Aesthetic Nutrition Pvt. Ltd, which sells chewable dietary supplements under the brand Power Gummies, has raised its first round of external funding, a top executive told VCCircle.
The company has raised $100,000 (Rs 70 lakh) from Alfa Ventures in its seed round of funding, said Divij Bajaj, founder and CEO, Power Gummies.
Alfa Ventures is a proprietary fund launched by angel investor Dhianu Das to make seed investments in startups.
The fund infusion will help the company scale up and launch a few other gummy health supplement variants in the near future, targeting different segments of the market, said Bajaj.
The New Delhi-based startup, which was founded in March 2018, seeks to tap into the nutritional over-the-counter healthcare market with its products. Its product Power Gummies, which are vegetarian, contains 10 essential vitamins along with biotin and folic acid which provide nutrition for hair and nail-care needs.
“Our vision is to break the biggest barrier in over-the-counter healthcare market—that is, the fear of medicine, which we tend to break down by eliminating the pills with tasty gummies,” said Bajaj.
The company aims to capture a big piece of the hair nutrition market, he added.
The company claims to have sold 797,340 (13,289 bottles) of Power Gummies so far and has a 33% loyal customer rate. It also sells its products on platforms such as Amazon, Nykaa, Healthkart and Netmeds.
Bajaj, a graduate of Delhi University’s Kirori Mal College, earlier co-founded Just Dakhila Pvt. Ltd, a platform to help parents and students search for schools. Ankita Chaudhary, a graduate in information technology from the University of Lucknow, is the chief operating officer at Power Gummies. She had also earlier worked with Just Dakhila.
Nutritional foods, supplements and drinks makers have attracted investor interest in the past months as they seek to tap into a growing class of health-conscious Indians with rising disposable income.
In April, VCCircle reported that RAW Pressery, which makes cold-pressed juices that are perceived to be healthier, raised fresh capital from a foreign investor.
Last year, protein-based functional foods brand Proliva raised funding from Mumbai Angels Network while food and beverage brand &ME, which focuses on women's health, received capital from Matrix Partners India.
Early last year, Bengaluru-based sports nutrition brand DAAKI also raised an undisclosed amount in angel funding from Rohan Agila.
Investor
Alfa Ventures was started by Das earlier this year and put in around 25% of the fund himself. The fund has a corpus of Rs 100 crore. It aims to make 25-30 bets, with an average ticket size of Rs 1 crore, Das had told VCCircle in February.
As an individual investor, Das counts GoMechanic, ClearDekho and Cleansecar in his portfolio.
In April, Alfa Ventures made its first investment in CivilCops, a chatbot operated by Delhi-based Tavroi Research Pvt. Ltd.
Earlier this week, the fund invested in Noida-based startup Skilancer Solar Pvt. Ltd, provides an artificial intelligence-powered autonomous robot to clean solar panels.
