India has approximately 26000 startups, making it the third-largest startup ecosystem in the world. The startup ecosystem in India has expanded quite rapidly, mainly through private investments, including seed, venture capital, angel, and private equity funds, with support from incubators, accelerators, and the government.
This year has been great for startups in India. Barely six months into this year, 17 startups in our country have entered the unicorn club. With their entry, the total number of Indian tech startups to join the unicorn club has reached 103. These 103 Indian unicorns have successfully raised more than $93 billion in funding and are valued at approximately $339 billion combined.
Table of Contents
17 Startups in Unicorn Club in 2022
Indian startups managed to raise $11.7 billion in 506 deals in the first quarter of the year. The funding amount was around 186%, and the deal count was 64% higher than last year.
Darwinbox
This Hyderabad-based startup was founded in 2015 by Chaitanya Peddi, Jayant Paleti, and Rohit Chennamaneni. It is a cloud-based HRtech startup that allows enterprises to automate the entire employee lifecycle on one HR platform. It caters to the firm’s HR needs across the spectrum: recruitment, onboarding, core transactions like leaves, attendance and directory, payroll, travel, people analytics, etc. This company raised $72 million in a funding round led by Technology Crossover Ventures in January 2022, making it the third Indian unicorn for this year. Existing investors like Salesforce Ventures, Lightspeed India, Endiya Partners, Sequoia India, 3one4Capital, JGDEV, and SCB 10X participated in the round. Last year, the firm raised $15 million in funding, led by Salesforce. It also raised another $15 million from Sequoia Capital in 2019 and $4 million in a Series A round in 2017. Till Date, Darwinbox has raised $107 million in funding in just over seven rounds.
This firm claims to have around 500 enterprise and large technology companies as clients in India and Southeast Asia. Clients include Tokopedia, Indorama, Zilingo, Fave, Adani, Mahindra, TVS, Kotak, the National Stock Exchange, Ujjivan Small Finance Bank, BigBasket, Swiggy, and others. The HR tech market was valued at $22.9 billion in 2020. Projected growth is #35.68 billion from #24.04 billion, at a CAGR of 5.8% during this period. Estimates say India accounted for around $3.6 billion of that market last year.
Oxyzo
This startup was born in 2016 and launched by OfBusiness founders Asish Mohapatra and Ruchi Kalra. This lending platform provides cash flow and matches working capital financing for purchasing new materials for SMEs in the manufacturing and contracting sectors. Oxyzo has $350 million in assets under management and is growing 100% annually.
Currently serving 2500 SMEs across India and disbursing loans worth Rs 4000 crore per annum, Oxyzo’s features include the facility to pay interest using credit lines, insufficient documentation, and interest rates of 18% per annum, which make it quite popular. Oxyzo is the financial arm of Of Business and has hit a billion-dollar valuation by raising one of the biggest Series A rounds. Oxyzo raised $200 million from Alpha Wave, Tiger Global, Norwest Venture Partners, Matrix Partners, and Creation Investments.
Games 24X7
This startup was founded in 2006 by Bhavin Pandya and Trivikraman Thampy. This is a gaming startup housing popular brands like RummyCircle and My11Circle. The platform claims that RummyCircle has more than 30 million registered users, adding 50000 new users daily. The cricket fantasy gaming product My11Circle has had 6 million downloads since its inception. Games24X7 is the 13th Indian unicorn of 2022 after raising $75 million in its recent funding round led by the Malabar India fund. Existing investors include US-based hedge fund Tiger Global.
The startup will receive the investment in two installments, with the first including an investment worth $32 million and the rest from the same investors. This startup’s valuation increased by 3X from $692 million in June last year to $2.1 billion. The fresh investments come around a year after the firm raised $18 million from Frederick Emmer Pollock, Jonathan Sawyer, and others.
