AppsForBharat, the owner of the devotion platform Sri Mandir, has raised Rs 175 crore ($20 million) in a Series C funding round led by its existing investor Susquehanna Asia Venture Capital, a venture capital firm sponsored by US-headquartered financial services firm Susquehanna International Group (SIG).
Its existing investors Nandan Nilekani’s Fundamentum, Elevation Capital, and Peak XV Partners also participated in the round.
“With this fundraise, we are entering the next phase of growth - scaling temple partnerships, improving digital infrastructure for temples and building AI capabilities to serve our users better,” said Prashant Sachan, founder and chief executive of AppsForBharat.
The company plans to use the capital to invest in over 20 temple towns in India, beginning with Varanasi, Ujjain, Ayodhya and Haridwar. It will further create logistics and fulfillment hubs across its temple network to manage delivery of prasad, and other ritual-related articles, the company said in a statement on Tuesday.
A part of the capital will also be used to improve its services and commerce verticals, and build AI-led features to bolster user engagement, it said.
Fundraising so far
The latest round brings the total funding raised by the company to $48 million (around Rs 410 crore). AppsForBharat last raised $18 million (around Rs 151 crore) in Series B funding in September 2024, led by mid-stage venture capital firm Fundamentum, participation from Susquehanna Asia VC as well as existing investors Elevation Capital, Peak XV, and Mirae Asset VC. Elevation had led its $10 million Series A in 2021.
The firm also counts Scott Schleifer of Tiger Global, Saurabh Gupta of DST Global, Ankush Sachdeva, Farid Ahsan and Bhanu Pratap Singh of General Autonomy, Utsav Somani of iSeed, Anshumani Ruddra of Google, Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal of Meesho, and Kunal Shah of CRED among its backers.
From seasonal to year-round
Sachan, an IIT Bombay alumni, set up AppsForBharat in November 2020. Its SriMandir app currently provides access to a range of products and services that cater to the spiritual and devotional needs of users. It helps users participate in pujas and make offerings (chadhava) as part of the rituals, and access devotional content.
“We have grown by 2X in the last 6 months and have been able to create significant value to our temple partners and our devotees.. enabled consistent, year-round revenue for priests, local vendors, and service providers in temple towns,” Sachan said.
“These communities have traditionally depended on seasonal footfall; by digitising their services, we’re helping uplift livelihoods and bring stability to an otherwise informal and fragmented ecosystem.”
The app claims to have more than 4 crore downloads currently, and sees 20% of the demand coming from the Indian diaspora living in the US, UK, UAE, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
“What excites us most is their evolution from a service marketplace to a comprehensive platform that serves the complete spiritual journey,” said Sai Araveti, Investment Advisor to Susquehanna Asia VC.
