Startup news and updates: daily roundup (November 25, 2022)

Retention cloud platform CleverTap launches CleverTap for Startups

CleverTap on Friday announced the launch of CleverTap for Startups (C4S). Through this initiative, CleverTap will offer a full stack retention platform to all budding digital-native brands, in order to help them personalise and optimise all customer touchpoints, improving user engagement and conversion. 

Till date, thousands of large digital-native brands have benefited from CleverTap’s platform, which has solved their needs at scale, speed, and security. The aim now is to make solutions even more affordable for pre-launch, early-stage startups, or companies with limited monthly active users.

New and early-stage businesses have very different needs from larger, well-established brands. They require more flexibility, affordability, and a partner that provides seamless support fuelling their growth plans. 

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CleverTap has currently partnered with more than 50 venture capital firms, incubators, and business accelerators including Sequoia Surge, Techstars, Y-combinator, AWS Activate, Accel, and others to provide exclusive discounts and resources to early-stage startups through this initiative.

The C4S initiative was undertaken a year back and the offerings have now been finetuned following feedback from 1000+ startups and is now ready to launch. Through this initiative, CleverTap aspires to be a growth partner for more than 100,000 new businesses by the end of 2025.

Angel investor Prateek Toshniwal announces $500K fund for agriculture, cleantech, and Web3.0 startups

Prateek Toshniwal, a seasoned entrepreneur and angel investor, has announced an investment fund worth $500,000 allocations for the ambitious startups. These funds will be targeted towards startups in agriculture, cleantech, and Web 3.0.

Prateek has already led many investors in his personal capacity in the beginning of FY2022 as well through his partnership with funds like IVY Growth Associates in India and MI Capital in UAE. Well versed with international taxation advisory, Prateek has not only mentored, but also enabled the various founders of his portfolio companies to scale. 

Prateek has made significant investments in ReshaMandi, Agrimarg, Indeanta, Neo Fantasy, Zappfresh, Clear Dekho, EMotorad, Zypp, AUS, Gripp. With the commitment of investing $500,000 in the startups, Prateek looks forward to collaborate with great founders with remarkable ideas and excellent execution skills.

Shakti Foundation and Intellecap launch ACCLIMATE fund

Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation (Shakti), in collaboration with Intellecap Advisory Solutions, has launched the Challenge Fund with an objective to strengthen and help accelerate the work of Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) committed to climate action in India.

Recognising CSOs as a dynamic source of strategic and innovative climate action, Shakti and the ACCLIMATE Challenge Fund aims to provide capacity building opportunities in areas that include electric mobility, green hydrogen, sustainable transport, industries, cooling, net-zero buildings, agriculture, coastal ecosystems, and climate finance, using a cross-sectoral approach.

It will seek to facilitate general operating support and bespoke capacity building and mentorship for shortlisted organizations for a duration of two years.

The Challenge Fund aims to stimulate tailored responses to local context-specific problems by tapping into local knowledge and creative capacity which is often the forte of CSOs who are deeply immersed in the context. The fund will engage and channel additional resources into organizations to initiate, implement and evaluate activities in a specialized field of climate mitigation. In many cases, such support has a significant impact on the effectiveness of these organizations in fulfilling their missions.

The applications for the fund are open for organizations across India. The last date to submit applications is 15th December 2022.

Three Wheels United and Zyngo join hands to drive EV adoption for last-mile delivery

Three Wheels United (TWU), a global fintech company for EV financing, has partnered with Zyngo, an EV logistics platform for the ecommerce industry, to accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles for last-mile delivery. Through this partnership, Three Wheels United will facilitate loans for partner drivers of Zyngo to easily switch from conventional cargo autos to EV cargo vehicles. TWU and Zyngo will deploy over 2500 EV three-wheelers across Delhi NCR, Bengaluru, Chennai, and Hyderabad by the end of the financial year 2023. 

TWU will provide the required financing solutions for drivers and Zyngo will assist drivers with vehicle maintenance, access to charging infrastructure, servicing and ensuring minimal vehicle downtime for operations. 

Three Wheels United has over 50,000 drivers on its platform, offering them various products and services. The company has financed over 4000 auto-rickshaws resulting in the reduction of 1,72,000+ tonnes of CO2 emissions, and the generation of an extra $71 million in income for the drivers. 

Very recently, TWU raised $10 million as a part of Series A Funding led by Delta Corp Holdings with participation from new and existing investors. With the new investment, Three Wheels United is in the process of scaling up two-wheeler and three-wheeler financing in India by partnering with the government and other industry players. TWU has also started pilots in the Middle East, Africa, and other emerging markets with a goal to improve driver livelihoods and reduce air pollution globally.

(This article will be updated with the latest news throughout the day.)