DealShare
This startup was founded in September 2018 by Vineet Rao, Sourjyendu Medda, Rajat Shikhar, and Shankar Bora. It is a social eCommerce marketplace. It helps first-time internet users shop online, with the middle-class population as its target audience. This company sells groceries and essential household products through social media and messenger platforms like WhatsApp. It uses two ways to reduce the cost of vital goods in the mass-market segment: directly sourcing household items of lesser-known brands and selling products through community sales. In India, the social commerce segment is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of around 55% to 60%, to reach $16 billion – $20 billion gross merchandise value (GMV) by 2025. Last year, Meesho entered the unicorn club.
In 2022, DealShare joined the unicorn club with a valuation of $1.62 billion. It raised $165 million in a Series E funding round. It saw participation from existing investors Tiger Global and Alpha Wave Incubation and fresh investors like Kora investments, DF International Partners, and Twenty Nine Capital Partners. The current round has seen DealShare raise around $330 million to date. The startup’s valuation has grown more than 3X since its last fundraising in July 2021. Its gross revenue has increased 10X over the last year, with an ARR of $750 million for 2022.
ElasticRun
ElasticRun was founded in 2016 by Sandeep Deshmukh, Shitiz Bansal, and Saurabh Nigam. Its tech platform is an extension of FMCG company’s direct distribution networks in rural areas, helping businesses reach small Kirana stores in remote areas. This startup also engages with banks and financial institutions, giving them access to underserved SME customers from its Kirana network. Using data analytics, Pune-based ElasticRun helps Kirana businesses hone their marketing strategy. This startup was the first to enter the unicorn club in February.
It raised $300 million in a fresh round of funding led by Masayoshi Son’s SoftBank. New York-based Goldman Sachs, Proses Ventures (Formerly Naspers Ventures), Innoven Capital, and Chimera Investment, an Abu Dhabi Royal Group subsidiary, also participated. The Series E round valued the firm at $1.5 billion. The new investment has come almost a year after the company raised $75 million in a Series D funding round spearheaded by Avataar Venture Partners. This round also saw participation from Proses Ventures and Kalaari Capital, amongst others. This round valued the startup at around $400 million, thrusting its valuation up by 3.75x.
Livspace
Based in Bengaluru, this startup was founded in 2014 by Anuj Srivastava and Ramakant Sharma. It is a curated marketplace providing end-to-end home design experiences. It has an online marketplace offering software tools to assist designers and homeowners in designing interiors. It became the sixth unicorn of the year. In a Series F funding round, it raised $180 million from American investment behemoth KKR & Co, Swedish Retail mammoth IKEA, Jungle Ventures, Peugeot Investments, and Venturi Partners.
Livspace has managed to raise around $450 million from 10 funding rounds. This is the company’s major round in the last 15 months after it raised $90 million in Series D funding in September 2020, led by Swiss-based investment firm Kharis Capital and consumer-space expert Venturi Partners. Late in 2021, French multinational giant Saint-Gobain also acquired a minority stake in this startup.
Xpressbees
This Pune-based startup was founded in 2015, a spin-off from eCommerce giant FirstCry. It is an eCommerce logistics company offering express delivery services. Present across 3000 cities, it services over 20000 pin codes, delivering around 1.5 million packages per day. Xpressbees has 100 hubs across the country with over 10 lakh sq ft warehouse capacity and operates around 52 airports in India. It also runs GlobalBees – a thrasio-styled roll-up company that entered the unicorn club last year. Xpressbees raised $300 million in its Series F funding round led by private equity firms Blackstone Growth, TPG Growth, and ChrysCapital.
Investcorp and Norwest Venture Partners were the existing investors who participated in this round. Xpressbees’ total funding came to $500 million, putting the company at a valuation of around $1.2 billion. India has four logistics unicorns, including Rivigo, BlackBuck, and Delhivery. This investment comes around two years after Xpressbees raised $110 million in its Series E funding round from Investcorp, Norwest Venture Partners, and Gaja Capital. During this round, the value was around $400 million. The latest round of funding pushed Xpressbees’ valuation up by 3X.
