WorkApps – India’s first Enterprise Workflow Collaboration [EWC] company announced that it has received seed fund of $1 million from legendary enterprise SAAS investor – Sashi Reddi, Partner – SRI Capital. WorkApps product is being rolled out simultaneously in US, Europe and APAC later this year. The core management team at WorkApps includes Rudrajeet Desai, MVS Murthy and Shankar Borate

Rudrajeet is a first-generation entrepreneur in the consumer Internet and mobile industry space. MVS Murthy is a BFSI professional with 19 years of experience in Product development, Portfolio Management, Channel Management, Strategy & Business Innovation in large corporates like ICICI Bank, Edelweiss & Tata AIG, among others. Shankar Borate is a computer scientist from IIT with 20 years experience in building a wide range of products for giants like Adobe, Symantec, Intuit, Siemens & GE.

Sashi Reddi, Managing Partner, SRI Capital stated

We foresee the next big wave for Indian start-ups in the Enterprise Collaboration market globally. With over two years of product testing, I am extremely excited about the potential of WorkApps to be a pioneer in the Enterprise Workflow Collaboration [EWC] category. With Rudrajeet, MVS Murthy and Shankar Borate leading the global product roll-out, I’m confident that WorkApps will be able to create immense value to large enterprise customers in the Enterprise Collaboration space. WorkApps will create a digital inside enterprise and enable diverse teams to digitally come together to co-create using real-time collaboration. Though there are many players in this space, none of them cater to the Large Enterprise market, which is where WorkApps has built a very robust and scalable product.

Rudrajeet Desai, Founder and CEO of WorkApps said

We are excited to have SRI Capital as one of our early investors and to have Sashi join our board. Our next phase is about rolling out the product globally and creating a deeper impact for certain industries. Enterprise Workflow Collaboration (EWC) on SAAS will be a dominant force in the enterprise space and our product will enable large enterprises to augment communication efforts, improve efficiency and change the way people collaborate and work together.

MVS Murthy, Co-founder and COO, WorkApps said

Enterprises have limited bandwidth and assorted knowledge to work with pure play service companies. This makes it difficult to create a one-view of the entire organization’s requirements. One of the most unique differentiators of WorkApps Inc. is our hybrid Product and Consulting model where an Enterprise doesn’t need to pay hourly development fee and yet get a lot of flexibility for Customization and Integration into their own systems. We co-create with our Customers and pass on an ownership that is unique to each of them.

About SRI Capital
SRI Capital is a seed stage investor focused on the “as a service” economy. Interest areas include software, data, analytics, services—anything where the customer pays a subscription amount on a recurring basis for that offering. They have over 20 investments in Enterprise SaaS, SME and Consumer SaaS sectors in India and US. For more information, please visit SRI Capital

Rainmaker Ventures, co-founded by Industrialist Sudhir Menon & Digital Marketer Atul Hegde, announced that it has invested $5 million in YAAP – a super speciality digital content company. Rainmaker Ventures with presence in India, USA, Brazil and Singapore is an early stage start-up fund of $50 million that was launched in December last year. Rainmaker Ventures identifies competent start-ups and not only invests seed-capital, but also, wholly mentors these establishments through the co-founders collective expertise of growing successful businesses in the past.

Image Source* – IamWire

YAAP, focusses on the three digital content service lines of Design, Discovery and Distribution. In Content design the firm looks at branded content, digital show formats, syndication, brand and visual identity, in Content discovery it looks at influencer identification, outreach and empanelment and in Content distribution it looks at programmatic content placement, alliances and channel partnerships. The focus being creating and distributing engaging content for businesses to attract, retain and deliver customer satisfaction.

YAAP has a non CEO, Partner model where digital media professionals Nikhil Bapat & Manan Kapur have joined in as Partners in Mumbai & Gurgaon respectively. The company will use majority of the funds invested by Rainmaker Ventures for acquisitions in the Branding & Visual Identity space, Automated content distribution platforms & Content creation platforms. The funds would also be utilized for YAAP’s expansion plans in the Singapore & USA market where they plan to open offices by early next year.

