PropTech Startup Ivy Homes Raises $7 Mn in Seed Funding Round From Khosla Ventures, Venture Highway, and Others

Ivy Homes Co-founders (Pritam Thakur & Abhialash Narahari)

Ivy Homes raises $7 million in seed funding round from Khosla Ventures, Venture Highway, and other leading VC firms

The funds will be utilised to build product and expand the team

Ivy Homes, a new-age prop-tech startup that uses artificial intelligence and machine learning to provide instant liquidity to sellers, has raised $5.75 million in equity and $1.3 million in debt in a seed round of funding. The round saw participation from leading investors, including Khosla Ventures, Venture Highway, Y Combinator, GFC, Foundamental, Better Capital, and Titan Capital.

Ivy Homes makes instant offers to buy homes using AI and Machine Learning. It uses a machine-learning-based pricing algorithm to forecast the fair market value of a property based on more than 50 parameters. As a result, Ivy Homes serves a fairly vast market that has remained relatively unchanged in recent years. It provides a substantially more convenient option to selling by handling the whole process while also enhancing the experience of home purchasers for resale homes.

Speaking on occasion, Abhilash Narahari, Co-founder, Ivy Homes said, “The funding that we have raised is a big step toward realising our mission to deliver transparent solutions to the real estate sector. With our unique data and pricing engine, we aim transform what is a complex, painful and month-long ordeal into a transparent and predictable process.”

Pritam Thakur, Co-founder, Ivy Homes says, “Home selling is such a large problem to solve, and we believe the best way to deliver a superior customer experience is by being fully transactional.”

Commenting on the Ivy Homes fundraise, Priya Mohan, Partner at Venture Highway, said, “As the first institutional investors, we are excited to back founders who solve complex problems and deliver category-creating solutions. Abhilash and Pritam bring a combination of domain, previous start-up and tech experience, and in this we saw a strong founder-market fit. We believe Ivy Homes has the opportunity to create a tech-driven ‘never before seen’ customer experience for home sellers and buyers."

Venture Highway Raises $78.6 Mn for their 2nd Fund Focused on Seed Investments in India

Early stage venture capital firm, Venture Highway, raised $78.6 million for its second fund focused on technology seed investments in India. A large part of the fresh raise will be used for new investments in approximately thirty early

stage companies over the life of this fund. Founded in 2015, Venture Highway is known for its bets in disruptive startups like Meesho, Sharechat, Moglix, O4S, Wishfin and WMall.

The Fund was started as a passion to give back to the startup ecosystem in India and has investments by Samir Sood and Neeraj Arora who are friends from Google. Having worked with global firms such as Google, Microsoft and Cisco Systems, Samir’s professional journey spans roles in building a family business in India, making early-stage technology investments and leading mergers and acquisitions globally and in Asia. Neeraj Arora, the former Global Business Head at WhatsApp is an advisor and the founding anchor Limited Partner based in Silicon Valley.

The Fund is a founder-focused seed fund and partners with the next generation of Indian technology entrepreneurs by providing guidance and early rounds of institutional capital. Backed by iconic investors from Silicon Valley, the average cheque size for this Fund is expected to be a million dollars. Venture Highway seeks to partner with capital efficient technology businesses and add value through their global and local networks.

[caption id="attachment_141024" align="alignleft" width="300"] Samir Sood, Founder, Venture Highway[/caption]

On the new fund, Samir Sood, Founder, Venture Highway LLP, an advisor entity, commented, “We are extremely passionate about helping advise technology entrepreneurs build their businesses with our local and global networks. Our goal is to give back to our country’s early-stage ecosystem and we continue to be extremely excited about the quality of the current generation of entrepreneurs building large businesses out of India.”

Venture Highway has now become an institution to help drive the early stage technology ecosystem in India. The first fund backed great founders in category leaders such as Meesho and Sharechat, which are among the top 30 soonicorns in India. Some of its

other early investments have been in renowned startups such as Moglix, OkCredit, Tracxn, Cars24 and Wishfin.

