4 rising startups in India – Mar 8

Photo credit: Trocaire.

Indian startups were alive with the spirit of women’s day today. Ecommerce site Flipkart launched a “Super Women’s Day” initiative, a monthly event to support women buying online by curating specific products for them, Ola tied up with on-demand services startup UrbanClap to gift their women drivers with the experience of a salon at their homes, and healthcare firm Practo is working with one of India’s leading women’s healthcare centers to have doctors answer women-specific questions today on Practo Consult, their new doctor Q&A platform. Of course, as is the nature of funding, startups continued to get investments despite – or specifically because of – the festivities.

LoveCycles

In the spirit of Women’s Day, Prime Venture Partners announced an investment of US$750,000 in menstrual cycle tracker LoveCycles. Amit Somani of Prime Venture explained that the eventual goal of the app was to improve overall awareness of women’s health, with the menstrual cycle being a good focal point to start from.

Although there are plenty of similar apps on the market, LoveCycles is the only one focused on the Indian market. It’s been released in thirteen languages including Hindi, and co-founder Jean Paul projects that the app will have 5 million monthly active users in the next 18 months, with 2 million of them coming from India.

Dunzo

Photo credit: plantronicsgermany.

Dunzo, a task-tracking app, raised US$650,000 in series A funding from Aspada, Blume Ventures, and a few angel investors including Google MD of Southeast Asia and India, Rajan Anandan. Users can create to-do lists, work with friends on tasks, and check off things that they’ve done.

“Dunzo makes it easy to be lazy. I’d pay a lot to be lazy,” a user was quoted as saying in Dunzo’s press release.

It was founded by Ankur Aggarwal, Dalvir Suri, Mukund Jha, and Kabeer Biswas and claims to have achieved over “10,000 moments of customer delight.”

Medidaili

Photo credit: Ilmicrofono Oggiono.

Medidaili raised US$100,000 in angel funding today. It’s a medical services site that lets people compare prices of diagnostic tests, look up health check-up packages, and book emergency services.

“With Medidaili our aim is to offer a one stop platform streamlining the preventive care search process for consumers,” explains co-founder Akshay Hartalkar. Started by Akshay and Manish Dashputre in November 2015, the app currently works in Bangalore and will launch in Hyderabad and Pune by the end of the month.

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