This week has seen a bumper round of investment for Indian startups, with 30 companies securing a total of $292 million in funding. The top two fundraisers were Acceldata and Ushur, based in the US and India respectively, who each received $50 million. This represents a substantial increase from the previous week's total of $87 million. Nine growth and late-stage startups, including one undisclosed round, also announced their latest fundraising efforts, with Acceldata and Ushur among them.
In the early-stage sector, 21 startups have secured funding, including five undisclosed rounds. Electric vehicle (EV) start-up Turno led the pack with a $13.8 million Series A round, followed by Rezolve.ai, FireCompass, Hatica, Cusmat, and Bluelearn. The financial details of startups including Eume, SatSure, Chingari, Recode Studios, Avenue Growth, and Winston were not disclosed.
The city of Bengaluru dominated the funding charts this week, with 14 of its startups securing a total of $212 million. Meanwhile, Pune-based startups raised $35 million across three deals. Artificial intelligence (AI) was the standout segment, with the highest number of deals and amount raised, followed by SaaS, fintech, EV, and healthtech.
The week also saw five merger and acquisition deals, including the acquisition of HRtech start-up MyRobin by Better Place, and Upwards by Lendingkart. Unitus Ventures also launched a new fund worth $9.6 million.
In contrast to previous weeks, there were only a couple of employee stock option plan (ESOP) buybacks, including Tredence's $30 million and Sunstone's $14.5 million worth of stock. Unfortunately, there were also layoffs, with media reports suggesting that around 50 employees were let go by Pocket Aces. So far this year, nearly 5,000 startup employees have been affected by the ongoing "funding winter".
