Braving the so-called funding winter that impacted overall deal flow in the Indian startup ecosystem, a handful of companies did manage to raise mega-rounds ($100 million and above) and survive the storm.
With $1.05 billion in its kitty, edtech decacorn BYJU’s ruled the pecking order of the list of top 20 most funded companies, according to a compilation by DealStreetAsia.
The edtech giant raised this amount across two rounds. In March, BYJU’S had raised $800 million, of which $400 million was pumped in as a personal investment from the company’s founder Byju Raveendran at a valuation of $22 billion. The company raised an additional $250 million in October from existing investors including Qatar Investment Authority (QIA).
The mega rounds came even as the company has been in the news throughout the year for its financial performance, accounting practices, and mass layoffs. While BYJU’S is the most valuable Indian edtech firm, it is also the biggest loss-making unicorn in India.
Meanwhile, the single largest funding round of $805 million was raised by VerSe Innovation, the parent of news aggregator Dailyhunt and short video app Josh, in April this year. The round was led by global investors Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPP Investments), Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board (Ontario Teachers’), Luxor Capital, and Sumeru Ventures.
Food ordering and delivery platform Swiggy occupied the third spot with a $700-million round led by US asset manager Invesco at a $10.7 billion valuation. The round saw the participation of new investors such as Baron Capital Group, Sumeru Venture, IIFL AMC Late Stage Tech Fund, Kotak, Axis Growth Avenues AIF- I, Sixteenth Street Capital, Smile Group and Segantii Capital.
Here’s the list of other startups that made it to the top 20. Together these 20 startups raised a total of $7.6 billion in 2022.
