Agritech startup Otipy raises $32 million from investors to expand business
Agri-tech startup Otipy, which mainly sells fresh vegetables and fruits through its mobile app, has raised USD 32 million (Rs 235 crore) from investors including Westbridge Capital to grow its business.
In the series B funding round, existing investors SIG and Omidyar Network India also participated.
In July last year, the Gurugram-based startup had raised USD 10.2 million (around Rs 76 crore).
Launched in 2020, Otipy, which is part of Crofarm Agriproducts Pvt Ltd, is a business-to-business-to-consumer (B2B2C) ecommerce platform for fresh produce that includes vegetables, fruits, dairy and other grocery items.
Otipy founder and CEO Varun Khurana said “leveraging our fast supply chain and community leader network we aim to provide fresh, quality produce to consumers at the lowest price. We will continue to build on our proposition for value conscious consumers.”
The series B round of funding will support the company as it seeks to expand business to new pin codes, strengthen supply chain, invest in technology, and add product categories, he added.
Otipy uses its technology to procure fresh produce from farmers based on the demand generated as per its prediction engines and delivers the farm fresh goods to customers within 12 hours of harvest.
The startup expects its turnover to jump nearly five times to Rs 100 crore by the end of this fiscal year.
The company’s revenue stood at Rs 19.73 crore in the previous year.
Sandeep Singhal, MD at Westbridge Capital, said: “We are excited to partner with Otipy as they disrupt the daily essentials market via the community group buying model.”
Otipy has over 5 lakh customers across Delhi NCR as well as tier 2/3 towns like Sonepat, Meerut and Bhiwadi. It now plans to expand its operations to Bangalore, Mumbai and Hyderabad and Chennai.
Otipy moves more than 100 tonnes of fresh produce from the farms to its consumers every day.
In December, Khurana had said that the company aims to become profitable by 2023.
“We have created a model that small business owners, particularly women, have found appealing and successful. We have 20,000+ community leaders or resellers helping us provide various products to our valued clients,” he had said.
Otipy said that it has the industry’s lowest wastage of 3 per cent.
Leveraging its community leader model, Otipy said it operates at the industry’s lowest logistics cost as low as Rs 4/kg, from its warehouse to the consumer’s doorstep.
(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Dear Reader,
Business Standard has always strived hard to provide up-to-date information and commentary on developments that are of interest to you and have wider political and economic implications for the country and the world. Your encouragement and constant feedback on how to improve our offering have only made our resolve and commitment to these ideals stronger. Even during these difficult times arising out of Covid-19, we continue to remain committed to keeping you informed and updated with credible news, authoritative views and incisive commentary on topical issues of relevance.
We, however, have a request.
As we battle the economic impact of the pandemic, we need your support even more, so that we can continue to offer you more quality content. Our subscription model has seen an encouraging response from many of you, who have subscribed to our online content. More subscription to our online content can only help us achieve the goals of offering you even better and more relevant content. We believe in free, fair and credible journalism. Your support through more subscriptions can help us practise the journalism to which we are committed.
Support quality journalism and subscribe to Business Standard.
Digital Editor