About Venture Highway

Venture Highway (www.venturehighway.vc) has a deep Silicon Valley connection through its founders and investors. The team adds value through its local and global networks and experiences. The Venture Highway LLP entity was bootstrapped and founded by Samir Sood (ex-Google) and is advised by Neeraj Arora (Founding anchor LP of Venture Highway and former Global Business Head, WhatsApp), based in Silicon Valley.

Community-led Commerce Platform Marsplay Raises Funding from Venture Highway and Industry mavens

Marsplay, the community-led commerce platform, has raised a pre-series A round of funding, led by Venture Highway with participation from Alvin Tse from Xiaomi, Jonathan Lau, Partner, Cadorna Ventures. existing angels including the personal offices of Shailesh Rao, a partner with TPG Growth, and Nikhil Mohta, Director, ICICI Ventures also followed on in this round. Marsplay’s seed round was led by Amit Agrawal, former YouTube India Head, Vivekananda Hallekere, CEO, Bounce, and Shamir Karkal, Founder Simple.com, among others.

Marsplay revolutionizes fashion shopping, by moving it away from catalogues to a personalized, curated, visual feed of fashion trends from your circle of acquaintances and your local community. The community fully captures local and personal aesthetic influences to give users a more relevant shopping experience. What makes Marsplay unique is a shoppers ability to purchase everything you see in your feed with a single tap but more importantly, it ensures that the fashion aesthetic/choices works uniquely for you - essential for the Indian shopper, who prefers local fashion markers to what’s working on Paris or Milan fashion ramps.

“Fashion has always been about social cues, and while social platforms have amped up community interactions, fashion commerce has lagged behind, with a massive gap between discovery and instant purchase. Also, current social platforms seem to be tone-deaf when it comes to local influences - in India, where, as the old saying goes, the fashion language changes every 100km.

We envisioned a platform that provided easy-to-shop fashion advice on ‘What to wear’ and ‘When to wear’ that was crowdsourced from a community passionate about fashion and beauty. We see our relationship with this crucial community as a symbiotic one - not only do we provide them with a platform to build their personal brand, but also one with the tools to monetise their creativity.” shared Misbah Ashraf, Co-Founder Marsplay.



Misbah should know how communities work best - he previously founded a payment company and lead the product growth at Silicon Valley based startups - Pursuit, Toymail (YC W16) and Pulse.qa (YC W18).

"Fashion trends, ideas, and inspirations are often derived from people rather than brands. Social media creators are genuine & relatable people sharing real-life experiences of products that they like or dislike. Consumers look up to their favourite influencers not just for the relatable content but content that aids their buying decisions. At Marsplay, we believe in empowering every single person to be a brand of their own and build the most human way for millennials to shop online." shared Ayush Shukla, Co-Founder Marsplay. His friend, and collaborator from the last 8 years.

Ayush previously ran a Digital Marketing Company, Co-founded a B2B grocery delivery startup and worked as a Digital Marketing Expert at US-based firm Workwiththecoach.

Marsplay plans to use the funds to build its product engineering team and build a strong creator community. It seeks to employ the long tail of influencers to surface discovery and commerce of interesting fashion beauty products and brands - fulfilling a felt need to stand out, in one's attire and accessories, in the age of homogenised fast fashion.

“Fashion-led product discovery has been shifting away from eCommerce websites to social networks, however, the discovery to purchase process is still disconnected. More consumers are now seeking inspiration for fashion trends from people who are more relatable than celebrity influencers. In Marsplay, we have found a single platform that provides users with a seamless discovery of fashion trends and the ability to purchase their chosen product with a single click. We are excited to partner with the Marsplay team, as they build out community-driven fashion commerce in India”, said Samir Sood, Founder, of Venture Highway

Social Experience Startup MyScoot Raises $1.7 Mn from Lightspeed India, Venture Highway, Mayfield

MyScoot, the community platform for home-hosted experiences, has raised $1.7 million (approx. INR 11.7 crores) in a round of seed funding featuring Lightspeed India Partners, Venture Highway, and Mayfield India.

