Noida-based mobile app firm News in Shorts has raised US$4 million (around Rs.25 crore) in Series A funding round led by Tiger Global. Japan's Rebright Partners and and existing investors Sachin and Binny Bansal, the founders of Flipkart also participated in the round.
Founded in 2013 by three IIT dropouts Azhar Iqubal, Deepit Purkayastha, and Anunay Arunav, News in Shorts publishes top news stories in 60-word bite-sized portions, containing only the essential facts, compromising on anything that is close to opinionating and storytelling.
"Mobile content is ripe for disruption, and we believe they (News In Shorts) can revolutionize the way content is being consumed on mobile devices. The 60-word news 'shorts' is just a step towards that goal," said Fixel, partner at Tiger Global.
"In the next three months, we will build a larger team, ramp up technology, move into audio and video streaming and add a layer of personalization to our content," said 22-year-old Azhar Iqubal, co-founder and CEO.
Iqubal also said it was the founders of Flipkart who made this round of funding possible for News in Shorts, ut was Sachin & Binny Bansal who introduced News In Shorts to Tiger Global - one of Flipkart's early investors - which got the ball rolling for this Series A round.
Recently, this month only another similar app NewsHunt also raised Rs 120 crore in Series C funding led by Falcon Edge Capital
Launched in September 2013, News In Shorts was initially a Facebook page, and picked up followers immediately. It was shortlisted for the third batch of Nasscom's 10,000 Startups and then became part of the fourth batch of Times Internet's accelerator T-Labs. In June 2014, angel investors and mentors Ankush Nijhawan, Gaurav Bhatnagar and Manish Dhingra led its Rs 2 crore funding round, with participation from Flipkart Co-founders Sachin and Binny Bansal, as well as Times Internet.
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