BENGALURU: Blue-collar jobs hiring platform Apna has raised $100 million in a Series C funding round led by Tiger Global with investment from Owl Ventures, Insight Partners, Sequoia Capital India, Maverick Ventures and GSV Ventures. With this round, apna has attained a total valuation of $1.1 billion.
The aggressive growth of e-commerce, food delivery industries, in particular, has led to rising demand for a blue-collar workforce across logistics and delivery chains enabling the hiring platforms to onboard millions of users.
Apna said that it has grown 125x over the past 15 months and is currently conducting 18 million interviews each month. In the future, the company plans to use the proceeds to further strengthen its presence in the existing 28 cities and expand pan-India by the end of 2021 to help accelerate India’s economy.
The team plans to double down on their edtech platform for skilling and invest in hiring exceptional talent and building world-class engineering and product capabilities. Apna plans to build a global enterprise by venturing into new markets such as the USA, South East Asia, and Middle East and Africa starting in 2022.
The platform leverages a sophisticated algorithm that matches candidates with employers taking into account their skills, experience and preferences. The app also comprises 70+ communities for skilled professionals like carpenters, painters, telecallers, field sales agents, delivery personnel and others. “Apna communities have enabled users to grow their professional networks, upskill through peer learning and find gig opportunities. Apna’s communities enabled 17 million peer-to-peer professional conversations in the past month,” said Nirmit Parikh, Founder and CEO, Apna.
Communities for skilled professionals
The app also comprises 70+ communities for skilled professionals like carpenters, painters, telecallers, field sales agents, delivery personnel and others.