MyScoot, which is a platform to meet verified new people at home-hosted social events, plans to use the funds to hire its core team, recruit top tech talent and more deeply penetrate their current market.

The funding is received from marquee institutional investors, who have a diverse portfolio across e-commerce, consumer tech, and digital communities.

Millennials in India are constantly looking for new social experiences and meaningful interactions, which has given rise to a $35B+ experiences market. What makes MyScoot different is it its 5-step profile verification process and the host’s ability to earn money from their home, according to their interests.

The funding will help MyScoot build AI-based social experience recommendations, develop their safe-guards, and establish a stronghold in their already active Delhi and Bangalore market. In addition to some of the strongest firms in Indian investment, MyScoot closed their funding round with angel investors, such as Kunal Shah, CEO of CRED, and Maninder Gulati, Chief Strategy Officer at OYO Rooms.

The product is reminiscent of the Airbnb model, where users, post-completing MyScoot’s 5 step verification process, are able to ‘host’ or ‘book’. The host sets the price point for their offering and earns money as they select guests to attend. Built to establish real connections, MyScoot offers bold, fresh, experiences and parties of all kinds from dinner parties, board game brunches, Salsa dance socials, to backyard bonfires.

All 30 and under, co-founders Suyash Sinha, Sidharth Rawat, Akhil Tripathi, and Somvir Yadav have built a solution for India’s largest asset - its youth. 2020 will mark India’s rise as the youngest country in the world with an average age of 29. MyScoot is a uniquely Indian solution to a uniquely Indian problem - highly digital youth, disconnected in a digital world.

Loneliness is on the rise with millenials on the move, following work opportunities across cities and countries. It can be hard to make meaningful connections in a city where one has no previous network. Realising first hand how difficult it was to meet and connect with people in bars and pubs, MyScoot’s founders, Suyash Sinha and Sidharth Rawat felt the need to for a better way to meet people.

Regarding the round of funding, Suyash Sinha, CEO & Co-Founder, MyScoot said, “We’re excited to have such seasoned investors and experts support the MyScoot mission - to make real connections in today’s digital, online world. Their belief in our vision will allow us to scale and create a stronger, more robust platform to better serve users. Our goal is to reach more of the world’s largest youth cohort, Indian millennials, enabling them to create bonds and build friendships in a new and meaningful way."

Nikhil Khattau, Managing Director, Mayfield India, highlighting the reason behind choosing to invest in MyScoot, said, “We’re passionate about MyScoot because it’s an idea larger than home-hosted parties. It’s a safe place for micro-communities, a non-digital space to forge connections.

The experience market is on the rise and MyScoot has tapped into something larger - one’s need to belong. There is no other solution in the market, building digital to non-digital relationships in such a manner. We’re proud to support a solution especially built to the largest young cohort in the world - Indian millennials.”

The Problem MyScoot is Solving:
Supporting micro-communities and local events, MyScoot caters to modern Indian consumers’ needs and desires - convenience, personalisation, and sense of belonging. (Deloitte)

The World Economic Forum identified ‘loneliness’ as an epidemic in 2019: “Chronic loneliness is a health concern across generations, with 40% of under-25-year old people reporting that they feel lonely."

23% of Indian students log into social media platforms for more than 8 hours daily due to low-battery anxiety, nomophobia, and FOMO, says research from Omidyar.

The Journey of MyScoot

• August 2017 - MyScoot beta launched via a Google Form amongst friends of friends, gaining more than 500 registrations within days


• September 2018 - MyScoot formally launched


• March 2019 - MyScoot raised 150,000 USD as part of Y-Combinator Winter 2019 batch


• July 2019 - MyScoot closed Seed round of USD 1.7M and has 2000+ bookings and 200+ hosts

Supply Chain SaaS Startup O4S Raises $2.1 Mn in in Pre-Series A led by Venture Highway

Gurgaon-based supply chain SaaS startup O4S (Original4Sure) has raised $2.1 million in Pre-Series A funding led by Venture Highway to expand its operations in India.

Founded in 2016, by Divay Kumar and Shreyans Sipani, O4S has so far raised a total of $2.5 million including a seed investment of $400,000 in 2017.

