Rural India-focused commerce startup bags $2m seed funding

Hesa, an India-based commerce platform, announced it has raised US$2 million of seed funding in a round led by Mastermind Capital managing partner Manish Modi on behalf of local startup incubator Venture Catalyst. The incubator’s fund 9Unicorns, Inflection Point Ventures, We Founder Circle, Keiretsu Forum, Faad Network, Startup Angels Network, and Salil Chakrabarty Innovation Fund also joined in.

The round is the company’s first institutional fundraise after being bootstrapped since it’s founding.

Hesa founders Vamsi Udayagiri (left) and Hema Nandiraju / Photo credit: Hema

Founded by husband-and-wife team Vamsi Udayagiri and Hema Nandiraju in 2019, Hesa enables brands to connect with rural customers through its network of agents called Hesaathis. These agents not only help sell the brands’ products and manage their supply chain at the local level, but they also do village-level mapping, manage surveys, and conduct campaigns and promotions for these companies.

Hesa earns revenue from a percentage of each transaction, but it also has marketing and service-based income, such as promotions on the Hesa app and offline activations in rural areas. Since its launch in April 2020, it has generate US$4 million in gross revenue, with 15% monthly growth on average and a 65% retention rate.

Hesa has currently connected more than 65 brands to 600,000 customers in rural areas through 8,000 of its Hesaathis. These agents are spread across roughly 5,000 villages in India. The company aims to reach 50,000 villages with at least 50,000 Hessathis in the next nine months.