Mamearth turns unicorn after a fresh round

Mamaearth, a baby and mother care brand, has raised nearly $80 million in a new round led by Sequoia at a unicorn valuation. This is the Bengaluru-based startup’s second round in 2021. It had raised $50 million in a round led by Sofina in July, at a valuation of $730 million. According to regulatory filings, MamaEarth has approved the allotment of 1,741 Series F preference shares at an issue price of Rs 33,85,049 in order to raise Rs 589.3 crore ($79.5 million). Sequoia led the round with a Rs 311.8…

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Globalbees joins unicorn club with $111.5 million funding

SoftBank-backed GlobalBees Brands Pvt Ltd, a Thrasio-style direct-to-consumer (D2C) venture that aggregates and invests in e-commerce brands, announced on Wednesday that it had raised $111.5 million in a Series B funding round led by Premji Invest at a unicorn valuation. Unicorns are private companies that have a market capitalization of $1 billion or more. The funding round was led by Steadview Capital, with participation from existing investors SoftBank and e-commerce baby products company FirstCry, according to the company. GlobalBees is now valued at $1.1 billion, making it the 44th Indian…

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India emerged as second largest startup hub : Said PM Modi

Prime Minister Narendra Modi stated on Tuesday that India has emerged as the world’s second largest startup hub, thanks in large part to students from Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs). The Prime Minister during the 54th convocation ceremony of IIT Kanpur said, “In this 75th year of independence, we have over 75 unicorns, over 50,000 start-ups. Of these, 10,000 have come only in the last 6 months. India has emerged to be the second biggest startup hub in the world, and this feat has been achieved majorly with the help…

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Indian geospatial technology startups ready to take on the sky

Awais Ahmad, co-founder of the Indian geospatial technology startup Pixxel, is excited for the New Year. His startup is finally set to launch the first of its planned low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites, after multiple delays due to operational issues and a variety of other factors. Similarly, GalaxEye, another startup developing its own satellite constellation, has stated that the first member of its 15-satellite constellation will be launched in early 2023. Back on the ground, the geospatial survey company Genesys International recently announced a plan to create high resolution 3D maps…

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Neobank Jupiter raises $86 mn in Series C round

Neobank Jupiter has raised $86 million as part of its Series C fundraise according to regulatory filings accessed through Tofler, The round was led by US-based QED Investors and Sequoia Growth Fund, and other existing investors such as Tiger Global, Matrix Partners, 3one4 Capital, and BEENEXT participated. This is Jupiter’s second round of funding in 2021, a year that saw an unprecedented surge in startup funding. Jitendra Gupta, the startup’s founder and CEO, confirmed the funding and stated that the company’s valuation has now increased to $710 million. This represents…

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Zoom acquires the assets of event production startup Liminal

Zoom, a video-conferencing platform, announced on Tuesday that it had acquired certain assets from Liminal, an event production startup. Liminal is a startup that provides event production solutions based primarily on Zoom’s SDK. Andy Carluccio and Jonathan Kokotajlo, two of Liminal’s co-founders, will also join Zoom. “Liminal’s solutions, including their ZoomOSC and ZoomISO apps, will help bridge Zoom with traditional and emerging event control applications and hardware to help theaters, broadcast studios, and other creative organizations address complex technical production needs, and collaborate and create online effectively,” the company said…

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Whatsapp working on a new community feature

WhatsApp has reportedly been working on a new Communities feature, and we now have our first look at it. The Communities feature is expected to enhance the app’s functionality by allowing up to ten groups to be linked in a single ‘Community.’ The feature was recently discovered in an iOS beta build and is expected to be available on both platforms soon. Admins of a community will have more control than admins of a group and will be able to do things like decide who can and cannot message on…

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5G network will be available in India by 2022 : Says DoT

Following speculation about the rollout of the 5G network in India, the Department of Telecommunication (DoT) confirmed on Monday that the 5G network will be available in India by 2022. The Department of Transportation stated that 13 cities across the country will receive 5G service in the beginning. Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chandigarh, Chennai, Delhi, Gandhinagar, Gurugram, Hyderabad, Jamnagar, Kolkata, Lucknow, Mumbai, and Pune are among these cities. Airtel, Jio, and Vi conducted 5G trials in the majority of these cities earlier this year. “Costing Rs 224 crore, the project is likely…

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Indian startup funding increased 3 times in 2021

Total funding for Indian startups increased threefold over last year, reaching $39 billion by 2021. While the total number of startups founded during the period was 3,476, approximately 1,700 companies saw 2,055 funding rounds, according to the most recent data from Tracxn, a company that tracks startups and private companies. This year, 40 of India’s 76 unicorns (each worth more than $1 billion) joined the club. In 2021, approximately 40% (85) of the total number of’soonicorns’ (companies with the potential to become unicorns in the near future) were created. Companies…

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Russian court fined Google 7.2 million roubles

A Moscow court fined Google 7.2 billion roubles ($98 million; £73 million) for failing to delete content deemed illegal in Russia on multiple occasions.The offending content was not specified in the court’s press service announcement. This is the first time in Russia that a technology behemoth has been fined based on its annual revenue.Google told the AFP news agency that it would study the court decision before taking any further action. Russian authorities have increased their pressure on technology companies this year, accusing them of not properly moderating their content…

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