Sudhir Menon, Co-Founder, Rainmaker Ventures added

YAAP is a perfect example of the nature of investments Rainmaker Ventures wants to lead. We will contribute both Capital & Mentorship to YAAP. We see YAAP become a leading player in the digital content ecosystem within the next 2 years. We have a fantastic model & the senior team in place and now will go out aggressively looking for the right acquisitions.

In a joint statement Nikhil Bapat & Manan Kapur, Partners at YAAP said

At YAAP we are trying to build a unique model both from our offerings & the company structure itself. We are happy to find a partner like Rainmaker Ventures that is so bullish of the Digital Content sector and are going beyond infusion of capital into the company, with active mentoring of the management team.

Atul Hegde, Co-Founder Rainmaker Ventures will be the Chief Mentor and join the YAAP board post this investment. This is the second investment made by Rainmaker Ventures, an early seed-fund that was launched in December last year. The fund is already in the process of investing in compelling businesses that are impactful in nature. Expansion will also be enabled with more senior professionals from varied sectors joining the company as full time mentors.

Greytip Software, a leading provider of HR and Payroll solutions to SME’s and enterprises across India, has raised INR 35 crore in its series B round of funding. The funding was led by New Enterprise Associates and Blume Ventures. The funds will be primarily used to enhance their flagship cloud solution, greytHR to enable its adoption among a wider set of enterprises and small businesses and for expansion into Tier I and Tier II markets.

greytHR helps businesses manage their employee-related TDS, PF, ESI, & LWF compliances and significantly cuts down the cost and time in providing services to their employees. It automates key areas of HR, payroll management, leave and attendance tracking, thereby reducing and simplifying work while delivering accurate and super-fast results. Its employee self-service mobile app is being widely used with 30K+ downloads, empowering employees to check their TDS, PF, etc. on-the-go.

Image Credit - Greytip Software
Image Credit* – Greytip Software

Speaking on the announcement, Girish Rowjee, CEO, Greytip Software said

We have constantly obsessed about how we can help SMEs easily and efficiently manage their HR and Payroll processes. Our cloud app, greytHR is a product of that obsession. In NEA and Blume Ventures, we see ideal partners who believe in our vision of helping small businesses use cloud to cut down operation costs and improve productivity.

Speaking on the funding aspect, Karthik Reddy, Blume Ventures said

Greytip has been a pioneer in developing an SMB-centric solution that’s a leader in India already in its space. Scaling this beautifully to both large enterprises now and regional markets across Asia, we are very excited to deepen our investment into Greytip after being their first believers a couple of years ago.

Tarun Sharma, New Enterprise Associates India said

What impressed us was that greytHR team has demonstrated their ability to achieve tech leadership and gain meaningful scale in the SaaS based HR and payroll market in India in a short span of time. With more than 300,000 employees across India already getting their payroll processed each month through their SaaS platform, greytHR is well poised to grow through new product offerings and expanding reach. Their deep presence in the Indian market makes them an ideal platform to benefit from the digitization of enterprises in India, irrespective of company size, sector or location.

Greytip Software enables more than 3,500 businesses manage 300,000+ employees daily. The company’s vision is to reach out to all enterprises and small businesses across Tier I and Tier II cities and help them benefit from automating their people processes.

About Greytip Software

Greytip software is a leading provider of HR & Payroll solutions to SMEs across India. Its cloud application, GreytHR, helps clients manage their employee life cycle. It automates key areas of HR, payroll management, leave and attendance tracking, thereby reducing & simplifying work while delivering accurate & super-fast results. For more information, please visit www.greytip.com & www.greythr.com

About NEA

New Enterprise Associates is a leading venture capital firm focused on helping entrepreneurs build transformational businesses across multiple stages, sectors and geographies. With approximately $17 billion in committed capital across 15 funds, NEA invests in companies at all stages in a company’s life-cycle, from seed stage through IPO. For more information, please visit NEA

Kickstart Jobs, a Gurgaon-based entry-level talent acquisition startup, raised an undisclosed amount of funding in its Series-seed round. Led in collaboration with ah! Ventures, this round saw investments from marquee investors like Vivek Joshi – Founder, Wyzen Tech; Mohit Satyanand – Chairman, Team Works Art; Amit Banati – President [Asia Pacific], Kellogg’s; Arun Khanna – President (Asia), Dun & Bradstreet and a few others including ah! Ventures themselves.

