Inc42 has released its Indian Tech Startup Funding Report – 2018. According to the report, in 2018, Indian startups received total funding of $11 Bn across 743 deals. While in 2017, 4 startups took away half the funding i.e. $6.9 Bn, in 2018, 9 startups notch $5.4 Bn of the total $11 Bn.
Some of the key highlights of the Indian Tech Startup Funding Report 2018 are:
Stagewise Analysis: The year 2018 observed a significant drop — 40% in comparison to 2017 — in funding deals in the early stage. From 551 in 2017, the number of deals in the early stage came down to 331 in 2018. Growth-stage deals remained almost the same while late-stage deals registered an 18% growth as compared to 2017.
Business Model Analysis: The B2B-B2C model had the highest percentage share (41.1%) in the total number of deals. Also, B2B-B2C bagged 52.68% of the total amount invested in 2018. However, the total investment in this model in 2018 — $5.7 Bn — fell 27.46% as compared with the previous year.
Sector-wise Analysis: Fintech secured the maximum number of deals i.e. 121, while, ecommerce took away the maximum funding with $2.1 Bn in investments. Consumer services, healthtech, enterprisetech continues to shine.
Geography Analysis: Bengaluru scored 247 deals in 2018 followed by Delhi/NCR raking up a total of 224 deals. Other major cities such as Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad and Pune are growing well.
Investor Analysis: In 2018, both investor participation and unique investors came down by 17% from 1.9K in 2017 to 1.6K in 2018 and 1.1K to 0.99K respectively. Interestingly, 90% of angel investors have done just a single investment and just 1% have done more than 3 investments in 2018.
Investor Ranking: Rajan Anandan and Binny Bansal became the top angels with 6 deals each. Accel Partners India (28 deals) and Sequoia Capital India (24 deals) took the top slots amongst the VC firms.
M&A Overview: In 2018, over 122 M&As were reported in the Indian Tech startup ecosystem.
Predictions for 2019: Funding expected for 2019 is $13.5 Bn through 936 deals, however, the funding gap observed in 2017 and 2018 will continue in 2019 where a handful of startups will be attracting a major chunk of the funding.