B9 Beverages, known for its Bira 91 brand of craft beer alcoholic beverages, has raised $4.3 million in a pre-Series C round, according to documents accessed from data intelligence platform paper.vc. It has raised the money from Sixth Sense Ventures, a domestic venture capital fund focusing on consumer investments.
“Unlike many other startups, B9 Beverages has continued to raise from HNIs even while raising from institutional investors such as Sequoia Capital," said Vivek Durai, founder, paper.vc.
As per the documents, the pre-Series C is an unusual nomenclature, indicating that it wants to raise a larger Series C round at a suitable valuation. Its valuation currently stands at $246 million with Sequoia as its largest single investor.
The startup last raised $50 million in May 2018 from Belgian investor Sofina, which has also backed some of India’s largest startups including Flipkart and Byju’s.
The deal also marks Sixth Sense’s second investment in two months, after it backed MyHealthcare, a digital integrated healthcare ecosystem, by investing $3 million. MyHealthcare works with hospitals, diagnostics and speciality health institutions in building their digital health business.
Founded by Delhi-based Ankur Jain, Bira’s other investors in the include Chennai-based asset management firm Anicut Capital; General Atlantic managing director Shantanu Rastogi and senior vice-president Alok Misra; Naik Family Trust 2013; Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal, co-founders of e-commerce firm Snapdeal; Ashish Dhawan, co-founder of private equity firm ChrysCapital; Mayank Singhal, venture investor with RNT Capital Advisors; and Deepinder Goyal, founder of restaurant discovery platform Zomato.
Actor/director siblings Farhan and Zoya Akhtar and film producer Ritesh Sidhwani are also investors.
