Published: 3/2/2021
Good afternoon, we're on to Tuesday and more companies are raising money (or at least are in the midst of doing so). Today we have Groww potentially raising a large round, and Apna adding to their Series A.
➡️ The investment app Groww is now in talks with Tiger Global and other investors to raise a new funding round of about $100M. This comes just months after the company's $30M Series C led YC's Continuity Fund with Sequoia Capital India also participating.
➡️ Interestingly Tiger Global is also an investor in both Upstox and INDMoney that compete with Groww on some level as well. Tiger Global seem to be deploying a bunch of capital across various stages all over the world at the moment, as Kate Clark (The Information) also noted the company has already participated in 30 deals this year- https://twitter.com/KateClarkTweets/status/1365439631731290113
➡️ And I don't think this news is very surprising in the age of pre-empted rounds and one where people are looking to open trading accounts in droves. In the US alone, both Robinhood and Public raised large sums of capital at the start of this year.
➡️ The company has also expanded its product offerings over time with users being able to invest in SIPs, mutual funds, stocks (including futures and options), gold and fixed deposits. Users can also invest in stocks of US-listed companies as well and it seems like Groww wants to be the single place where newer investors invest all of their money.
➡️ And with Groww's main competition being Zerodha (which is bootstrapped), it seems like the company can definitely raise and burn capital to grow faster than its competitors. Millions of Indians are now new investors in the public markets and I think we're going to be seeing a fight for their capital and attention span as Groww continues to groww.
2. http://tcrn.ch/3e3sMNQ: Apna adds more capital to its Series A
➡️ A professional network for blue & grey collared workers Apna has raised an additional $12.5M investment led by Sequoia Capital India and Greenoaks Capital with further participation from existing investors Lightspeed India and Rocketship VC. This brings the company's Series A round to about $20M
➡️ Currently over 6M workers are using the platform to find jobs and upskill themselves. There are now tens of millions of interactions being conducted between employers and potential employees on the platform with over 80,000 employers as well.
➡️ With the pandemic and ensuing pandemic sending millions into unemployment, it seems like Apna was started at just the right time to be able to help these workers across the country. The company currently plans to charge recruiters to be on the platform as well as provide paid upskilling courses for workers.
➡️ I think the combination of education + employment makes Apna seem like a compelling bet. We've had so many EdTech companies in the country but most of them haven't really been able to impact actually helping people get jobs in a meaningful way and maybe Apna changes that.
Feedback & ❤️ always appreciated BONUS (Tweet of the day): https://twitter.com/youngarjeezy/status/1366265767310712835
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