Let's catch up!
Latest IQ reports, welcoming 2 new companies, our Mysore founder offsite, and more.
Dear Investors and Friends,
Wishing you all a joyful and vibrant Navaratri!
It has been a while since we last caught up, but we’re back with some exciting updates to share.
We added 2 new reports to our ongoing ‘20 Things About…’ mini-report series:
1. 20 Things About Education in India
India has ~500 Mn people who are < 19 years of age. That’s a LOT of kids that need to be educated, and we haven’t been able to keep up with the demand.
We’ve got the numbers; education has always been a top priority for Indians, and everyone is chasing the ‘education upgrade’, irrespective of class, be it for status, salary, or even marriage prospects. VCs have invested in all possible business models, but we haven't seen a large outcome yet. So, what’s next in Education?
Read our 20 nuanced and crisp insights and observations surrounding India’s $225 Bn Education Opportunity here.
2. 20 Things About Weddings in India
Nobody does weddings quite like India!
With 1 in every 4 weddings worldwide being from India and over 10 Mn job opportunities created by this industry alone, it's safe to say weddings are a big deal here.
In this report, we dive into the history, social context, and economics of Indian weddings. We also cover how Indians spend money on weddings and changing consumer preferences in this space. Read the full report here.
Check out both reports and let us know your thoughts!
Find all our reports in the ‘20 Things About…’ series here.
We welcomed 2 new companies to our portfolio:
1. Furnishka, an offline first furniture retailer, raised $3.2 Mn in its pre-Series A round led by us.
They are aimed at making high-quality furniture accessible to everyone. Through both their online and large-format stores, Furnishka offers over 1k SKUs and has served 10k+ customers so far.
Read more about their pre-Series A round and what they’re building here.
2. Convin, an AI-powered conversation intelligence platform, raised $6.5 Mn in its Series A round led by us.
Their platform empowers customer-facing teams—sales, support, and collections—to analyze omnichannel conversations and extract actionable insights from them. So far, they’ve partnered with 80+ brands, including Titan, Asian Paints, Acko, and Treebo, to increase agent productivity, reduce misselling, ensure compliance, and elevate CX.
Read more here.
We're also super happy to share that we are continuing to back 2 of our portfolio companies:
1. Agrim, a B2B agri-inputs e-commerce platform, raised $17.3 Mn in its Series B round, led by Asia Impact, along with participation from us, Omnivore, Kalaari Capital, and others.
Read more here.
2. Our pre-seed company Llumo raised $1 Mn in its seed round led by SenseAI ventures, along with participation from us, AumVC, and others.
Llumo is an AI optimisation platform helping high-growth SaaS businesses drastically reduce their AI performance costs and conduct 360° LLM performance evaluations in real time.
Learn more about their seed round here.
In July, we had the privilege of hosting Mr. Harsh Mariwala, Founder and Chairman of Marico Limited and Kaya Limited, at our office.
In a candid and free-flowing conversation with our team and some of our portfolio founders, Mr. Harsh generously shared lessons from his five decades+ of experience in company building. Read our favourite takeaways from the session here (the ones on team building are a must!)
We kicked off the 8th Edition of our Anti-Dilution Series in August, a learning program for Analysts and Associates from the ecosystem. 100+ budding VCs joined us each for our sessions on Agritech, Gaming, and VC Careers.
We wrapped up August with a cozy autumn offsite in Mysore, bringing together 50 founders from our portfolio. The 2-day workation was packed with knowledge-sharing sessions, open conversations, and, of course, plenty of fun!
IQ Portfolio in the media:
1. Masai School alumnus Aman Kashyap captivated the internet by sharing his remarkable journey of going from a delivery boy at Swiggy to becoming an SDE at the same company.
2. Kunj Sanghvi, VP of Content at Kuku FM, shared with Analytics India Magazine how they’re leveraging GenAI for content creation, voice production, and generating and analysing metadata—empowering their creators to become full-stack creatives.
Check out the full feature here.
3. We were thrilled to see Andreessen Horowitz feature Reo.Dev in their report on how AI is set to transform the next generation of Sales Tech.
Reo.Dev is a revenue intelligence tool helping developer-focused go-to-market teams accelerate sales. It uses AI to find developer accounts that are ready to buy from vast data sources.
Read the report, ‘Death of a Salesforce’, here.
IQ Top Picks:
Find 3 high-quality content recommendations handpicked by the IQ team below—stuff that is both enjoyable and insightful. Happy reading, watching, or listening!
1. Newsletter: Mid-Life Entrepreneur by Shashank Mehta (Founder and CEO, The Whole Truth Foods)
Why do consumers happily pay ₹1000 for a face cream but hesitate at ₹100 for a protein bar? In his post, ‘Why packaged food startups fail’, Shashank reveals the struggles behind scaling food brands, from tight profit margins to the way we value what we consume. A thought-provoking read for anyone interested in consumer brands!
2. India's toy market has long been dominated by imports, but that’s quickly changing. Check out this thread by Aditya Kondawar (Partner and VP, Complete Circle) on how India is redefining its position in the global toy market.
3. Book: Build by Tony Fadell
Decades of product design and leadership experience distilled into a no-frills guide, ‘Build’ is a must-read for anyone who wants to excel in product design, entrepreneurship, or leadership. With lessons from developing iconic tech like the iPod and iPhone, the book gives readers an inside look at what it takes to create game-changing products and companies.
As always, we would like to leave you with some of the things our founders and the IQ team have been saying online:
Thank you for taking the time to read this newsletter. We’ll be back with another one soon.
Cheers,
Team IndiaQuotient.