India, as a country, in addition to its existing market, has seen a tremendous spurt in its entrepreneurial outlook and is soon becoming a utopian land of thriving businesses. Unfortunately, this turn of events has still not transcended into the concurrent employment it should encourage, especially in the blue and grey collar jobs market. The core of this rut lies in the fact that there has been no bridge that connects the eager job seekers with the right employers. This is where Kickstart Jobs, a startup focusing on the niche talent acquisition in the entry level workforce, comes into the picture.

Started in August 2015, Kickstart Jobs evolved to solve an inherent problem in the highly fragmented entry level workforce ecosystem. The company aims to create a scalable platform to connect entry level candidates with prospective employers and vice versa. Within a year of its commencement, Kickstart Jobs is already operational in the key north Indian territories of Delhi, Noida and Gurgaon, with a workforce of 10 employees and 2 promoters. It has, in this short span of time, registered more than 5000 candidates, enlisted about 3000 vacancies, conducted more than 2000 interviews and boasts of a month on month growth of 100% in the number of candidates scheduled for interviews via their platform.

KickStarter Jobs Team
KickStart Jobs Team

The conceptualization of the enterprise is credited to its two founders, Samriddhi Malhotra and Abhishek Srivastava. Samriddhi Malhotra, an XLRI Jamshedpur alumni, comes with a rich experience of working with numerous rural communities on a grass-root level. This background of hers helps her thoroughly understand the core requirements and competencies of the workforce at the entry level section. Samriddhi heads the product development and operations at Kickstart Jobs. Abhishek Srivastava, a mechanical engineer from ISM Dhanbad, comes with years of experience in managing domestic and international operations at a multinational corporation. Given his wide exposure, he spearheads the strategy and business development at Kickstart Jobs.

Kickstart has developed a unique operational proposition, wherein ‘Leaders’ are identified among the communities of job seekers and are in turn collaborated with, to utilize their strong network and connect with the entry level job seekers. The company believes in empowering these leaders with technology, currently in the form of a  mobile app, thus bettering the process of data mapping.

Commenting on the need for a product like Kickstart Jobs, its unique proposition and the inclusion of technology, Co-Founder Samriddhi Malhotra said

The market for entry level hiring is one with both tremendous potential as well as enormous challenges. None of the solutions present in the market today have been able to really delve into the job seeker’s psyche and create a solution that works for both candidates and employers. Kickstart is attempting to do just that. We have closely observed existing patterns of job seeking at the entry level workforce and are leveraging this existing pattern and enabling it with technology.

Giving an investor’s perspective, Harshad Lahoti, Founder and CEO of ah! Ventures opined

As an investor, the growth that is about to unfold in this entry-level jobs sector in the near future is evident to me. This growth and spurt of service offerings in the sector is especially lucrative for the currently existing workforce of over 500+ million in the blue & grey collar ecosystem of India. And, given the fact that this number is increasing at about 12 million per year, the need to effectively harness these human resources becomes all the more essential. ah! Ventures and it’s investors saw that potential in Kickstart Jobs, not only in terms of their strong team but also in their unique methodology in operating and creating value for both, the job seeker & the employer. In our opinion such a product was long overdue, especially in a growing market like India, and we are sure to see stupendous success in the future of Kickstart Jobs.

ah! Ventures is India’s first full-spectrum startup investment network and platform comprising of over 750+ investors, including some of the renowned angels and early-stage VCs. The CLUB ah! Network today has over 10000+ startups, 675+ seed/angel investors and over 80 VCs & institutional investors, making it one of the largest platform of investors and startups. The network last year secured its first profitable exit from Ed-tech venture Harness Handitouch within two years of its investment. CLUB ah! has till date invested close to INR 85 crores in over 25 startups spread across varied industries and domains, including Kickstart Jobs.

