Lightspeed, Elevation co-lead Indian B2B agritech startup’s $13m round

India’s Vegrow, a business-to-business agritech startup, has raised US$13 million in a series A round to step up its technology-driven offerings in the country’s US$50 billion market for fruit and vegetables.

The round was co-led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Elevation Capital, while existing investors Matrix Partners India, Ankur Capital, Better Capital, and Titan Capital returned to the table.

Photo credit: Sompong Sriphet / 123rf

The B2B platform will use the fresh funds to expand to 100 cities in India, invest in technology, and launch new products.

Established in 2020, Vegrow currently has a presence in over 30 cities across the country. It runs a technology platform that offers services which include farm selection, profiling produce quality, market intelligence, and smart matchmaking between farm inventory and customer requirements.

Vegrow was established by former ITC executive Praneeth Kumar, ex-Urban Company executive Shobhit Jain, former Chronus director product manager Mrudhukar Batchu, and Kiran Naik.

“At Vegrow, we focus on select products as compared to building a large basket,” the company said in a statement. This strategy allowed it to go deep into the value chain and tap into the agritech sector’s rapid growth.

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Vegrow has its eye on India’s US$300 billion agriculture value chain, initially focusing on the fruit and vegetable segment. With its farmer engagement model and tech-driven quality profiling, Vegrow aims to deliver higher returns to farmers, reduce supply-chain wastage, and make wholesale procurement easier.

The firm claims to have spurred a 20x jump in top-line growth for farmers and B2B wholesalers.

“Having invested in commerce companies like Pinduoduo, Oyo, and Zetwerk we have realized that the no. 1 pressing need of the small supplier, a farmer in this case, is higher revenue realization. It’s not accessing inputs, credit or crop advisory,” said Lightspeed Venture Partners’ Vaibhav Agrawal. “Therefore, we believe companies building marketplaces between farmers and buyers, using technology to eliminate inefficiencies will have the largest market opportunity eventually.”