Mumbai Angels is making follow-on investments in two of its portfolio companies. The firm has announced its follow-on investment in Speakwell English Academy, a spoken English training provider in Mumbai. The other investment will be in At Your Price, an online flight ticketing business run by Infiniti Software Solutions Pvt Ltd. Both these investment have seen participation of existing and new angel investors, all of who are part of the Mumbai Angels.
Mumbai Angels, which has been the most active early stage investors in recent times, is investing in the range of Rs 2 crore in Speakwell in this round, it said in a statement. It will also hold two board seats in the company. Praveen Chakravarthy and Vikas Choudhury will join Speakwell board from Mumbai Angels.
Mumbai Angels, which has invested in around 20 companies by now, has also invested in distressed travel inventory player At Your Price. The company, which has offices in Mumbai and Bangalore now, is the only firm in India with an algorithm for distressed inventory, said Chakravarthy, one of the co-founders of Mumbai Angels.
At Your Price has tweaked its business model, and combined its distressed play with a corporate product. "They are now installed in 100 corporates across India," said Chakravarthy. The company is currently getting a lot of traction and is also profitable.
Speakwell raised its first round from Mumbai Angels around one year back. The company plans to utilise the fund to expand its presence in the domestic as well as international market, apart from launching new businesses. The company, which has utilised its earlier fund to consolidate its offerings in Mumbai and in building more depth in its team, brand and content, believes that this round will help it expand further by leveraging its brand and technology on offer.
Aslam Moosa, CEO, Speakwell, said in the statement that the company had successfully completed an International Program for Indian students and planned to expand the services further to tier II cities in India. “The current round of investment will help us to rapidly grow in this front," Moosa added. Speakwell currently runs over 65 centers in Mumbai. It also has operation in Pune and Ahmedabad, and plans to foray in Kanpur. Apart from spoken English courses, Speakwell also offers training to those aspiring jobs in the retail sector.
Earlier this week, Mumbai Angels announced an investment of over Rs 2 crore in Onward Mobility, a mobile applications startup in Mumbai. Earlier in January this year, it has invested in AIOCD Pharmasofttech AWACS Pvt Ltd, a company engaged in creating electronic data exchange platform for pharmaceutical retailers & wholesalers.
Of the nearly 20 companies backed by Mumbai Angels, around eight have been able to raise series-A round of funding from venture capital players. Usually a series-A round involves a partial and full exit from the angel investors, which give them good returns.
"Typically Series-A rounds happen anywhere from 3-10 times our price point of entry," said Chakravarthy. Mumbai Angels has seen partial or full exit events recently from companies like Reverse Logistics, Dhama Apparels, Apalya Technologies and InMobi.