On working with ah! Ventures, Co-founder Abhishek Srivastava said

ah! Ventures has been most helpful during our period of fund-raise. We approached ah! Ventures to close our funding requirement and they pro-actively helped us close in 5 days, in which they also participated. Their network is huge and the response has been extremely prompt. We wanted to bring ah! Ventures on-board as their reach and connections will keep us in good stead for future. We hope to use their industry and investor connects to scale our business.

ah! Ventures is a growth catalyst that brings together promising businesses and investors by creating wealth creation opportunities for both. ah!’s unique model serves investors, entrepreneurs & enablers through a unique blend of customised services, skill, and industry & domain experience. Founded in 2010, ah! Ventures has systematically disrupted the early stage funding ecosystem of India through its innovative approach toward startup investing. First of its kind initiatives like the CLUB ah! platform, ah! Angels [India’s largest angel network], ah! Seeders and ah! VC networks [India’s first seed & VC investment networks], have brought together and integrated the previously segregated startup funding life-cycle, under one roof. This, coupled with ah! Impact network, an impact investment network for investing in social enterprises and ah! Mentors network, a mentor network to engage with startups in their growth and expansion, has today made ah! Ventures one of India’s most respected change leaders and a formidable industry force to reckon with.

ah! Ventures is in the process of closing 2 more investments in the coming week.

About Kickstart Jobs

Started in 2015, Kickstart Jobs is a startup founded by by IIT- XLRI alumni. The company focuses on talent acquisition, specific to the blue and grey collared workforce. Birthed to solve an inherent problem in the highly fragmented entry level workforce ecosystem, Kickstart Jobs, aims to create a scalable platform to get people at the entry level, to connect to the employers and vice versa. Within a year of its commencement, Kickstart Jobs is already operational in the key northern territories of Delhi, Noida and Gurgaon with a workforce of 10 employees and 2 promoters. It also boasts of 100% growth in the number of candidates scheduled for interviews via Kickstart. For more information, please visit Kickstart Jobs

About ah! ventures

ah! Ventures is a startup focused growth catalyst that brings together promising businesses and investors by creating wealth creation opportunities for both. ah!’s unique model serves investors, entrepreneurs and enablers through a unique blend of customized services, skill and industry & domain experience.

Delhi-based VISIT, an on-demand healthcare service provider, has a raised a seed funding from MapmyIndia, a marquee Technology Company based out of New Delhi. The startup plans on channeling this investment to further develop the technology being used in the app.

[Image Source* – VISIT]

Speaking about the investment, Vaibhav Singh, Co-founder, VISIT said

With the new funding, we plan on investing heavily in improving our technology. We are also aiming at increasing the number of doctors on the app to 500 over the next 3 months. The vision is to bring m-Health to a billion Indians over the next 5 years. No matter where you are you should have access to quality healthcare at just a tap.

Rohan Verma, CTO and Director of MapmyIndia said

We have been in search of supporting a team whose mission was to make quality healthcare easily available to everyone and who had the capability to execute on this mission. In VISIT we found both and are extremely excited to support them achieve their mission.

The idea for the healthcare app was conceived when four graduates from BITS Pilani – Anurag Prasad, Vaibhav Singh, Chetan Anand and Shashvat Tripathi felt the need for such a service on the BITS Pilani campus, which is located in a remote area and accessing quality healthcare was inconvenient.

VISIT aims to avoid various frictions in the delivery of healthcare today like booking an OPD appointment, in-clinic waiting and inability to get in-house doctor visits. They do so by connecting patients with practitioners across multiple disciplines anytime, anywhere through smartphone or computer. It aims to put convenience back into the hands of patients and physicians with their salient feature ‘Q’, free text-a-doctor service.

