Creative agency covering storytelling, ad film production, digital campaign execution, influencer marketing. Clients include Swiggy, Netflix, BGMI, Mumble, CRED, Ather, Amazon Prime Video. Round of an undisclosed amount. Founders: Naveed was head of production at All India Bakchod (AIB) for five years and executive producer at Only Much Louder; Aakash headed social media at AIB for eight years. Founded in Apr 2020.

Omnichannel Gen AI stack to help enterprises drive sales conversion. The company drives sales automation 24/7 across voice, text-base chat and digital, and provides conversation insights. Clients across industries/geographies range from Giva (jewellery brand) and Emaar to Mashreq Bank, Aditya Birla Capital. $1.5M seed round. Other investors in the round: Growth Sense, Growth91, angels (Ankit Nagori, Sanjay Suri, Amit Lakhotia, Mekin Maheshwari). Founders: Ajay is a Venture Partner at First Cheque, was an Associate Director for New Initiatives at PayU and a GM for Market Expansion at CARS24; Hanit looked at business finance for North and East India at Udaan, prior to which she was at EXL; Kushal is from a sales background (Prestige Group, Hindustan Coca Cola). All three are from IIM. Founded in Jan 2022.

SaaS for childcare centres, from standalone preschools to chains that run such centres. "Aims to become the global operating system for childcare centres" - used by 3000 centres across 56 countries. Provides the full suite of SaaS tools - parent communication, learning and assessment tools, enrolment, attendance tracking and billing/payments. $2.5M seed round. Founders: CEO Navneet was an engineer at Media iQ for five years; CTO Sourabh and CPO Purva were also at Media iQ and at Oracle - Purva was also briefly Director of Product Management at Paytm Ads. Founded in Mar 2018. Comps: Brightwheel (SF, $55M Series C from Addition, Emerson Collective); Lillio (Canadian, $50M Series B from Bain Capital Double Impact); LineLeader (PE owned).

B2B platform for SMEs and D2C brands to manage their export operations - from logistics (shipping, warehousing, returns, customs, insurance) to compliance to marketplace solutions (enabling sales on Amazon/Tiktok/Walmart). "The company aims to make international selling as seamless as domestic commerce." Seed round of an undisclosed amount. Used by 1000 customers to ship to over 220 countries. Founders: two of the founders, Anshul and Darpan, built two businesses together - Sponsoredby (to connect event organizers with sponsors) and Paapos (on demand delivery); the third co-founder Sanchit was an engineer at Walmart and Uber, and co-founded Shyp (B2B logistics, YC23). Founded: May 2024.

Fintech platform focused on lending and insurance for dairy farmers in rural India. The lending model captures industry specific data (e.g. milk production, weather patterns, cash flow trends). Present across MH, Karnataka and UP with ₹55CR in asset backed loans disbursed. Also provides a team of para-vets to farmers, helping them manage nutrition, hygiene, and overall cattle health. Works closely with dairy cooperatives (e.g. AMUL), lenders (RBL, Shivalik etc.) and insurers (IFFCO Tokio etc.) $2.6M Pre-Series A round, not seed. Seed round by Incubate, Seedstars, Sparrow VC. Founding team of veteran bankers: Arun comes from Citibank (Head of Structured Trade), Deutsche Bank, ICICI, HSBC, HDFC; Indrajyoti is from Innoterra and spent 15 years at HDFC; Ravi is from Yes Bank; Rahul (CTO, not linked here) is from Nokia and most recently Innoviti Payment Solutions (VP-Tech). Founded in mid 2022.

"Better for you" protein shakes and protein bars. Aiming to close this calendar year with ₹10CR. $450K pre-seed round. Angels in the round: Mukesh Bansal (Myntra), Ayyappan R (FirstClub), Chanakya Gupta (Tuco Kids), Arun Sharma (Qlub). Founders: Hem is from Tata Advanced Systems, Ola and most recently Curefit ((Head of Expansion & Franchise Business); Prashant is from NestAway as well as Curefit (most recent role: Head of Trainer Org). Founded in May 2024. Comps: Phab (OTP, Capri Global), The Whole Truth (Sauce, Z47, Sofina), The Yoga Bar (Fireside, acquired by ITC). As Aviral Bhatnagar tweeted recently, protein-focused food brands are one of the most common categories aspiring seed stage founders are building in. Prebiotic/probiotic beverages is the most common, for AJCV. https://x.com/aviralbhat/status/1934870771043606868

Vertical short drama OTT, starting in Telegu. $5M seed round. The co-founders have built Chai Bisket over the past decade, a producer of web series (with 10M YouTube followers) and shows for OTTs in Telegu. Comps: Flick TV (also funded this week, see No. 10 below), Kuku TV, ShareChat’s QuickTV, Reel Saga, Reelies and global players, largely from China.

Home décor and kitchen brand sold D2C, now expanding into offline retail. The company has a range of 250 products. Currently at ₹120CR ARR, ₹150CR targeted by Dec 2025, ₹200CR by Mar 2026. $2.2M in what appears to be the company's first round, a Pre-Series A. The two co-founders are brothers, one of whom started out of college, the other ran a digital marketing agency for four years.

DeFi startup offering non-custodial crypto wallet services, offered through a crypto debit card for customers in the Middle East, SE Asia and LatAm; and for Indian users a one-tap fiat-to-crypto on-ramp. ₹5CR pre-seed round from a single angel. The founder started PlutoPe in 2022, no prior information available on his background.

Microbiome-based life sciences company, with a customer facing solution to improve gut health. ₹4CR pre-seed round. Founders: CEO Bipin was co-founder at Gaia Smart Cities (IOT devices for trains and airports); the Chief of Science and Technology has been a Senior Research Scientist at The Systems Biology Institute in Japan for 17 years; and the CEO of SBX Technologies (Japan) for a decade; Hiroaki Kitano, the Chief of Research and Collaboration, is the Head of the The Systems Biology Institute.