In H12019, as many as 28 companies had the potential to cross the $1 billion valuation mark, which lowered to 17 in H12020,
Amid the COVID-19 outbreak, Indian startups are seeing lower funding activity, with fewer companies receiving funding between January and June.
Startup funding activity declined by 29 percent in the first half of 2020 to $4.2 billion, as against $5.9 billion in the same period in 2019, Business Standard reported citing data analytics firm Tracxn.
Between January and June 2020, 443 companies secured funding, lower than 725 recorded in the same duration last year, according to Tracxn's India Tech Semi-Annual Factsheet.
Three startups were obtained the 'unicorn' tag in the first half of 2020, after being valued at over $1 billion each, compared with six startups in H12019.
Also read: Online teaching is hot skill now, but what does it take to get there?
The three startups were online baby products store FirstCry, financial tech company Pine Labs and beauty products e-tailer Nykaa. Other startups that received funding were education technology companies Byju's and Unacademy, and scooter-sharing company Bounce.
In H12019, as many as 28 companies had the potential to cross the $1 billion valuation mark in the near future, which lowered to 17 in H12020, the paper reported citing Tracxn.
Tracxn stated that alternative lending and test preparation technology were the spaces that generated the maximum interest and saw large increases in funding.
Companies in the test preparation technology space recorded a total investment of $666.2 million in H12020, up 538 percent.
Startups in the alternative lending sector, which includes companies such as Navi, Lendingkart and InCred, raised $704.5 million in H12020, which is 67 percent higher than investments recorded in the same period in 2019.