Uniphore
Ravi Saraogi and Umesh Sachdev founded this conversational automation startup in 2008. This startup has combined conversational AI, workflow automation, and RPA (Robotic Process Automation) in a single integrated platform to transform and equalize customer experiences across industries. This became the 8th startup to enter the unicorn club in 2022 after raising $400 million at a $2.5 billion valuation. The funding round was spearheaded by NEA and saw existing investors participate.
In 2021, Uniphore made two acquisitions – Emotion Research Lab for better capabilities in emotion AI and Jacada for better low-code/no-code capabilities. Considering the current round, this unicorn’s total funding is $610 million.
Fractal
Fractal Analytics is a multinational AI company providing services in consumer packaged goods, insurance, life sciences, healthcare, retail and technology, and the financial sector. Founded in 2000 by a 5- member team including IIM A alumni Srikanth Velamakanni and Pranay Agarwal, together with Nirmal Palaparthi, Pradeep Suryanarayan, and Ramakrishna Reddy. This 21-year-old startup provides AI and advanced analytics to Fortune 500 companies. Fractal’s latest round of funding made it the first contender to enter the unicorn club in 2022.
In the Private Equity round, $360 million was raised from TPG Capital Asia and secondary share purchases from funds provided by Apax Partners. Fractal has raised a total of $685 million in around five rounds. The newest investment comes around two years after it raised $200 million from Apax Partners in 2019. Fractal had raised $100 million from the Malaysian sovereign fund Khazanah in 2016. Fractal Analytics took its time to enter the unicorn club – almost two decades, at a time when Indian startups are hitting the billion-dollar evaluation mark in 6.6 years.
LEAD
This EdTech startup was founded in 2012 by Sumeet Mehta and Smita Deorah. This firm helps schools combine technology, pedagogy, and curriculum into one integrated teaching and learning system. This was the first EdTech startup to enter the Indian unicorn club in 2022. In January, this firm raised $100 million in a round led by WestBridge Capital and GISV Ventures, which positioned it at an extraordinary $1.1 billion valuation.
This funding round was the company’s fifth, with the last coming in April 2021. LEAD School has raised $166 million in financing in over five rounds. Last year, EdTech startups managed to raise over $4.7 billion, making them the third-most funded Indian startup sector of 2021, trailing only eCommerce at $10.7 billion and fintech at $8 billion. LEAD is the sixth EdTech unicorn in India, following BYJU’s, Unacademy, Eruditas, Vedantu, and UpGrad. LEAD has around 5000 schools across 500 Indian cities on board and serves more than 2 million students.
Hasura
This firm was founded in 2018 by Tanmai Gopal and Rajoshi Ghosh and provides data access and data flow tools and services through GraphQL APIs, a solution to speed up product and data delivery. This is the 9th Indian startup to enter the unicorn club in 2022.
It has raised $100 million from Greenoaks Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Vertex Ventures, and Nexus Venture Partners in its Series C round in February 2022. Hasura has raised close to 136 million dollars in funding and claims its application has been downloaded 400 million times, earning it 25000 GitHub stars since its introduction in 2018.
CredAvenue
This startup was founded by Gaurav Kumar in 2017 and is a debt platform that connects enterprises with leaders and investors. Offers 5 products: CredLoan, CredCoLed, Plutus, CredSCF, and CredPool. It claims to have more than 2.3k corporates and more than 750 lenders in its portfolio. Based in Chennai, this is the 10th Indian startup to reach the $1 billion evaluation.
This fintech startup raised $135 million in its Series B funding round, led by New York-based Insight Partners, B Capital, and Dragoneer Investment Group. These were new and existing investors such as Sequoia Capital, Lightspeed Ventures, Lightrock, and TVS capital. With this funding, CredAvenue’s valuation touched $1.2 billion. Last year, in September, the startup raised the 2nd largest Series A investment that the Indian startup ecosystem had ever seen, with $90 million. The funding round was led by Sequoia Capital, together with Lightrock, Lightspeed Ventures, Cred, and Stride ventures. This funding helped CredAvenue’s valuation reach $410 million.
