These 22 startups are waiting in wings to become unicorns in 2022
- IBEF
- January 10, 2022
According to a VCCircle estimate, India's startup ecosystem is anticipated to produce 22 unicorns by 2022. In the next several years, the country is expected to have more than 100 unicorns.
In 2021, these'soonicorns,' or firms on the verge of becoming unicorns, received funding at a valuation of more than US$ 500 million but less than US$ 1 billion. Logistics firms ShipRocket and Porter are among the top five on the list.
Shiprocket raised US$ 185 million from Zomato, Temasek, and Lightrock for a US$ 950 million value, while Porter raised US$ 100 million from Tiger Global Management and Vitruvian Partners for a US$ 525 million valuation.
They could be joining the likes of Zinka and Delhivery, two other logistics unicorns.
Online gaming company Games24x7 and three fintech businesses OneScore, Jupiter, and ClearTax are among the other soonicorns. The list includes companies from eight different industries, with fintech startups leading the way, followed by retail and edtech firms.
Credit card designed specifically for mobile devices OneScore; Jupiter, a neobanking platform; ClearTax, a tax return filing business; KhataBook, a kirana-tech startup; Rupeek, a gold-loan startup; and neobank Open were among the fintech soonicorns.
At a post-money valuation of over US$ 720 million, OneScore raised US$ 76 million in its series C round of fundraising from Ocean View Investment, Matrix Partners, Sequoia Capital, QED Innovation Labs, and Hummingbird Ventures. Neobank Jupiter raised US$ 86 million in a round co-led by Tiger Global and Sequoia with a valuation of US$ 711 million, and Open raised US$ 62 million at a valuation of US$ 500 million from Temasek and Google, as well as Tiger Global.
LivSpace, a (Business to Business) B2B marketplace for packaging materials, Zepto, a 10-minute food delivery business, and Purpple, a beauty product vendor, could all raise funding at a valuation of more than US$ 1 billion in the retail sector.
While edtech businesses Vedantu, Eruditus, and UpGrad joined the prestigious club in 2021, LEAD School, Teachmint, and BrightCHAMPS are set to join in 2022.
GSV Ventures led a US$ 30 million funding round for LEAD School, a B2B management software supplier. Rocketship.vc and Vulcan Capital led a US$ 70 million investment in Teachmint. Premji Invest, GSV Ventures, and other investors contributed US$ 63 million to BrightCHAMPS. Each of the three edtech companies was valued at over US$ 500 million.
Agritech, online gambling, logistics, and media enterprises are among the companies on the list.
DeHaat, a Gurugram-based online marketplace for farm products and services, and Ninjakart, a (business to business) B2B platform for farm produce, each raised US$ 115 million and US$ 145 million at a valuation of more than US$ 500 million. Online gaming businesses Games24x7 and Zupee are poised to join Dream11 and Mobile Premier League in the unicorn club this year.
Whatfix, a software-as-a-service (SaaS) startup that attracted US$ 90 million from SoftBank, news aggregation InShorts, which received US$ 60 million from Vy Capital, and music app Gaana are the other three companies.
To be sure, in 2021, India's startup ecosystem produced 44 unicorns, compared to just 11 in 2020. India is home to around 70 unicorns, ranking third behind the United States and China.
India, according to some estimates, already boasts over 100 unicorns. According to Credit Suisse India equity strategist Neelkanth Mishra, these firms were collectively valued at over US$ 240 billion as of March 2021, and they hailed from a variety of industries, including technology, pharmaceuticals, and consumer products. He went on to say that two-thirds of these 100 unicorns were founded after 2005, with the fintech sector producing the majority of them.
Disclaimer: This information has been collected through secondary research and IBEF is not responsible for any errors in the same.
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