Consumer brand Happi Planet, fintech startup PocketATM and ice cream brand Frubon secured early-stage funding, the companies said on Tuesday.
Happi Planet
Happi Planet, a home care products brand, has raised around $1 million (Rs 8.47 crore) from Fireside Ventures.
Notably, this is Happi Planet’s second fundraise. The startup had raised Rs 1.25 crore from 100X.VC in March 2023.
The startup will use the funding proceeds to double down its efforts on online platforms and expand its physical reach to 250 stores by the end of 2024.
Happi Planet is founded by Nimeet Dhokai and Mayank Gupta, former Procter & Gamble executives in 2022. The brand provides home care products that are made from plant-based actives.
Its products are available on online platforms like Amazon, Big Basket and D-Mart Ready, as well as in offline modern trade stores like Reliance Signature stores.
Mumbai-based fintech startup PocketATM has raised $400,000 (Rs 3.3 crore) in a pre-seed funding round from a host of investors including Indian Express Commercial Ventures, the investment vehicle of Indian Express Group, Samir Modi of Modicare, Himanshu Nautiyal from Fractal Analytics, Nirav Mehta of Morgan Stanley Private Equity, Hemant Adarkar of Artha Center and Rajat Agarwal, partner at Vertices Partners.
PocketATM aims to allow local mom-and-pop stores to become cash dispensing touchpoints and service customers by delivering cash at home & also enabling cash-outs at the shop location, thus localising cash circulation.
PocketATM functions by utilising the idle cash liquidity at Kirana stores, allowing customers to withdraw cash using a QR code, eliminating the need for cards or traditional ATMs.
The platform is already operational in the Mumbai and Navi Mumbai regions, gradually expanding its footprint.
Dev Milk Foods Pvt. Ltd, a Jaipur-based company selling ice cream, milk and value-added dairy products under the brand Frubon, has secured funding in a Series A funding round from Fireside Ventures, Pi Ventures Llp (Narotam Sekhsaria Family Office) and other angel investors.
The fresh infusion of funds will be used to grow the existing retail footprint, improve the company’s production and distribution capability, enable expansion to other North Indian cities via various retail channels and increase product offerings.
Founded by DD Verma, a senior dairy technologist from the National Dairy Research Institute, Karnal, Frubon was commercially launched in 2017. The company is operated by Rahul Verma and Rohit Verma.
Frubon has a product suite of 200 stock-keeping units (SKUs) including a pure milk-based ice cream range of kulfis, cups, sundaes, cones, party packs, tubs, cakes along with value-added products including flavoured milk, paneer, ghee, flavoured fruit lassi, masala buttermilk and traditional dairy products.
