[Funding alert] P2P rural commerce startup Rozana raises $2.5M in Pre-Series A round

Peer-to-peer (P2P) rural commerce startup, Rozana.in on Thursday said it has raised $2.5 million in its Pre-Series A round of funding.

The startup says it brings rural India into the fold of e-commerce . 3one4 Capital and Europe's IEG - Investment Banking Group co-led the round, which also saw participation from angel investors such as Manisha Girotra, CEO, Moelis and Board Member, Prosus (formerly Nasper) and SK Jain, Co-Founder, Sequoia & Westbridge Capital.

The fresh capital will be utilised to improve the platform's technological capabilities and increase Rozana's footprint in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Karnataka.

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Co-founder & CEO at Rozana, Ankur Dahiya, said, "Rozana is a revolution brewing for over a billion Indians. Our day and night effort is to focus on empowering hundreds of millions of consumers through tech and a network of tech entrepreneurs."

Rural and semi-urban areas are regions that are largely untapped by e-commerce and legacy brands alike.

Rozana adopts a village by village strategy to drive product innovation, and demand and supply optimization for D2C brands. 

It provides a full stack tech solution to enable micro-entrepreneurs into giving a wide array of offerings to their end consumers. These entrepreneurs can, meanwhile, make use of the platform to onboard new customers, put out their latest deals, and helps them in placing online orders.

Regarding their investment into the platform, Nitya Agarwal, VP at 3one4 Capital, added, "We are excited to partner with Rozana in their journey to revolutionize consumption beyond tier 1 in India. The team’s approach will serve as a feeder for discovery of consumer needs mapped at an unmatched scale and demographic depth. Rozana’s razor sharp focus to empower micro-entrepreneurs is truly admirable and we believe that the team has the potential to unlock new household spends in an incredibly efficient manner."

Rozana says it has managed to tap into over four lakh households in nine months alone, and is looking at a steady growth in the future.

Mihir Kapoor of IEG added, "Rozana has a model which is successfully bringing online commerce to a huge Indian population. Moreover it can also bring panchayat wise data and the power to create demand and supply through a scalable tech model. We are equally excited for sustainable growth for Rozana rising 30% month on month with healthy unit economics."

Rozana is currently expanding its footprint in Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, and Karnataka over the next 12 months, with offices in Lucknow, Kanpur, Bengaluru, Faridabad, Gurgaon, Noida, New Delhi, Rae Bareli, Barabanki, Greater Noida, and Ghaziabad.