Bengaluru-based Eloelo, a social commerce firm floated by former Flipkart executives, on Thursday said it has secured $13 million (around Rs 100 crore) in a Series A round co-led by KB Investments and Kalaari Capital, with existing investors Waterbridge Ventures and Lumikai Fund.
The round also saw participation from Convivialité Ventures and Rocket Capital.
Eloelo, operated by Greenhorn Wellness Pvt. Ltd, plans to use the fresh money to scale up its tech, product and content teams, along with fostering new partnerships with content creators.
Eloelo was founded in 2020 by Saurabh Pandey and Akshay Dubey. Pandey, who did his MBA from Jamnalal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies (JBIMS), Mumbai, worked as a category leader in Flipkart for five years. Dubey, an alumnus of IIT Kharagpur who was a senior manager at Flipkart, has also worked with used car marketplace GoZoomo.
“We have been growing at 40% MoM with a vision to build the future of interactive entertainment. Our Series A fundraise demonstrates the belief our current and new investors have in what we are building and enables us to take bolder bets to shape the creator economy for Bharat,” said Pandey.
The startup claims to have crossed over 3.5 million users and 40,000 creators on its platform.
KB Investment Co is the venture capital arm of South Korea’s KB Financial Group. It seeks to invest in venture companies that offer innovative technology, service, and entrepreneurship.
Kalaari is a $160 million venture capital fund with a strong advisory team in Bengaluru investing in early-stage, technology-oriented companies in India.
“There is an entire generation of first-time internet users who are now able to build a direct channel to their followers. Deeper relationships will be built between creators and their fans, powered by the emergence of an entire ecosystem of tools and platforms that enable this shift. Eloelo is enabling these creators with a blend of social games & interactivity with live streaming,” said Vani Kola, managing director at Kalaari Capital.
In 2020, Eloelo raised $450,000 (Rs 3.35 crore) as a part of its seed funding led by early-stage venture capital firm Waterbridge Ventures, VCCircle reported.