This allows the patients to ask all health related questions to doctors with just a text message. VISIT also follows up with patients for any further information they require. If the patient requires a treatment, ‘Q’ helps connect the patient with a specialist who can send prescriptions and order lab tests.

Anurag Prasad, Co-founder, VISIT said

‘Q’ is designed to be a health-based Q&A platform that works with a personal conversation between you and your physician. It’s an easy way to get a first opinion from a doctor, especially for mothers with children’s health questions.

Patients can also request a “visit” from their smartphone; therapists can connect over video within 30 minutes and are able to diagnose and treat with nothing more than a smartphone/PC and their expertise. VISIT also has specialists like therapists, general physicians, dermatologists and nutritionists.

Talking about the specialists associated with VISIT, Chetan Anand, Co-founder, VISIT said

We make sure that the empanelment of doctors is carried out through a strict verification process thereby providing a reliable service to our customers. On an average only 1 out of 5 doctors make it through our stringent quality checks.

About VISIT

VISIT was founded by four BITS Pilani students Anurag Prasad, Vaibhav Singh, Chetan Anand and Shashvat Tripathi to reinvent the traditional practitioner-client relationship, by founding an on-demand tele-medicine app called VISIT. It aims to put convenience back into the hands of patients and therapists with an On-demand Health Care platform. VISIT therapist and physician mobile applications enable the modern house call: patients can push a button and request a “visit” from their smartphone; therapists connect over Video within 30 minutes and are able to diagnose and treat with nothing more than a smartphone/PC and their expertise. For more information please visit GetVisitApp

PurpleHealth, a 360-degree “Health On Demand” platform, has raised USD 100,000 from disruptive tech investor, Katabole Technology Ventures.
Founded in 2014, PurpleHealth is a 360-degree health & wellness platform that delivers a diverse spectrum of solutions, services and products to consumers, corporates, healthcare providers and institutions. The platform empowers consumers to take active control of their health by providing a one-stop seamless interface to choose the right medical practitioners, schedule appointments, set up video & audio chats with doctors and much more, thus helping them better manage their health and wellness interactions.
Furthermore, PurpleHealth enables healthcare providers with tools and technologies that assist them to better engage with their customers. The platform currently has over 38,000 doctors and 4000 hospitals as part of its vast and growing network.
PurpleHealth Co-founders : L-R Vikram Nair, Prakash Sathyapalan, Mini Balaraman
Vikram Nair, Co-founder & CEO, PurpleHealth said
At PurpleHealth, we work with a unique ‘Total Health’ approach that focuses on meeting the country’s (and moving forward, the world’s) health-care challenges with integrated solutions through a 360-degree health platform. The Indian healthcare sector is expected to register a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 22.9% during 2015-20 and grow to USD 280 billion. We intend to play a substantial part in that growth story by creating a massive, positive impact on how health & wellness products and services are accessed by and delivered to every individual, corporate & institution.
We will use this round of funding to further build on the PurpleHealth.com product roadmap and strengthen the team.
Balaji Jagannathan, Founder & CEO, Katabole said
We believe that when it comes to health, people today, by and large, feel dis-empowered. They want the ability to choose and decide by themselves and they crave the right platform that will give them access to all the information they need to make their health-related decisions
What really excited us about PurpleHealth was their inclusive approach that recognizes the scale of the problems the health space presents, and looks for imaginative (and sustainable) solutions that deal with the ecosystem, and involve all stakeholders, small and big-healthcare providers, corporates, other institutions and individual consumers. With this as the backdrop, we are positively confident that PurpleHealth.com will disrupt the Health & Wellness industry. Their product roadmap is very exciting and we are looking forward to the innovations that PurpleHealth will be bringing to the market.
About PurpleHealth
PurpleHealth is a 360-degree health platform that delivers a large and diverse spectrum of solutions, services and products to consumers, healthcare providers and institutions. Currently, the Healthcare delivery ecosystem operates through individual, independent and unconnected silos. PurpleHealth aims to build collaborative healthcare distribution models with a common customer pool, through integrated technology. PurpleHealth enables consumers to take active control of their health by providing a one stop seamless interface with it’s fast growing healthcare network, which is already 38,000 Doctors and 4000 Hospitals strong. The platform empowers its users to choose the right medical practitioners, schedule appointments, set up video & audio chats with doctors, and much more. PurpleHealth’s range of products and services spans the entire spectrum of health and wellness needs. PurpleHealth believes that in order to achieve a positive impact, it is important to provide quantifiable, personalized and accessible care, services and solutions to the consumer. In addition, PurpleHealth provides bundled Health and Wellness solutions to corporates – customized at individual and group level – due to the growing incidence of chronic and preventable lifestyle ailments. The goal of these solutions is to reward healthy behaviours and positively reinforce healthy living habits amongst its users. For more information, please visit PurpleHealth
About Katabole Technology Venture
Katabole means disruption and also, laying the foundation. It is the genesis of an exciting future, seeded by technology and driven by possibility-thinking. Katabole has a simple, crystal-clear purpose: pick smart people with fresh, disruptive, technology-driven ideas and help convert those ideas into big, phenomenally big, really, really, really big businesses, worldwide that challenge and obliterate the status quo. Katabole invests in disruptive ideas across Education, Healthcare, Fintech, Digital, Security, Storage, IOT, Mobile, Social Networks and Data Analytics. For more information, please visit KataBole

IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, is investing Rs. 171 Crores in Indian eye-wear company Lenskart, to help the company expand access to high-quality and affordable eye-care products in Tier-III, Tier-IV cities. IFC was the lead investor for the Rs. 400 crores Series D investment round which also saw participation from TPG Growth, Adveq Management and IDG Ventures. In addition, Ratan TataKris Gopalakrishnan [Co-founder of Infosys)] invested in their personal capacity as part of this round. Avendus Capital was the exclusive financial advisor to this transaction.

Lenskart is into assembly, manufacturing, wholesale distribution and supply of high quality eye-wear products, such as eyeglasses, power sunglasses and contact lenses. Company plans to utilize the funds for strengthening its technology, supply chain, lens manufacturing, and expanding reach of its high-quality eye-wear products across 400 cities.

[Image Credit* – Lenskart]

Peyush Bansal, Founder and CEO of Lenskart said

IFC is a long-term partner with global knowledge and a broad network of Internet, technology and healthcare clients, including in the eye care space. We appreciate IFC for their support to our vision of ‘Lenskart glasses in every home’. We will be able to draw on IFC’s extensive global experience in the healthcare and manufacturing sectors, particularly in supply chain development and capacity building to realize its potential and develop best practices, he further added.

Pravan Malhotra, IFC’s co-lead for Global Internet Investments & lead for VC investments in South & Southeast Asia said

The Lenskart investment is a part of IFC’s Venture Capital group’s strategy to invest in innovative Internet, Healthcare and Technology companies across emerging markets. This investment will support a rapidly growing market leader in the Internet sector, while meeting a significant gap in the Indian eye care market As part of this investment, he will join Lenskart’s Board of Directors.

Lenskart has adopted a unique omni-channel approach thereby making eyewear truly accessible by making it available on desktop, mobile, hypermarkets, high streets, malls, hospitals and now even at home. The company conducts over 1,500 eye exams daily through its home eye exam service which it intends to make available for every home in urban and rural India.

Lenskart with its special focus on skill development and entrepreneurship development in India, gets people certified by National Skill Development Corporation [NSDC]. It runs skill development programs across four cities for training people on operating complex machinery required for manufacturing lenses as well as conducting accurate eye exams. It has over 100 business partners who run and operate stores and plans to partner with another 1000 entrepreneurs in the next three years. The company encourages women entrepreneurs under the Stand Up India scheme where it helps them get bank loans to become entrepreneurs.

Lenskart has been relentless about its focus on customer centricity. The company has built a strong leadership team, all of who work with the single mission of ‘creating enthusiastically satisfied customers all the time’. It has roped in professional stalwarts from retail, marketing and digital industries to head the respective divisions. The company will continue hiring great talent, particularly in technology.

