Supply chain-focussed software-as-as-service (SaaS) provider Pando has raised $30 million (around Rs 254 crore) in a Series B funding round led by Iron Pillar, which invested $12 million in the company.
New investor Uncorrelated Ventures as well as its existing investors Nexus Venture Partners, Chiratae Ventures and Next47 also participated in the round.
Several angel investors, including CVS Health chairman David Dorman, New York Stock Exchange board director Tom Noonan, Bain Capital partner Scott Kirk, Inspire Brands co-founder Paul Brown, Gainsight chief executive Nick Mehta and Pubmatic’s founder Amar Goel also invested in the company’s Series B round.
Pando plans to use the fresh funds to drive the company’s growth across geographies and industries. “The capital will power a bigger brand and deepen our sales presence in Asia and the US. It will also strengthen our investments in R&D, especially in our AI and no-code capabilities to put power in the hands of supply chain leaders who drive business growth and agility,” said Jayakrishnan.
Pando was set up by Nitin Jayakrishnan and Abhijeet Manohar in 2017. It provides a no-code cloud platform, which helps manufacturers, distributors, retailers, and third-party logistics services providers streamline the end-to-end order-to-fulfilment process. It claims that its services improve service levels and reduce carbon footprint and costs.
Mohanjit Jolly, partner at growth-stage focused VC Iron Pillar, has joined Pando’s board in conjunction with this investment. He believes that Pando will be a global leader in the category.
“Large verticals such as logistics are ready for technology-led disruption. Pando’s growth with multiple Fortune 500 companies is a testimony to the quality of the product and the management team. It’s the vision of building a generational company is the reason behind this partnership with founders Abhijit and Nitin.”
To be sure, Pando counts several Fortune 500 enterprises such as Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, Nestle, Nivea, Accuride, Danaher, Perfetti Van Melle and BP Castro, among those who use its cloud platform. It has a presence in Asia Pacific and the US.
Pando’s chief executive Jayakrishnan emphasised that most of the brands are weighed down by legacy logistics tools that make their products less affordable, accessible and eco-friendly.
“Our platform allows these brands to automate manual processes, modernise legacy systems and plug the gaps between tools without multi-year transformations.”
Prior to this, Pando raised Rs 64 crore (around $8 million) in a Series A funding round in January 2020, led by Chiratae Ventures, with participation from Siemens-backed Next47 and existing investor Nexus Venture Partners. To date, the startup has raised $45 million.
“Since Pando’s Series A in 2020, our revenue has grown 8x and our customer base, 5x. We’re scaling our North America and global business with customer wins and a network of strong partners,” said Pando’s chief revenue officer for Asia-Pacific, Parvesh Ghai.
In the next 18 months, Pando will grow its revenue by 3x while maintaining a healthy burn ratio of 1:1, Jayakrishnan added.
