This Startup is Most Valued in India, Followed by Oyo Rooms, Snapdeal, Ola and Byju's Vijay Shekhar Sharma-led Paytm will be the most valuable start-up in India with a recent fundraise of $1 billion
You're reading Entrepreneur India, an international franchise of Entrepreneur Media.
Paytm's parent company, One97 Communications, raised capital from a series of existing investors including Ant Financial and SoftBank's Vision Fund. According to reports, the capital infusion is worth $1 billion and the total valuation of company has reached a staggering $16 billion.
According to company financing and angel investment database platform, CB Insights, One97 Communications tops the Indian list of The Global Unicorn Club: Current Private Companies Valued at 1Bn+. Here are the most valuable start-ups of India. What is also important to note is that a company like Flipkart would also have been in the list had it not been acquired by Walmart.
Paytm Official FacebookOne97 Communications
One97 Communications is the parent company of fintech start-up unicorn Paytm. Paytm was founded in 2015 by entrepreneur and investor, Vijay Shekhar Sharma, and is backed by marquee investors including the likes of Intel Capital, Sapphire Ventures and the Alibaba Group. Paytm has expanded into several verticals including Paytm Payments Bank, Paytm Mall and Paytm First Games, among others.
ShutterstockOYO Rooms
Led by a 20-something start-up entrepreneur Ritesh Agarwal, OYO Rooms is a "decacorn' valued at $10 billion, according to a data by CB Insights. The start-up was also on the top spot of LinkedIn's 25 start-ups where Indians want to work. The company has been going all out in terms of expansion and acquisition.
In September this year, Agarwal announced the buyback of his shares from investors Lightspeed Venture Partners and Sequoia Capital, a move that increased his stake in the company to 30 per cent, a major jump from the initial 10 per cent control he had with him.
Snapdeal BlogSnapdeal
The e-commerce start-up is backed by giants such as SoftBank, Alibaba Group and Blackrock and is one start-up that has seen ups and downs equally. When Snapdeal burst into the Indian start-up ecosystem, it became a success story that every other company wanted to imitate. It was considered one of the biggest and most successful companies in India. However, the valuation bug bit this Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal founded company a bit too deep. Cash-burn and deep discounting took a toll on the company as Amazon engulfed the Indian e-commerce market space. According to CB Insights, it is valued at $7 billion.
OlaOla Cabs
A start-up that has been standing tall and withstanding the winds of lacking profitability, regaining control from investors and take on state transportation bodies is none other than Ola Cabs. Founded by Bhavish Aggarwal and Ankit Bhati, the cab aggregator unicorn is backed by Softbank Group, Sequoia Capital and Accel Partners, among others. Aggarwal had announced plans to go public and had iterated that preparations have started for the same. It is valued at $6.32 billion.
Byju's FacebookByju’s
Byju's is an edtech start-up and the first edtech unicorn of India. The proliferation of smartphones and the democratizing of mobile Internet have opened avenues for not just communication, shopping and entertainment but also education. One of the start-ups that cracked the code of amalgamating education-technology is entrepreneur Byju Raveendran who founded the company in 2011. Today, it is backed by Tencent Holdings, Lightspeed India Partners and Sequoia Capital India, among others, and is valued at $5.75 billion.
