Funding roundup: From LendingKart to Airbnb

In the startup world we live in daily new investments are initiated. Here's a round up of the winners from this space.

Voler Cars Gets Undisclosed Amount of Funding

Voler Cars, a self-drive car rental company has raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Kanodia family, and Amit Banka, an entrepreneur, and investor. Voler that was founded in 2010 by Vikas Parasrampuria, competes with bigger rival Zoomcar and aims to have a fleet of 1000 cars in 12 months.

The funds in this round will be used for adding more cars to its fleet in Hyderabad, Mumbai, and Pune among other cities.

Nilekani Invests $25M in KKR Realty Unit

NandanNilekani has invested around $25 million through his family office Entrust in a real estate non-banking finance company (NBFC) unit of KKR India, as per DealStreetAsia report. With Nilekani's investment, the equity corpus of the NBFC unit has gone up to $250 million. It had earlier received bigger equity infusions from GIC of Singapore ($110 million) and US-based Townsend Group ($75 million).

KKR's real estate unit has been actively providing structured credit solutions to stressed but fundamentally strong companies in the past 18 months.

Rise India Buys Majority Stake in Padhopadhao.com

Gurgaon-based Rise India, an education, and skill development firm, has acquired a majority stake in tutor aggregator Padhopadhao.com as it aims to establish its presence in the online tuition market.Rise India has acquired 60 percent stake in Padhopadhao.com.

Financial details of the deal are still undisclosed.The acquisition will help the portal expand operations to cities such as Mumbai, Jaipur, Chennai, Chandigarh, Bangalore, and Hyderabad.
Travelyaari Raises $3M in Bridge Round Led by GVFL

Online ticket booking platform Travelyaari which is run by Mantis Technologies Pvt Ltd, has raised $3 million in a bridge round of funding led by existing investor GVFL Ltd.

The company will use the money for its expansion and marketing plans. Around five years ago, GVFL had invested in Travelyaari through its SME Technology Venture Fund also. Travelyaari’s backend system, which is used by more than 1,600 operators for their day-to-day operations, supports annual transaction volume of more than Rs 3,000 crore. This Bangalore-headquartered company competes with the likes of redBus.in, Paytm and Abhibus.com.

Japanese Mobile Marketing Company Adways Buys POKKT’s Reward-based App Pocket Money

Japanese mobile marketing company AdwaysInc has acquired Pocket Money, an incentivised Android app operated by India-based video advertising platform POKKT for an undisclosed amount. Pocket Money is a reward-based ad platform which helps app developers to acquire and engage customers in a targeted way. It claims to have an installed user base of over 6 million.

“We have built Pocket Money as a successful and profitable business in less than 18 months. However, we want to focus on our core business, POKKT Video Ads, a leading mobile video ad platform for games in India & SE Asia. Adways is a large global performance ad company and the right partner to scale the pocket money business significantly in India,” said Rohit Sharma, Founder & CEO, POKKT.

Blume Ventures Hits 3rd Close of Its Second Venture Capital

Early stage investment firm Blume Ventures has hit the third close of its second venture capital and expects to complete the fundraising process in July. The firm has made more than 20 investments from the new fund in the last 13 months.

The firm had made first close in December when it raised $30 million in a round led by Silicon Valley-based ICONIQ Capital, a global merchant bank for a group of influential families. The firm hit the second close in January when it raised $10 million from limited partners Kaiser Foundation and Dream Incubator. The third close has come after three months that brings its total corpus to more than $50 million and it is targeting $60 million for the second fund.

Lendingkart Group Raises $32M in Series B Funding

Lendingkart Group, India’s leading digital lending platform for SMEs has raised Rs. 205 crore ($32M) in new financing; out of which $20M was raised as equity and $12M as debt. This Series B round was led by Bertelsmann India Investments (BII), with participation from Darrin Capital Management and existing investors – Mayfield India, Saama Capital and India Quotient.

With this new round of funding, the company has raised Rs. 260 crore ($41M) till date. The latest infusion of growth capital will be used by the Lendingkart Group for strengthening its data science capabilities, enhancing its technology platform as well as infrastructure for improved mobile capabilities.

Airbnb Seeking Funding Valuing It at $30 Billion

Airbnb, which lets users list their homes and apartments for short-term rentals, is in talks for a new round of investment that would value the company at about $30 billion, according to people briefed on the matter.

Under the terms of the new fund-raising, Airbnb will have tripled its valuation in two years. Airbnb plans to use the financing to further feed its growth plans and international expansion said these people, who spoke on condition of anonymity.