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Paras Chopra’s Nintee shuts down, to return investors’ money

EntrackrEntrackr · 1y ago
Paras Chopra’s Nintee shuts down, to return investors’ money
Medial

Nintee, a digital health startup launched by Wingify founder Paras Chopra, has announced shutting down its operations after a year of launch. In a blog post, Chopra said that the majority of funding raised by the company is still remaining and will be returned to investors over the next few weeks. Nintee was backed by the likes of Peak XV Partners, Kunal Shah, and others. “Our original hypothesis was to use AI for helping people build better habits to transform their lives. This attracted a passionate niche, but we couldn’t build conviction that it could be a VC-scale business,” said Chopra. After abandoning the initial idea, the firm tried another pivot to explore education and learning related ideas, but Nintee team quickly discovered that building a successful consumer app today is very hard. Nintee has provided four months of severance to the impacted employees and also offered them to join Chopra’s other company VWO at the same salary. Nintee was the third company founded by Chopra after VWO and Wingify. His bootstrapped company Wingify reported back-to-back profits in the past fiscal years. Its revenue from operations increased 16.8% to Rs 223 crore in FY23 with Rs 51 crore profit after tax. Around half a dozen startups operating in India have announced shutting down their operations in the ongoing calendar year so far. The list counts Resso (India), Rario, OKX (India), Muvin and GoldPe. In 2023, more than 15 startups ceased their operations over funding and other challenges.

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Edtech startup Bluelearn shuts operations, to return 70% of capital

EntrackrEntrackr · 1y ago
Edtech startup Bluelearn shuts operations, to return 70% of capital
Medial

Social learning platform Bluelearn on Sunday announced that it has shut down its operations as the firm found it tough to grow fast. The three-year-old firm will return 70% of the capital it raised to its investors. The Bengaluru-based startup had raised nearly $4 million across two rounds from Elevation Capital, Lightspeed, Titan Capital, 2am VC. Angel investors including Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal, Awais Ahmed, Vivek Mohan and others also backed the community driven platform. “We realised that building a venture-scale business with Bluelearn was tough. We had been very conservative with capital, allowing us to return 70% of the capital we raised back to investors,” Bluelearn’s co-founder and CEO Harish Uthayakumar said on X. Founded by Uthayakumar and Shreyans Sancheti, Bluelearn started off as a telegram channel for students to help each other with common questions. At its peak, the startup claimed to have over 250,000 members from various colleges and startups across India and abroad. Since its inception, the company has helped thousands of students with internships, jobs and make friends through its online community. More than half a dozen startups operating in India shut down their operations in 2024 so far. The list counts Resso (India), Rario, OKX (India), Muvin, GoldPe, Koo and Nintee. However, a few of them have also announced to return a significant capital to their investors. For context, Paras Chopra-led digital health startup Nintee, which shut down its operations in April, said that it will return a majority of the capital raised from its investors. Similarly, trading app Investmint will return 25% of capital as it underwent insolvency proceedings. As per a media report, fashion startups Fashinza and Virgo will also return capital to their investors after a failed pivot. As per data compiled by TheKredible, more than 15 startups ceased their operations due to funding crunch and other challenges in 2023.

Tiger Global-backed Toplyne shuts down operations

EntrackrEntrackr · 9m ago
Tiger Global-backed Toplyne shuts down operations
Medial

Plug-and-play platform Toplyne is shutting down operations and returning capital to investors, according to sources who spoke to Entrackr. This decision comes as a surprise, given that Toplyne had raised funding from prominent investors like Peak XV and Tiger Global. “Despite securing sizable funding, the startup struggled with scaling beyond a certain point, leading the founding team to make the decision to wind down and reach out to investors to return remaining capital,” said one of the sources requesting anonymity. Toplyne is a plug-and-play platform designed to help sales teams at product-led growth companies increase conversion rates among freemium users. Founded by Rishen Kapoor, Ruchin Kulkarni, and Rohit Khanna, this three-and-a-half-year-old startup facilitated lead conversion by integrating actionable insights directly into products, enabling companies to turn potential leads into paying customers. “After 3.5 years of building Toplyne, we’ve made the tough decision to wind down operations and return capital to our investors. Despite our best efforts, we couldn’t reach the scale or product-market fit we aimed for,” said Rishen Kapoor in a LinkedIn post. Toplyne has raised over $17 million in total capital from investors including Peak XV, Tiger Global, Surge, Together Fund, and angel investors like Kunal Shah and Harshil Mathur. According to the startup data intelligence platform TheKredible, Toplyne was valued at approximately $80 million in its latest fundraising round. Sources indicate that one of the co-founders, Rohit Khanna, exited the firm sometime last year due to differences within the founding team. Queries sent to Kapoor and Peak XV didn’t elicit any immediate response. Toplyne joins a group of startups that have shut down operations in 2024 while returning partial capital to investors. Others on this unique list include Greenik, Fashinza, Virgio, Investmint, Bluelearn, Paras Chopra-led Nintee, and Karthik Gurumurthy-led Convenio.

