Nivesh.com, Arthya Wealth, KikoTV, and 6Degree raise funding

By Beena Parmar

  • 04 May 2021
Credit: 123RF.com

Nivesh.com has raised $1.6 million (Rs 11.8 crore) in a round led by seed and early-stage investor IAN Fund.  

The round also saw investors including angels from Indian Angel Network (IAN), LV Angel Fund as well as angels such as Vir Mehta and Raghav Kapur, the company said. 

The fintech firm was previously funded by LV Angel Fund, Next Billion Fund managed by Windrose Capital, and marquee angel investors such as Vivek Khare, Basab Pradhan, Rahul Gupta and Sandeep Shroff. 

The fresh capital will be used for expansion of product portfolio, specifically insurance and lending products, and for bringing more investment products to partners and customers. 

The expansion will also focus on tech enhancement. Nivesh is aiming to scale up partners and the team.  

It was co-founded by Sridhar Srinivasan and Anurag Garg, who had earlier co-founded mutualfundsindia.com and exited after acquisition by ICRA. 

Nivesh helps distributors of mutual funds and other financial products to deepen their penetration in the country. 

Arthya Wealth & Investments 

Arthya Wealth & Investments has raised $1 million (Rs 7.4 crore) in pre-Series A funding from family offices of industrialist Rishi Kumar Bagla (Bagla Group) and technocrat Krishen Lal Khanna (Trenton Investments).  

Founded last year by Gaurav Arora, the Mumbai-based wealth management and investment advisory firm has offices in Mumbai, Indore and Nagpur. It will soon expand to other regions like NCR, Bengaluru, Pune and Ahmedabad. 

The firm, which uses tech, will soon launch PMS (portfolio management services). 

Startup incubator and accelerator Venture Catalysts and global venture capital firm SOSV led a pre-Series A funding round in social ecommerce startup KikoTV. 

The round saw Negen Capital chief executive Neil Bahal and other angels, the company said. 

KikoTV is a live-streaming social e-commerce platform that enables users to virtually shop, sell, discover, and access entertainment. 

Shivam Varshney, an IIT Bombay alumnus, and Alok Chawla, an MBA from NMIMS, co-founded KikoTV which blends shopping and entertainment. Varshney says the funding will be used to speed up the seller onboarding process, develop the product and expand the team. 

 “…KikoTV is poised to disrupt a burgeoning social commerce market whose GMV (gross merchandise value) is pegged at $1.5-2 billion and projected to hit $16-20 billion in the next five years,” said Anil Jain, co-founder of Venture Catalysts. 

6Degree (Protinus Fashion Networking Pvt Ltd) has raised $1 million from Hyderabad-based SucSEED Indovation Fund, Keiretsu Forum, SucSEED Angel Network and AngelBay. 

The funds will be used to ramp up operations for flagship B2B retail SaaS platform catering to the fashion and lifestyle sector, the firm said. 

6Degree cofounder Nikhil Hegde said, “India is a growing $100 billion fashion and lifestyle market which is built on the foundation of over a million SMEs, waiting to ride the digital wave and scale their business. Our experience over the past year has been rewarding with over 300% growth in revenues to reach Rs 13 crore in 2020-21.” 

Bengaluru-based MedSign has raised undisclosed seed funding from SMSRC, an advisory and research firm catering to the pharma industry in India and Bangladesh, as a part of a strategic collaboration.

The funds will be utilised to strengthen healthcare delivery, the company said.

MedSign was founded in 2018 by healthcare professionals Kamlesh Patel, Shrihari Shidhaye and Vivan Darole.

The startup focuses on improving accessibility of health records and continuity of care.

Since going to the market in January last year, MedSign has onboarded 1,300 plus multi-speciality doctors and over 19,000 patients. It has also partnered some pharmaceutical companies.