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Unicorn India Ventures leads $2 Mn round in PeLocal

EntrackrEntrackr · 8m ago
Unicorn India Ventures leads $2 Mn round in PeLocal
Medial

Fintech startup PeLocal has raised $2 million in a seed funding round led by Unicorn India Ventures. The Chennai-based company had previously raised $1.06 million in the same round from Future Monk Investments and others. The proceeds will be used to expand and enhance the platform and also help accelerate go-to-market strategies for rolling out large-scale projects, PeLocal said in a press release. Launched in 2021 by Vivekanand Tripathi, PeLocal is a payment solutions provider within WhatsApp, advancing digital transactions for clients like Delhi Metro, Indraprastha Gas, Mahanagar Gas, and insurance providers. The platform specializes in transit ticketing, utility payments, and financial services, delivering secure solutions across government and private sectors. It aims to empower secure and end-to-end solutions leveraging cutting-edge communication channels. PeLocal aspires to leverage technologies like WhatsApp for seamless, secure, and customer-centric transactions. It also bridges the gap between merchants and consumers, envisioning the idea of being ‘Vocal for Local.’ The company plans to go aggressively on payments in WhatsApp and further strengthen its leadership position in the payments solutions market. In the last 12 months, PeLocal claims to have grown from 500K monthly payment transactions to 3 million monthly payment transactions. The company aims to touch 10 million monthly payment transactions on WhatsApp in the next 12 months. It is planning to launch a Marketing Catalog on WhatsApp with payments and an SMB payments platform on WhatsApp. It competes with other players in the space like Yellow.ai, Gupshup, and others.

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Atomicwork closes Seed round at $14 Mn

EntrackrEntrackr · 9m ago
Atomicwork closes Seed round at $14 Mn
Medial

B2B SaaS startup Atomicwork has raised an additional $3 million in its seed round from Abhinav Dhar, ex-CIO of TransUnion, Prasad Ramakrishnan, CIO and technology leader, Avanish Sahai, former ecosystem leader at Salesforce, ServiceNow, and Google Cloud and Rich Waldron, CEO of Tray. The firm’s existing investors like Storm Ventures, Z47 (formerly Matrix Partners), Blume Ventures, and Neon Fund also participated in the round. This is the second tranche of its seed round. In September last year, Atomicwork had raised $11 million led by Blume Ventures and Matrix Partners India. With this, the total funding for the startup stands at $14 million. The proceeds will be used for enterprise AI agent technology, fuel the firm’s GTM team expansion in the United States over the next three years, the company said in a press release. Founded in September 2022 by Vijay Rayapati, Kiran Darisi, and Parsuram Vijayasankar, Atomicwork provides software that automates workflows under the information and technology (IT), human resources (HR), finance, and other business functions. It helps companies instantly help their employees by collecting tribal knowledge from across the organization – stored in docs, wikis, information systems, email threads, and chat conversations. Previously, Rayapati had founded Minjar which raised $2 million before getting acquired by US-based publicly-listed cloud infrastructure company Nutanix for about $50 million. Blume also invested in Minjar’s initial funding round. Darisi and Vijayasankar were part of the founding team of SaaS unicorn Freshworks.

HiWiPay raises $2 Mn in Seed funding led by Unicorn India Ventures

EntrackrEntrackr · 4m ago
HiWiPay raises $2 Mn in Seed funding led by Unicorn India Ventures
Medial

HiWiPay raises $2 Mn in Seed funding led by Unicorn India Ventures Cross-border payments platform HiWiPay has raised $2 million in a seed funding round led by Unicorn India Ventures. The round also witnessed participation from Dewang Neralla's family office, Jupiter Metaverse LLP, and other angel investors such as Ritesh Malik, Mitesh Shah, and Nilesh Doshi. The proceeds will be used to expand and enhance the trade remittance business, as well as scale up operations in the education remittances sector, HiWiPay said in a press release. Co-founded in 2022 by Dewang Neralla, Geeta Chauhan, and Ujwal Tamminedi, HiWiPay is a cross-border payments platform that offers a seamless digital experience, eliminating paperwork hassles and ensuring secure, compliant transactions. The platform removes challenges such as a lack of transparency in exchange rates, perceived high forex margins, due diligence, compliance requirements, and documentation obstacles. The Mumbai-based startup aims to streamline processes across various sectors and industries facing intricate procedures. The platform provides competitive exchange rates and real-time tracking, making global payments effortless. HiWiPay plans to introduce its student app in the UK to establish a presence in key hubs across Europe. The company claims to have partnered with multiple banks and NBFCs to help individuals secure education loans, making studying abroad more accessible and achievable. It also plans to enter the SME trade remittance space and is set to launch co-branded forex cards and other financial services to cater to students. In the next 12–18 months, HiWiPay plans to onboard 5,000 international students on its student app. The company expects its transaction volume to reach $100 million in remittances and aims to double the network of education consultants to 1,000. It also plans to support 1,000 SME exporters with trade remittance solutions while strengthening banking partnerships to improve FX rates and payment efficiency. It competes with Skydo and Bricks Pay on the trade side and Fly Finance on the education side.

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