Everstone to acquire Paras Chopra’s Wingify for $200 Mn

EntrackrEntrackr · 6m ago
Everstone to acquire Paras Chopra’s Wingify for $200 Mn
Medial

Everstone to acquire Paras Chopra’s Wingify for $200 Mn SaaS company Wingify is in the process of being acquired by private equity firm Everstone, according to sources familiar with the development told Entrackr. This acquisition is set to be one of the largest deals in the SaaS space and a significant milestone for a startup that has been bootstrapped since its inception. Sources indicate that Everstone is set to acquire a majority stake in the Delhi-based company. "Co-founder Paras Chopra will retain a minority stake in Wingify but will not have any operational role. Meanwhile, co-founder and CEO Sparsh Gupta will hold a significant stake and continue leading the company as chief executive officer (CEO)," said one source on condition of anonymity. TechCrunch, which reported the development first, said that the deal will be worth around $200 million. Entrackr has reached out to Chopra and Everstone for comments. Wingify offers SaaS solutions to online enterprises, supporting them in optimizing their conversion rates through their proprietary tool known as the Visual Website Optimizer (VWO). While Wingify has reached $50 million in annual recurring revenue, its revenue from operations increased to Rs 288.61 crore in FY24 from Rs 220.60 crore in FY23. The company’s profit after tax also increased 30% year-on-year to Rs 61.04 crore. Besides Wingify, Chopra also co-founded two startups: VWO and Nintee. Backed by Peak XV Partners, Kunal Shah, and others, Nintee was shut down in April last year, with the firm returning the majority of the capital it had raised from investors. According to Chopra’s LinkedIn profile, he has been the founder and independent director of Turing's Dream since April of last year. With a fund size exceeding $2 billion, Everstone focuses on the Indian and Southeast Asian markets. It has deployed capital in mid-market, control growth, and cross-border opportunities across sectors such as technology services, healthcare and pharma, consumer, financial services, and industrials.

Exclusive: Trading app Investmint halts services; explores M&A deal

EntrackrEntrackr · 1y ago
Exclusive: Trading app Investmint halts services; explores M&A deal
Medial

Signal-based trading app Investmint has halted its services as the company found it difficult to figure out a reliable business model, sources aware of the development told Entrackr. In October 2022, Investmint raised $2 million in Seed round led by Nexus Venture Partners, with participation from other angel investors. As per sources, the firm had decent traction with substantial money left from the last fundraise but the team couldn’t translate them into monetization. “Investmint has been exploring acquisition opportunities with well capitalized wealth management companies,” said one of the sources requesting anonymity. Founded in February 2022 by Aakash Goel and Mohit Chitlangia, Investmint used to assist users in arriving at investment decisions and managing wealth with data backed signals. “If the acquisitions talks won’t materialize, the company may return remaining capital to its backers,” said another source who also requested anonymity. The company’s spokesperson confirmed that the team has discontinued Investmint as a product and is re-evaluating its offerings. “We’re in late-stage talks with a few big players for M&A,” the spokesperson said. A clutch of startups have returned or are in the process of returning investors’ money after their startup failed to find a product market fit (PMF) or sustainable business model. Earlier this year, Nintee, a digital health startup launched by Wingify founder Paras Chopra, announced shutting down its operations. The firm also announced that it will return the majority of funding it raised from the investors. As per an ET report, fashion startups Virgio and Fashinz are planning to return most of the capital they raised from the investors after a failed pivot. Virgio has raised nearly $40 million while Fashinza has scooped up over $150 million in funding to date. While the majority of investors don’t like to exit out from a portfolio company with a slice of their original investment, the trend of returning capital by founders seems to be a progressive one. After all, there is no point in being stuck when things aren’t working out for long.

Paras Chopra to launch advanced AI lab in India after $200 Mn exit

EntrackrEntrackr · 5m ago
Paras Chopra to launch advanced AI lab in India after $200 Mn exit
Medial

Paras Chopra to Launch Advanced AI Lab in India After $200 Mn Exit Indian entrepreneur Paras Chopra, who recently sold SaaS startup Wingify for $200 million, is now planning to set up a modern AI lab in India. Announcing the development on social media platform X, Chopra stated that he aims to create efficient reasoning models and advanced AI algorithms that can have a global impact. Chopra is assembling a team to prepare a proposal for India’s AI mission and is seeking technical experts to join, either full-time or part-time. However, he has not yet disclosed the name of his next venture. He believes that solving problems in complex domains is crucial for economic growth and that enhancing AI models capable of highly intelligent reasoning could help address some of the world’s most pressing challenges, such as poverty, cancer, and fundamental questions about the universe and human consciousness. Unlike large Western AI labs with massive budgets for GPUs, Chopra’s project will prioritize efficiency. The team will explore innovative methods such as reinforcement learning, distillation, pruning, and neuroscience-based approaches to improve AI performance using limited computational resources. This will mark Chopra’s third startup venture, following Wingify (VWO) and Nintee. While Wingify was acquired by Everstone, Nintee was shut down in April last year. The company, backed by Peak XV, Kunal Shah, and others, returned most of the capital it had raised from investors.

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