Bayside Media Pvt. Ltd, which operates a management training programme startup SEAL Professional, has raised capital in its pre-Series A funding round from Mumbai-based Equanimity Ventures.
The company will use the funds to support its programme development and marketing apart from focussing on product innovation and geographical expansion, SEAL Professional said in a statement.
The company didn’t disclose the amount it raised.
Mumbai-based SEAL Professional was founded by Shyaam Santhakumar in 2016. It trains undergraduate students in management and leadership skills and helps them with internship and first-job placements.
The startup says it has so far trained over 4,000 students. More than 1,800 people who have gone through its programme have been placed at companies such as Flipkart and Zara.
Equanimity managing partner Rajesh Sehgal said SEAL Professional is a great effort by Shyaam and his team to systematically train undergraduate students preparing them for the real-world job market.
“We believe this is a pertinent problem being solved at a scale which can transform the lives of students and employment in India,” he added.
Equanimity is an early-stage venture capital firm founded in 2017 by Rajesh Sehgal, who has previously worked with Franklin Templeton. The firm counts the US-based investor Mark Mobius as an investment committee member. HCL co-founder Arjun Malhotra is part of its advisory board.
The VC says it focusses on early-stage firms in the Indian startup ecosystem. In February 2018, it marked the first close of its debut fund at Rs 70 crore ($10.8 million). The largely sector-agnostic fund has a target corpus of Rs 200 crore, including a greenshoe option of Rs 100 crore.
In May last year, Equanimity led a Rs 14 crore (around $2 million) funding round in the Mumbai-based VNF Ideas Pvt. Ltd, which operates agricultural-technology startup FreshVnF. Ahmedabad-based venture capital firm GVFL and the family office of Asian Paints Ltd non-executive vice-chairman Manish Choksi also invested in FreshVnF.
Also that month, the VC firm led a Series B round of funding in Peel-Works Pvt. Ltd, a grocery business-to-business commerce platform. It has also invested in companies including online event venue booking platform BookEventZ.com, fintech startup Sqrrl and medical supplies marketplace DrStore.
