Kiko Live, a video-based social commerce startup operated by Smooth Tag Technologies Pvt Ltd, has raised $1 million pre-Series A funding, the company said in a statement today.
Homegrown startup incubator and accelerator Venture Catalysts, United States-based venture capital firm SOSV, and multi-city Tech-Startup investor GSF Accelerator led the funding round along with Dinesh Agarwal, CEO, IndiaMart InterMesh Ltd, and Amarjit Bajra, managing director of Spotify India, the company said.
“The funding will be utilised to scale up technology and marketing and onboard Live sellers on the platform,” said Shivam Varshney, co-founder and CEO, Kiko Live.
Kiko Live or Kiko TV was set up in 2020 by by Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)-Bombay alumnus Varshney and Alok Chawla, an MBA from NMIMS.
The Indore-based platform enables local sellers to open an online store in under two minutes by using modern technology to provide customers with a two-way interactive shopping experience, allowing them to enter a shop virtually and engage with sellers and get assistance from them.
“Kiko Live solves the online selling problem of millions of small retailers which is nearly a $1 trillion business in India. We believe their solution is simple and easy to adopt by sellers and being early movers in this space gives them a great advantage,” said Rajesh Sawhney, GSF Accelerator, founder and CEO, GSF Accelerator.
The company enables millions of local merchants, who generate more than $ 700 billion in annual revenue in India, to create virtual live stores and sell to customers and also provides payment and delivery solutions, Kiko Live said.
Earlier in January, Kiko TV had raised an undisclosed sum as part of its pre-Series A fundraise led by SOSV.
This was after a fund-raising round of an undisclosed sum from Venture Catalysts’ 9Unicorns Fund and a clutch of angel investors December 2020.
In August last year, Kiko TV had raised $300,000 (around Rs 2.18 crore) from 9Point8 Capital and other angel investors, according to VCCEdge, the data intelligence arm of VCCircle.
Meanwhile, Venture Catalysts had also participated in Kiko Live’s seed funding round through its fund 9Unicorns.
The VC firm is also planning to expand its focus on fintech startups as it is planning set up a fund of $100 million (Rs 750 crore), VCCircle reported this week reported this week.