ReshaMandi, an agritech startup digitizing India’s silk supply chain, announced today that it has raised USD 1.7 million (INR 12.25 crore) in seed funding. The round was led by Omnivore and Strive Ventures with participation from Axilor Ventures and Supply Chain Labs (Lumis). ReshaMandi is building a full-stack platform for organizing the silk supply chain, providing services including quality testing, technical advisory, high-quality inputs, and market linkages at each node of the silk supply chain.
ReshaMandi’s vision is to build traceability “from farm to fashion” by organizing the silk ecosystem comprising silkworm rearers, sericulture farmers, yarn reelers, fabric weavers, and retailers. For sericulture farmers, the startup provides farm & rearing advisory (via mobile app) and high-quality inputs to produce premium cocoons. Reshamandi also provides an IoT system that is installed on farms to measure temperature, humidity, light & air quality in order to reduce silkworm mortality & improve % produce. Once cocoons are ready, farmers can sell them at the ReshaMandi marketplace using the app at competitive rates. Yarn reelers also have access to the ReshaMandi mobile application for one-click procurement of cocoon, quality testing services for yarn output & linkages. On similar lines, silk weavers also get access to ReshaMandi mobile app for one-click procurement of premium silk yarn & output market linkages. Additionally, ReshaMandi is exploring fintech opportunities to further buoy this sector. Recently, ReshaMandi launched their D2C brand Amraii, with the vision of selling silk apparel at reasonable rates.
Since commencing operations less than a year ago, ReshaMandi has reached an ARR of USD 30 million. The startup is working with more than 2300 farmers and has IoT devices deployed across 10 rearing centers. Recently, ReshaMandi was named the Best Emerging Social Enterprise of 2020 by Business Mint.
The founders’ plan is to use this funding to strengthen their digital platform and expand beyond Karnataka, establishing a presence in other important Indian silk hubs such as Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu.
Based out of Bangalore, ReshaMandi was founded in April 2020 by Mayank Tiwari (CEO), Saurabh Agarwal (CTO), and Utkarsh Apoorva (CBO). Mayank is a gold medalist from NIFT with 13 years of cross-domain experience in retail, e-commerce, user experience, and lean manufacturing. Saurabh is a full-stack technology architect and innovator with 14+ years of industry experience, 10+ deep technology patents, and expertise in building customer-centric software products. Finally, Utkarsh is an IIT Delhi alumnus with 12 years of experience. He has led multiple startups including HandyTrain, Clusto, GuitarStreet, and EduLabs, with successful exits.
Commenting on the investment Mayank Tiwari, Co-Founder and CEO of ReshaMandi said, “We are excited to bring the first technology-led disruption to India’s USD 10 billion silk industry. Our goal is to reduce the import of silk by helping Indian farmers improve their production capacity and quality."
Subhadeep Sanyal, Partner at Omnivore, observed, "Despite India being the second-largest producer of silk globally, the industry is still unorganized and in urgent need of technology interventions across the supply chain. With sericulture farmers having very high smartphone penetration, it is an opportune time for a digital platform like ReshaMandi to address the existing inefficiencies."
Siddharth Verma, Investment Manager at Strive Ventures, added, “ReshaMandi is enabling Indian sericulture farmers and other key players in the value chain compete with the Chinese mass silk manufacturing hubs. Through mobile apps, IoT devices and tech-enabled grading systems, ReshaMandi is enabling farmers to increase production, lower wastage, improve quality and get access to better pricing.”