This week, the startup world had one of the biggest funding news–with Paytm raising $1.4 billion from existing investor Softbank. It also saw cab aggregator Ola restricting Softbank’s rights and strengthening those of its founders. While it is not funding news, the move by Ola showed signs of a startup ecosystem that is maturing.
Like last week, when EarlySalary, the pay-day lending platform raised funding, this week too saw fintech startups like Arohan, PaySense and Telr raise funding, making one wonder if 2017 is truly the year of fintech.
The key funding developments for the week gone by include:
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Elize raises seed funding
Elize, the sanitary pad maker startup from Ahmedabad, raised a seed round led by angel investors Startup Buddy and senior members from Arthur D Little, Rohit Sethi, Adnan Merhaba, Viditha Kanakamedala, Arun Venkatachalam, and Sunil Kalra from Murugappa Group.
Started in January, Elize will use this current round of funding to help strengthen product and help create brand awareness.
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Zapty raises funding of $500,000 led by Ideaspring Capital
Zapty, the project management platform, raised $500,000 from early-stage venture capital fund Ideaspring Capital. This is the fund’s fourth investment. The platform has built Zaplets, which are proprietary micro workflows that can be customised according to the needs of different sectors
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Niki.ai raises undisclosed funding from SAP
The artificial intelligence-based chatbot company raised an undisclosed funding from SAP. The company has already raised investment from Ronnie Screwvala’s Unilazer Ventures and Ratan Tata.
The startup leverages natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning to converse with customers over a simple chat interface, and places orders on their behalf in seconds with partner businesses.
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Fynd raises Series A funding of $500,000 led by Rocketship
Fynd, the…