Full-stack agritech platform Gramophone has raised $10 million in its Series B funding round led by Z3Partners. Existing investors including Info Edge, Asha Impact, and Siana Capital participated in the round. In addition, Info Edge has doubled down its investment this round, Gramophone said. The round also saw participation from new investors such as Amit Sharma from erstwhile Sunrise Group, Sumeet Kanwar from Verity, and Chona Family Office (Havmor Group). The fresh fund will be used in geographic expansion, marketing, technology development, and merger and acquisition.
“Our mission is to improve the profitability of farming ecosystem across India. We are building a new age Agriculture Company keeping farmers at the centre. We have seen a huge shift in adoption of technology solutions by the new age farmers. With this investment we will double down on investing in technologies that lower costs, improves transparency and empowers the local community of agri entrepreneurs with more earning opportunities in rural areas,” Tauseef Khan, co-founder and CEO, Gramophone, said.
Gramophone, founded Tauseef Khan, Nishant Vats Mahatre and Harshit Gupta, claims to have seen four times increase in revenues over last year and expects to grow aggressively as more than one million farmers use its products and services, as per an official statement. It is planning to launch micro insurance and lending products in partnership with financial institutions.
According to Kitty Agarwal, partner, Info Edge Ventures, the company has seen tremendous growth in its evolution from being an advisory-led input commerce company to a full-stack Intelligent farming platform that does end-to-end input to output linkage for farmers and retailers. The rapid adoption of technology in rural areas is leading to bridging of information asymmetry and market access for farmers, Agarwal noted.
“Gramophone is bringing e-commerce to Rural India. Tauseef, Nishant, and Harshit’s understanding of agri-sciences and e-commerce and their relationships with Farmers as their end customers has been instrumental in their growth and success so far, “Gautam Patel, managing partner, Z3Partners, stated.
Read Also: Adloid appoints Amit Sharma as head of digital marketing