Amagi
This startup was founded in 2008 by Baskar Subramanian, Srinivasan KA, and Srividya Srinivasan. Amagi’s services include cloud broadcast and targeted advertising solutions to broadcast and stream TV platforms.
The company helps content owners launch, distribute and monetize live, linear channels on free-ad-supported television and video services platforms. Amagi became the 11th Indian startup to join the unicorn club after raising $95 million in a funding round spearheaded by Accel. Existing investors like Norwest Venture Partners and Avataar Ventures also participated in this round. Amagi managed to raise $100 million.
Purplle
This Nykaa competitor was started by Manish Taneja and Rahul Dash in 2012. It is an online marketplace for beauty products and appliances, claiming to host more than 1000 brands on its platform, including Lakme, WOW Skin Science, Plum, caffeine, Maybelline, SUGAR Cosmetics, and more. Purplle hit the billion-dollar valuation in June 2022 with its Series E funding round.
The startup’s value crossed $1.1 billion thanks to Paramak Ventures, Premji Invest, Blume Ventures, and Kedaara. Purplle wishes to use the cash infusion to scale its private brands and focus on tech investments. It has five D2C brands under its umbrella, allowing it to compete with Nykaa, SUGAR Cosmetics, Plum, and WOW Skin Science.
LeadSquared
Based in Bengaluru, this startup was founded in 2011 by Nilesh Singh, Sudhakar Gorti, and Prashant Singh, with Sukhbir Kalsi joining as a founding member. This company provides end-to-end sales, marketing, onboarding automation solutions, field sales management, and merchant management.
Claiming to have over 2000 enterprises across 40 countries, this SaaS startup has more than 150K mobile users. It has become the latest startup to achieve unicorn status after raising $153 million in a Series C funding round from WestBridge; more than a year after, it raised 432 million from Gaja Capital. This funding round makes the sales automation platform India’s 21st enterprise tech and SaaS unicorn, joining the ranks of Browserstack, Amagi, and Zoho. LeadSquared plans to use the funds to make growth investments in India and the US, expand in APAC and EMEA, and add new products and solutions. Its offerings are open to a wide range of sectors like healthcare, Edtech, BFSI, hospitality, and real estate. Clients include BYJU’s, DUNZO, ZoomCar, and Cars24.
Open
This startup was founded in 2017 by Anish Achuthan, Ajeesh Achuthan, Mabel Chacko, and Deena Jacob. This startup offers business banking, payments, and expense management services to SMBs across India.
Open became the country’s 100th unicorn after raising $50 million from IIFL. Existing investors include Temasek, Tiger Global, and 3one4 Capital. Open has increased its customer base to 2.3 million in the past year, with plans to reach 5 million globally next year. The startup wishes to use the capital to strengthen its leadership team and increase employee numbers from 500 to 1000 in the coming year.
PhysicsWallah
This startup was founded by Alakh Pandey and Prateek Maheshwari in 2020 and focused on providing competitive exam prep for NEET and IIT/JEE. It started as a YouTube channel in 2016 and eventually scaled up to an app and a website in 2020. According to this EdTech startup, more than 10000 of its students have cracked NEET and JEE in 2020 and 2021.
PhysicsWallah became the 101st Indian startup to reach a billion-dollar valuation. Based in Noida, this startup raised around $100 million in a Series A funding round from Westbridge and GSV Ventures. With this round, PW’s post-money valuation reached $1.1 billion, cementing its place as India’s seventh EdTech unicorn. The firm plans to use the incoming funds for business expansion, branding, introducing more courses, and opening new learning centers across the country.
Conclusion
These are the 17 startups that entered the Unicorn Club in 2022. We still have the next few months and quite a few potential startups. That could make their way to the Unicorn Club.