About Lenskart

Founded in 2010, Lenskart is India’s largest online retailer of premium quality and stylish eye-wear, offering over 10,000 different styles to suit all pocket sizes and diverse consumer needs. With a unique click and mortar business model, Lenskart is revolutionizing the eye-wear industry by offering disruptive services like Free Home Eye check-up, 3D Try On, Free Home Trial and First Frame Free among others. Through innovative technology and a deep focus on consumer satisfaction, Lenskart has grown more than 200% year on year in the last 2 years, to be among the top 3 optical businesses in India. Lenskart has been funded by three venture capitalists till date, namely IDG Ventures ($4 million in October 2011) and Ronnie Screwvala-led Unilazer Ventures [$10 million in February 2013] and TPG Growth & TR Capital [$22 million in January 2015]. For more information, please visit LensKart

About IFC

IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, is the largest global development institution focused on the private sector in emerging markets. IFC’s committed portfolio in India is over $5 billion as of June 30, 2015. In FY15, IFC committed $1.4 billion in new investments. In addition to strengthening local capital markets in India, IFC is focused on boosting financing in infrastructure and logistics, promoting financial inclusion, helping create conditions to attract increased private capital, and helping structure public-private partnerships.

In India, IFC’s venture capital group has supported a number of healthcare companies like Portea, EyeQ and Nephroplus. IFC is also building a portfolio of market leading internet companies that include BigBasket in India, Netshoes in Brazil, Souq in the Middle East and Hepsiburada in Turkey. For more information, please visit IFC

Zuver [earlier coverage here], a Mumbai-based start-up, co-founded by Sidhanth Mally and Sovin Hegde, have raised Rs. 1.2 crore [USD 180,000] in early stage funding from Shruth & Smith Group, Bangalore and Hermes Group, Mumbai.

The Zuver app offers customers great flexibility as they can book a driver in advance or real time for an hour, or for a whole day through an app. The technology that powers Zuver allows them to locate and dispatch the driver who is positioned closest to the customer, within 40 minutes. All these services are offered at a highly competitive price. Zuver is available on Android as well as on iOS and at http://zuver.in or you can connect with them at 022-43686868.

If you are a regular traveller, you can upgrade your Zuver App with a monthly subscription where you can avail the driver for an entire month at a discounted rate and unlike other driver services, you can even book a driver for an outstation trip. The Package deal for 8 hours which only costs you 650 rupees, pay per minute and flexi-plans make Zuver a highly economical choice.

With almost 60 drivers on board, Zuver is currently seeking Pre-Series A funding to expand to Pune and Bangalore. They are also planning to increase the number of drivers to 150 in Mumbai by May.

Commenting on the funding,  Sidhanth Mally, Co-Founder of Zuver said

The term Zuver means reliable. Our idea was to launch an app that offers a reliable, cost-effective and flexible driver on demand service. What would make us one of a kind is the credibility. We ensure that our drivers have gone through multiple screening processes and tests before they are Zuver Drivers. The first round funding was used to kickstart our operations in Mumbai. We will soon be seeking Pre-Series A funding to expand to other metros. Currently, our focus is to ensure that Zuver is launched and functioning immaculately

Sovin Hegde, Co-Founder of Zuver said

The concept of a driver on demand is underserved. An integrated app that would let you book, track and pay for premium driver services which not just offers any driver, but a sophisticated, well-spoken and well-mannered one at your doorstep is certainly a novel concept. We are empowered by a technology that would let us dispatch a driver within 40 minutes of your booking. Zuver will transform the way many commutes

Zuver for Android and iOS is available here & here respectively.

About Zuver – Driver on Demand
Zuver is a start-up with a unique selling proposition –a service that promises reliable, skilled, well-trained ‘driver on demand’ at your doorstep. They aim to make their drivers the gold standard for industry drivers and create a new benchmark. This mobile-first company that offers the best in class service is on its course to expand its presence in other metros. Zuver, Your driver on demand is available on Android and iOS or at 022-43686868. For more information, please refer Zuver