Indian unicorn club swells as two more join the league

Bengaluru, 27 February India added two more unicorns last week to take the total number of such startups to 41 as of now. By the end of last year, the country had 38 unicorns with 12 fresh additions despite being a pandemic year. Unicorns are startups with a market valuation of $1 billion (around Rs 7,000 crore or more).

Last week, Innovaccer, which is a SaaS (software as a service) company operating in the healthcare sector, entered the billion-dollar club after it raised around $150 million from Tiger Global, taking its valuation to $1.3 billion. The San Francisco-headquartered startup connects healthcare data across verticals and provides integrated patient records as well as insights for better patient outcomes.

Mumbai-headquartered Infra. Market became the newest unicorn with a valuation of $1 billion after the startup raised $100 million in a series C round from Tiger Global and a clutch of other investors. The company helps construction and real estate companies to procure material apart from handling logistics for executing their projects through technological intervention.

Earlier in January, Canadian billionaire Prem Watsa-backed Digit has turned into the first unicorn of 2021 when the Bengaluru-based general insurer raised around $20 million (Rs 135 crore) from existing private investors including A91 Partners, Faering Capital, and TVS Capital. Post this round of funding, the company is now valued at $1.9 billion.

A recent Nasscom-Zinov report has said that India could have 50 startups becoming unicorns this year on the back of strong investors' interest coupled with innovative business models.