Norwest, Kalaari Capital lead $7 million funding round in ElasticRun
NEW DELHI: Norwest Venture Partners and Kalaari Capital have led a $7-million (about Rs 47 crore) round of funding in Pune-based NTex Transportation Services, which owns and operates logistics and distribution platform ElasticRun.
The financing was completed in two tranches, with the first tranche of about $2 million coming through in April last year. The year-old startup, which has largely been in stealth mode, will use the proceeds to further build its technology infrastructure, on-board talent and expand operations.
“We invested in the ElasticRun team because of their relevant experience, having worked at DHL and Amazon. Their technology and network-centric approach to optimise the path of goods as they travel across different touch points makes them very unique,“ said Mohan Kumar, executive director, Norwest Venture Partners India.
ElasticRun was founded by San founded by Sandeep Deshmukh, formerly a senior executive at Amazon India, and Saurabh Nigam and Shitiz Bansal, who were both with EdgeVerve, the product and platform unit of Infosys.
“What we offer potential customers is that they don't have to spend capex on building fixed-capacity logistics setups. They can latch on to our platform and do away with the need for any setup cost,“ said Deshmukh, chief executive, ElasticRun. “This platform allows the brand owners to focus on core products and do away the concerns about managing the variability in demand.“
The company caters to industries across the board, including pharmaceutical, online retail, food products, automotive and hospitality sectors.
“Our key proposition is that we should be able to go to transport vendors, logistics vendors and space providers that are right at the bottom of the chain, and aggregate them on our platform and create a virtual logistics network for our clients. Such network reduces the cost considerably and induces the much required flex,“ Deshmukh said.
For Norwest, this is the first new investment in the current calendar year, and comes less than a month after the venture capital firm scored a multi-bagger exit from IndusInd Bank.
The stage-agnostic investor, which typically invests $15-35 million in a deal but may also write larger cheques, is currently investing out of its $1.2-billion global fund, which it raised last year.
For Kalaari Capital, the investment in ElasticRun follows its recent bets on payments startups Perpule and Airpay, both announced in March.
The financing was completed in two tranches, with the first tranche of about $2 million coming through in April last year. The year-old startup, which has largely been in stealth mode, will use the proceeds to further build its technology infrastructure, on-board talent and expand operations.
“We invested in the ElasticRun team because of their relevant experience, having worked at DHL and Amazon. Their technology and network-centric approach to optimise the path of goods as they travel across different touch points makes them very unique,“ said Mohan Kumar, executive director, Norwest Venture Partners India.
ElasticRun was founded by San founded by Sandeep Deshmukh, formerly a senior executive at Amazon India, and Saurabh Nigam and Shitiz Bansal, who were both with EdgeVerve, the product and platform unit of Infosys.
“What we offer potential customers is that they don't have to spend capex on building fixed-capacity logistics setups. They can latch on to our platform and do away with the need for any setup cost,“ said Deshmukh, chief executive, ElasticRun. “This platform allows the brand owners to focus on core products and do away the concerns about managing the variability in demand.“
The company caters to industries across the board, including pharmaceutical, online retail, food products, automotive and hospitality sectors.
“Our key proposition is that we should be able to go to transport vendors, logistics vendors and space providers that are right at the bottom of the chain, and aggregate them on our platform and create a virtual logistics network for our clients. Such network reduces the cost considerably and induces the much required flex,“ Deshmukh said.
For Norwest, this is the first new investment in the current calendar year, and comes less than a month after the venture capital firm scored a multi-bagger exit from IndusInd Bank.
The stage-agnostic investor, which typically invests $15-35 million in a deal but may also write larger cheques, is currently investing out of its $1.2-billion global fund, which it raised last year.
For Kalaari Capital, the investment in ElasticRun follows its recent bets on payments startups Perpule and Airpay, both announced in March.
