VerSe Innovation, the parent firm of news aggregator platform Dailyhunt and short video app Josh, has closed a $450 million funding round led by Siguler Guff, Baillie Gifford, and Carlyle Asia Partners. Existing investors Sofina Group, Qatar Investment Authority, and BCap also participated on a pro-rata basis.
VerSe Innovation Closes New Funding Round
The makers of Dailyhunt and Josh are on a fundraising spree. After securing funding of $100 million in February, VerSe has raised a whopping $450 million in series I round. The company’s valuation has surged to over $3 billion after the current financing event.
Dailyhunt parent has doubled its valuation to $3+ billion in the last five months. The firm has raised over $650 million in 2021 to date.
VerSe Innovation announced in a press release that current funding will be utilized to strengthen the management team of the startup. The startup believes that leadership plays a key role in the success of any firm.
Dailyhunt is supported by marquee and institutional investors including Goldman Sachs, Falcon Edge Capital, Sequoia Capital, Matrix Partners. The news aggregator firm Dailyhunt created history in December 2020 by becoming the first unicorn in the news aggregation space.
About Dailyhunt and Josh Operations
Currently, Dailyhunt claims to have over 300 million consumers per month on its platform where it provides news content in 10+ Indian local languages including English. While short video ap Josh recorded an immense growth after the Tiktok ban in India. Currently, it has 115+ million monthly active users and 56+ million daily active users.
Josh has tough competition from local short video apps Moj, MX Takatak, Chingari, and others. While Inshorts is the direct competitor of Dailyhunt. Inshorts has also raised three funding rounds within twelve months. In July, it had secured $60 million in a funding round led by Vy Capital with participation from existing investors. Importantly, the company has been positioning its new app Public as the anchor in recent fundraises.
The firm did not reveal FY21 performance yet. But, it recorded a 75 percent surge in its revenue to Rs 267.6 crore during FY20 compared to Rs 152.7 crore in FY19. But, Dailyhunt is responsible for this revenue surge. Josh app has not seen any sign of revenue collection till FY20.
Due to Josh, Verse Innovation losses grew 34.3% to Rs 401.3 crore in FY20 from Rs 300 crore in FY19 and the losses will continue surging in FY21 and FY22 as well because of Josh, as per industry Analysts prediction.
