NEW DELHI: Clensta, an IIT Delhi-backed start-up providing personal care and home care solutions, received Rs 5 crore as funding from N+1 Capital. This is the first investment by N+1 Capital after it received approval from capital markets regulator Sebi for its first investment debt fund for deployment in India.
Clensta will use the funds for scaling up upcoming products in the homecare category. The company recently entered a strategic tie-up with pharma brand Cipla for its first commercialised products, Waterless Bodybath and Waterless Shampoo. Together with Cipla, Clensta aims to expand to 7000 hospitals and four lakhs pharmacies with a team of 500 people over the next five years.
"We have a strong B2B2C presence with 500-plus hospitals and 25,000-plus retail outlets, including pharmacies. As our business now seeks to penetrate the D2C channels as well, this debt fund helps us grow further and reach out to consumers faster," Puneet Gupta, CEO & Founder, Clensta International, said in a statement.
"It also allows us to expand both, offline and online, covering all important aspects of the sales channel. It's a great opportunity that venture capitalist firms like N+1 have introduced revenue-based funding in India, which is quite popular in the west, and are providing the start-up ecosystem a thrust to move forward," he added.
Revenue-based growth capital firm N+1 Capital's vision behind these $100 million (Rs 730 crore) funds is to provide an opportunity to over 100 entrepreneurs to grow their businesses profitably and sustainably during the growth stage. The benefits for entrepreneurs include no personal guarantee, tech-driven risk scoring model, greater flexibility and constant capital infusion. The model also provides credibility, assurance, builds trust and reduces the time load for due diligence for the upcoming investors.
"N+1 is sector-agnostic, and the qualifying criteria are actually steady-state, as well as growing start-ups and MSEs with minimum monthly revenue of Rs 50 lakh, and at least 30 percent gross margin. Having said that, the fund is currently working with SaaS start-ups and some Direct-to-Consumer (D2C) start-ups," said Rahul Chowdhury, Managing Partner, N+1 Capital.