Tag: Stride Ventures

Stride Ventures leads ₹7 crore debt funding round in sustainable footwear brand Neeman’s

Banking & Finance

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Stride Ventures on Thursday said that it has led a ₹7 crore debt funding in sustainable footwear brand Neeman’s. The funding will be done through Stride Ventures India Fund – II and will be utilised by the shoe brand for expanding its portfolio, investing in product development and commitment to the planet.

It will also enable them in to at entering newer markets and segments.

Ishpreet Singh, Founder and Managing Partner, Stride Ventures, said, “Customers are increasingly gravitating towards environment-friendly businesses, as the world moves towards a sustainable way of living. While the Indian footwear industry is poised to grow at a steady pace, the D2C segment for the footwear industry has become the fastest-growing channel. With its strong marketing strategy and large social media presence, the brand has expanded across PR, marketing, brand strategy, influencer partnerships and other allied functions. Taran and Amar have ensured that Neeman’s is well-placed to tap a huge target addressable market, and we are pleased to partner with them on this journey.”

As a sustainable brand that uses completely natural, renewable, recyclable and chemical-free materials, Neeman’s value proposition across products include comfort, durability and eco-friendliness. The footwear is lightweight, flexible, machine washable, and can be worn with and sock-free, making them suitable for the varied Indian weather. It has sold two lakh pairs of shoes till date.

Amar Preet Singh, Founder & COO Neeman’s, said, “We are excited to have Stride Ventures as our partners in the journey of changing how India wears shoes. Since our inception, our motto has been to craft sustainable and comfortable shoes. Thus, we launched footwear using unexplored natural and renewable fabrics such as Merino Wool, Recycled PET bottles and even recycled tyres, which the new-age conscious consumers have well accepted. This investment will enable us to strengthen our journey towards reducing carbon footprint and stay committed to producing well-crafted comfortable shoes. It will also facilitate us in extending into other categories such as fashion and apparel.”

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Rural insurtech start-up GramCover raises $7 million in Series A funding

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Leading rural insurtech start-up GramCover has raised $7 million through its Series A funding, led by Siana Capital and Inflexor Ventures. Stride Ventures also participated in this round of Series A, the first round of institutional funding led by one or more investors.

Omidyar Network India, Flourish Ventures and Emphasis Ventures (EMVC) have already invested in GramCover. Unitus Capital acted as the exclusive financial advisor for the funding.

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GramCover, a tech-enabled insurance marketplace for rural India, has adopted a unique technology-led distribution and servicing model customised for rural India to minimise the inefficiencies and transaction costs involved in protecting people’s assets and families.

Scale-up plans

With the latest funding, GramCover will strengthen its technology and product offerings to scale up its business and support functions. The start-up will also increase the availability of various insurance products and services on “GramCover Partner” application and expand its point of sale network, tech, sales and operation teams across multiple geographies.

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Dinesh Goel, Partner, Siana Capital, said GramCover is well-positioned to continue its high growth trajectory. “Further, the business model helps achieve the twin objectives of profitable growth and providing livelihood risk protection to a large rural population of India,” he said.

Pratip Mazumdar, Partner of Inflexor Ventures, said: “Our investment in GramCover stems from Inflexor’s conviction in backing technology-led enterprises working towards deepening insurance penetration, to create a meaningful impact in a large, under-insured market.”

Launched in 2018 by insuring 1,000 farmers, GramCover has worked with over 1.7 million rural customers providing insurance across products like crop, motor, livestock and health worth ₹110 crore in premiums. The company aims to insure over 10 million farmers in the next two to three years with a premium target of ₹1,000 crore.

GramCover is currently present in Bihar, West Bengal, Assam, Uttarakhand, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra. It plans to extend its presence across the country further.

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Stride Ventures announces first close of Stride Ventures India Fund II

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Venture lending fund Stride Ventures on Wednesday announced the first close of Stride Ventures India Fund II, for which it has secured commitments of ₹550 crore.

Stride Ventures has secured commitments of ₹550 crore, out of its target corpus of ₹1,000 crore, with an additional greenshoe option of ₹875 crore.

The fund received approval for its ₹1,875 crore plan from Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) in June 2021.

Stride Ventures founder and managing partner Ishpreet Gandhi said that there has been considerable tailwinds in the Indian startup ecosystem which presents a perfect opportunity to invest in the potential of venture debt in India.

“With the majority of investors from our maiden fund returning to invest in the new fund, we have had a quicker-than-expected first close. Their confidence remains resolute in our mission to build innovative alternate financing solutions for founders to help scale their startups more efficiently,” Gandhi said.

The firm remains on track to announce the final close of the second fund by the end of 2021. With its ability to recycle capital, Stride will effectively have more than ₹3,000 crore for funding startups across the tenure of the fund, the statement said.

Fund deployment

The firm aims to ramp up deployment in late-stage startups across sectors like business-to-business (B2B) commerce, healthcare, agritech, fintech and direct-to-consumer (D2C) brands with average ticket size of up to ₹75 crore.

“In addition to family offices and institutional investors, the firm will diversify its investor base outside India for Stride Ventures India Fund II, on the lines of the maiden fund. Amid growing investor confidence and a maturing Indian startup ecosystem, the new fund represents a significant opportunity for the firm to build a robust pipeline of deployments in the coming months,” the statement said.

Founded in 2019, Stride Ventures closed its maiden fund of ₹350 crore earlier this year.

Stride Ventures have made disbursals of over ₹400 crore in 2021, through 20 investments which includes start-ups like Pocket Aces, Miko, SUGAR Cosmetics etc and late stage startups like Infra.market, Spinny, Home Lane, Zetwerk and Bizongo.

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Stride Ventures leads ₹10-crore debt round in Sequoia-backed Progcap

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Stride Ventures has led a debt round of ₹10 crore in Progcap, a growing fintech player providing access to fast and flexible collateral-free working capital to retailers.

Founded in 2017 by Pallavi Shrivastava and Himanshu Chandra, Progcap provides access to fast and flexible collateral-free working capital to retailers in Tier-II, III, and IV areas, where retailers typically face challenges in accessing capital for their businesses. Through its Last Mile Retailer Finance (LMRF) facility, the fintech company which has over two lakh retailers on its platform, provides the underbanked, semi-urban and rural retailers in India access to flexible, collateral-free working capital and has scaled up over 5x post Covid-19 with best-in-class asset quality. The company will also look to strengthen its ties with banks and corporates by leveraging Stride’s network.

Also read: Strides Ventures raises ₹85 crore from SIDBI

This is Stride Ventures’ 14th investment from its maiden fund and second in the fintech space.

“India has a complex supply chain. However, the solutions for small dealers and retailers are limited. Accessibility to credit will enable them to be at the forefront of India’s consumption story and Progcap is well positioned to drive this change,” said Ishpreet Gandhi, Founder and Managing Partner, Stride Ventures.

Pallavi and Himanshu, Co-Founders, Progcap, said, “We are excited to partner with Stride Ventures as we continue to scale the business. While Progcap is well capitalised, it is the Stride team’s deep expertise in the banking ecosystem that we are looking forward to tap into to help accelerate our growth. We have just crossed $100 million in disbursals and expect to reach $1 billion GMV by March ’22.

Also read: SUGAR Cosmetics raises $2 million in debt round led by Stride Ventures

Stride Ventures launched its maiden fund in 2019 and plans to invest in 25-30 start-ups for Stride Venture India Fund I.

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