5 rising startups in India – Feb 22

Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name. Plenty of our favorite frequent industries saw funding today. A home services startup? Check. A restaurant reviews app (with a twist)? Check. Foodtech? Present. The gang’s all here, joined by a parenting startup that wants to ease record keeping for you and your little one, and the medtech-AI startup that’s gotten both Flipkart founders’ blessings. Mondays can be jarring, so start off your week with some familiarity and check out these five startups.

Taskbob

The activity in India’s home services sector continued today as Mumbai-based Taskbob raised US$4.5 million today in a series A round of funding. The round was led by IvyCap Ventures with participation from Orios Venture Partners and Mayfield. Orios and Mayfield contributed an undisclosed seed amount in April 2015.

Founded last year by IIT and IIM alumni Aseem Khare, Abhiroop Medhekar, Ajay Bhatt, and Amit Chahalia, Taskbob offers home services like cleaning, handymen, drivers, maids, and at-home salon treatments. Taskbob claims to pre-screen its service workers for skills and psychometrically, as well as train them in vocational and people skills.

“Fulfilment, not discovery, is the real problem in India’s local services space,” said Aseem in a statement. “With this in mind, we have been more focused on supply and fulfilment issues rather than plain demand aggregation.”

Taskbob will use the money to expand across multiple markets for product growth and strategic acquisition opportunities, like its acquisition of Bangalore-based Zepper this past November. Over the next 18 months, it plans to scale to 10,000 orders per day. It currently claims to process 800 to 1000 bookings per day.

See: Housejoy buys Orobind. But will consolidation solve the problem of home services in India?

Magicpin

Think Zomato meets event discovery – in other words, get ready for dinner and a show. Restaurant and event discovery portal Magicpin bagged US$3 million today from Lightspeed India. Anshu Sharma, co-founder and CEO of the startup, is an IIM-Ahmedabad MBA and is a former Lightspeed principal.

Magicpin also helps users to interact with merchants in their region. It provides real-time promotions, loyalty programs, and content updates. Incubated by Lightspeed, it was founded in August 2015 by Anshu and IIM Bangalore alumnus Brij Bhushan. Brij has been previously involved with Nexus Ventures as an investor and in leadership.

Magicpin operates in Delhi-NCR, Jaipur, and Bangalore.

First Eat

Another foodtech startup has sprung up on the scene in India, ready to try its luck. The lucky challenger? Gurgaon-based First Eat, which has raised US$200,000 from an undisclosed serial investor. The mysterious investor is a food and beverage entrepreneur in Gurgaon.

First Eat, run by F. E. Food Tech, operates an on-demand and subscription model with a healthtech twist – it allows users to choose meals according to their health requirements. It was founded by former AbsolutData employee Saikat Bagchi, Shitiz Dogra, former Infosys employee Mannat Wadehra, and Rishabh Tickoo. It launched operations in November of last year.

SigTuple

AI meets medtech meets big data. Bangalore-based SigTuple announced today that it has raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding from Flipkart founders Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal, venture capital firm Accel Partners, and other angel investors.

Babyberry