gets SEC subpoena on inaccurate statements

The US Securities and Exchange Commission has subpoenaed some members of Faraday Future Intelligent Electric management team as part of a probe into inaccurate statements made to its investors, the EV startup said.

As per Reuters, an internal review had in February identified certain inaccurate statements and the company cut the base salaries of its Chief Executive Carsten Breitfield and founder Jia Yueting, asking them to report to newly appointed Executive Chairperson Susan Swenson.

The review by a special committee formed in November, however, rejected claims made by a short-seller that called the startup “a new EV scam in town”, saying they were not supported by the evidence reviewed.

The startup said it would miss the deadline for filing its 2021 annual report due to delays caused by the internal investigation. It had previously delayed the filing of its quarterly report in November.

Separately, Faraday Future said it expects operating loss to increase to about $186 million in the quarter-ended Sept. 30, from about $18 million a year earlier, mainly due to higher expense related to a production ramp up at its Hanford, California facility.

Binance steps up hiring, activity in crypto hub Dubai

Binance, the largest crypto exchange by trading volume, is recruiting over 100 positions in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and is helping to shape Dubai’s new virtual assets’ regulations, its regional head said.

Binance’s links with the Gulf state have deepened in recent months as the UAE tries to style itself as the world’s new digital assets hub and develops regulation, Reuters reported.

“It is a very progressive framework and we are very happy to be part of that process, working very closely with the Dubai government,” said Richard Teng, Binance’s MENA head. “I wish more regulators globally adopt this approach that Dubai has – a public-private sector partnership.”

The UAE’s crypto push comes as international authorities voice growing concerns about the use of cryptocurrencies in money laundering and other crimes.

The firm is currently recruiting for more than 100 UAE positions, Teng said and LinkedIn vacancies show, after being licensed by Dubai’s new virtual assets regulator this month.

CEO Changpeng Zhao is a regular visitor to the UAE and has said he bought a home last year. The firm is also helping Dubai’s financial free-zone develop a virtual asset ecosystem.