5 startups in Mumbai that are richer than you’d think

Photo credit: Rajarshi MITRA.

Finance, commerce, and movies: that’s what Mumbai, called Bombay up until recently, has been known for. If you want to deal with finance or commerce, chances are that the head office is in Mumbai. The city is also where the Hindi movie industry is centered, which is where Bollywood (Bombay + Hollywood) gets its moniker.

Perhaps it’s also fitting that the city is home to some of India’s more dramatic startup stories.

Of course, not everything in the city is larger than life. Several startups have written the first pages of their stories in the city, and several more startups have expanded into it. The city is the most populous in India, and that means a huge customer base that tends to have more cash to spend than other areas in the country.

Perhaps it’s also fitting that the city is home to some of India’s more dramatic startup stories. It seems a week can’t go by when we aren’t reminded that Ola (which has since moved to Bangalore) and Uber are performing some kind of business duet of Annie Get Your Gun’s “Anything You Can Do.” Meanwhile, Rahul Yadav has continued to remain in the news even after his ousting from Housing, and Advitiya Sharma, co-founder of the company, has decided to take a break from the world.

Not every company rises up to grab headlines, but there are plenty of heavily-valued startups in Mumbai today that have scraped through the early stages to become success stories. Our excellent research team helped us put together a list of the most-valued businesses in India that got their start in Mumbai. From there, I picked five that didn’t dominate headlines. There are plenty of cool startups out there, but check out these five businesses that started small and are now worth US$1.6 billion combined.

JustDial

Not your grandmother’s white pages. Photo credit: Pixabay.

Talk about growing with age. Local search engine JustDial got its start in Mumbai in 1996 as a local phone directory. It still has a white pages-type of business directory online, but it’s now a website valued at US$655 million with multiple other services. Customers can book flights, cabs, tables, and movie tickets; order groceries, food, and flowers; pay bills, and find deals and offers. Just last month, it made its smorgasbord of offerings available on one app.

JustDial scored a US$171 million IPO in June 2013 and, to date, has US$274 million in disclosed funding under its belt. It has offices in over 10 cities in India and is also available in Canada, the UK, and the UAE.

See: Forget search engines. This local market on chat has you covered

Meru Cabs

It’s this kind of situation that Meru Cabs wants to help you avoid. Photo credit: Pixabay.

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