In an official statement, O4S said the new funding will be used to strengthen its workforce, accelerate client acquisition, and build technology infrastructure across industries within India.

Currently focusing on industries such as Agriculture, FMCG, Pharmaceuticals and Personal Care, O4S counts PepsiCo, ITC, Honeywell and DCM Shriram among its clients. Its core offerings are Supplytics and Original4Sure, which are built on product serialization powered by advanced technologies such as Machine Learning and Internet of Things (IoT) that adapt to the dynamic nature of businesses.

Supplytics helps brands connect directly with retailers and distributors by tracking products throughout the supply chain, while Original4Sure’s key focus is on consumer engagement.

O4S ecosystem is built on cloud-based infrastructure and engages all supply chain partners on a mobile app. The key value propositions include real-time inventory visibility across the retailers, brand protection, retailer trade promotions and an integrated BI dashboard that provides real-time actionable insights.

Divay Kumar, CEO, O4S, said in press statement, “In the past one year, we have tracked over 500 million unique products across 100 thousand retailers in general trade. Over 10 million consumers have verified their products using O4S. This has helped brands increase their shelf space and tighten the control over the quality of goods sold to the consumer. This new funding will aid our next phase of growth to enable fraud-free supply chains and become a SaaS offering of choice.”

Samir Sood, Founder, Venture Highway., said in a statement, “With businesses focusing on increasing deeper engagement with retailers and end users, obtaining visibility along the supply chain has become more important than ever before. It has been successful in winning key contracts with large marquee brands within a short span of time. We are delighted to continue supporting O4S in their next phase of growth."

Source - Times of India

Venture Highway Invests in Bangalore-Based Digital Trust Solution Provider, BetterPlace

Venture Highway (through VH Capital), supporting next generation of Indian entrepreneurs that are innovating for the masses, today announced an investment in BetterPlace Safety Solutions, a Bangalore-based digital trust solution provider aiming to create “A Better Place For A Billion+ Indian Citizens”. Venture Highway is founded by Samir Sood, Ex-Head of Corporate Development - South Asia, Australia at Google, and is advised by Neeraj Arora, Business Head at WhatsApp.

Founded in 2015, BetterPlace has created India’s first web service that addresses the ‘trust deficit’ in any form of alliance or interaction between individuals and entities. With emphasis on building digital data to address the trust deficit, BetterPlace hopes to play its part in movement of millions of Indians from in-formal and semi- formal segments of the economy to one where the digital trust profile enables individuals to access services such as credit, health and insurance.

Commenting on the progress made by BetterPlace, Pravin Agarwala, CEO and founder said, “India is at a very interesting cross road where we are seeing massive migration across states, growth of the services sector to a point where it today employs more people than any other segment along with increased smartphone penetration thereby enabling the possibility of large scale digitization. These trends enable us to continue to build trust profiles on top of the Aadhaar platform”.

"We have been on the lookout for large opportunities that are scalable and impact the masses but do so in a financially prudent manner. After evaluating BetterPlace, we are deeply impressed with the core team, their strong technology platform and their vision to leverage the trust profiles. We believe this will bridge a much- needed gap in the safety quotient of the country and are excited to be part of the BetterPlace story.” said Venture Highway founder, Samir Sood.

Since its launch BetterPlace has created 2 lakh+ paid safety profiles of individuals with its aim to hit a million profiles in 2017. It today is helping its diverse client base and markets leaders across private security, facility management, last mile fulfillment, manpower suppliers and on demand aggregators. Reflecting on the progress made, Will Poole managing partner at Unitus commented “BetterPlace continues to make tremendous progress on its suite of products while at the same time cementing segment wise market leadership across areas that collectively employ 50 Million people in an organized manner”.

In Q1 2016, the firm announced a seed investment from Unitus, India’s most active seed fund. This was preceded in late 2015 by an angle investment by ex-Google India Products head and the man behind Google’s Map Maker, Lalitesh Katragadda who also continues to be a Board member and technology mentor.