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21 May 2021

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Why Indian government shouldn’t delay cryptocurrency regulations

Cryptocurrencies, with no underlying asset, pose high risk to investors. According to data from crypto exchanges, there are approximately 1.5 crore Indians who have invested in cryptocurrencies holding Rs 15,000 crore

Indians investing in cryptocurrencies may be taking a highly risky bet in the absence of regulations by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the government with respect to these instruments, said experts. Till regulations bring clarity, any type of crypto transactions should be banned in India, they said. “Be it as a medium of exchange, mode of investment/ assets, cryptocurrency dealings should be banned in India and should be made as a criminal offence,” said Madan Sabnavis, chief economist of CARE rating agency.

“Unless we have regulations and an official view on this, Crypto is no different from gambling,” said the veteran economist. The comment assumes significance at a time when investors are increasingly betting on crypto currencies.

Cryptocurrency is decentralised digital money, which works based on blockchain technology. Bitcoin and Ethereum are the poplar crypto currencies but there are thousands of cryptocurrencies in circulation.

Even as the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the Government have not formed an opinion on the crypto currencies, there are many Indians who have taken exposure in crypto market. According to data from crypto exchanges, there are approximately 1.5 crore Indians who have invested in cryptocurrencies holding Rs 15,000 crore. There are 350 startups who operate in blockchain and crypto. Crypto exchanges, WazirX, CoinSwitch Kuber and other exchanges, have seen a big rush in demand from users and crypto exchanges are advertising heavily on investments.

Already, the RBI has raised concerns on crypto currencies. On March 25, speaking at the 7th edition of India Economic Conclave, the RBI Governor, Shaktikanta Das had said the central bank has flagged some major concerns to the Government about crypto currencies. “Both RBI and the government are committed to financial stability. We have flagged some major concerns to the government on crypto currencies. The government will come out with a decision sooner than later,” Das had said.

The RBI, in 2018, banned all banks from dealing in cryptocurrencies but a Supreme Court order overturned this ban on a plea by Internet and Mobile Association of India (IMAI). The court said that while the RBI has the power to regulate virtual currencies, in the absence of any legislation, the business of dealing in these currencies ought to be treated as a legitimate trade that is protected by the fundamental right to carry on any occupation, trade or business under Article 19(1)(g) of the Constitution.

While the RBI is clearly not comfortable with the idea of cryptocurrency as a medium of exchange, the government’s stance on this issue is not clear. The government has proposed to present a Bill to regulate cryptocurrencies called The Cryptocurrency and Regulation of Official digital currency Bill, 2021. The Bill has provisions to make any dealings in cryptocurrency illegal. But there is no clarity yet on when this Bill will be introduced in Parliament.

Why people buy crypto?

There aren’t many attractive investment options in the present economic environment, where real interest rates have turned negative. With interest rate falling sharply, bank deposits have turned unattractive to the investors. Similarly, high volatility and a dull economic environment have made real estate, equity and mutual fund investments unattractive for HNI investors, prompting many of them to look at crypto bets.

Due to a mix of factors such as the COVID-19 crisis, the poor rate of returns on banking investments, cryptocurrency stands to gain in popularity as it is being seen with the potential to become a good investment alternative, like gold or real estate, if certain provisions are met, said Jaya Vaidhyanathan, CEO of BCT Digital.

“This is still far away, but it can happen over a period of time. We are going to see lack of trust from authorities till it is fully evaluated. Although Bitcoin has been seen with caution and distrust by authorities, its underlying technology, Blockchain, has a lot of advantages in today’s digital banking context as well,“ Vaidhyanathan said.

What if cryptocurrency gets banned in India?

Lack of clarity on regulation would mean that crypto investors may be facing high risk if the government decides against cryptocurrencies in India. Those holding crypto assets may face a sudden shocker if India decides to ban the cryptocurrency assets tomorrow, experts said.

“There is no underlying to the crypto currencies, so it is highly risky for anyone to use it as asset. You can’t certainly treat it as a mode of exchange. With high volatility seen in recent days, it is quite clear this is a speculative asset,” said Ashvin Parekh of Ashvin Parekh Advisory services.

“Also, there is a possibility of illegal elements using crypto for money laundering activities,” said Parekh. While big investors like Tesla founder Elon Musk can afford speculating in such assets, common investors may be facing high risk, Parekh added.

With the RBI not clarifying its position, banks have been wary about cryptocurrencies too.

“Central banks advocate the centralization of an economy and its banking system. Bitcoin or most cryptocurrencies, for that matter, are the opposite of that. They are not controlled by a country’s regulators or even governed by them,” said Vaidhyanathan of BCT Digital.

“Under such circumstances, it’s natural for regulators to be suspicious of them, leading to trading bans or tightened regulations. In 2018, a lot of Indians were trading in cryptocurrencies, convinced of its benefits. But soon, this was questioned and outlawed,” Vaidhyanathan said.

A senior banker, who didn’t want to be named, said banks are staying away from crypto transactions since the RBI hasn’t clarified its position officially. “For us, the RBI is the apex authority. Till the time, the RBI doesn’t clarify its position, we will not touch this segment,” said the banker.

23 Mar 2021

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Which Countries Are Leading the Data Economy?

Which countries are the top data producers? After all, with data-fueled applications of artificial intelligence projected, by McKinsey, to generate $13 trillion in new global economic activity by 2030, this could determine the next world order, much like the role that oil production has played in creating economic power players in the preceding century.

While China and the U.S. could emerge as two AI superpowers, data sources can’t be limited to concentrations in a few places as we have with an oil-driven economy — it needs to be drawn from many, diverse sources and future AI applications will emerge from new and unexpected players. The new world order taking shape is likely to be more complex than a simple bi-polar structure, especially since data is being produced at a pace that boggles the mind.

Building on our past work mapping the digital evolution and digital competitiveness of different countries around the world, we wanted to try to locate the deepest and widest pools of useful data. This is essential to run the myriad machine learning models critical to AI. To do so, it is useful to make a distinction between the raw volume of data and a measure that we shall call “gross data product” – our version of the new GDP. To identify the world’s top “gross data product” producers, we propose using four criteria:

Volume: Absolute amount of broadband consumed by a country, as a proxy for the raw data generated.
Usage: Number of users active on the internet, as a proxy for the breadth of usage behaviors, needs and contexts.
Accessibility: Institutional openness to data flows as a way to assess whether the data generated in a country permits wider usability and accessibility by multiple AI researchers, innovators, and applications.
Complexity: Volume of broadband consumption per capita, as a proxy for the sophistication and complexity of digital activity.

There are several nuances to note. For one, we recognize that the digital trace that is generated by computers around the world spans a very wide range of activities, from sending an SMS text message to making a financial transaction. To enable an apples-to-apples comparison across the world, we use broadband per capita as a measure of such breadth and complexity (in some ways, mimicking the use of per capita income as a proxy for overall prosperity).

Second, there are differences across countries in terms of how private data is shared across agencies and whether there are digital identity frameworks that can help connect individuals to their digital activities. These institutional factors could make a difference to how data could eventually be pieced together. We do not call out these distinctions. We chose the countries included in our analysis based on a few considerations: 1) Countries that are the most significant contributors to the global digital economy either because they are high on our earlier digital evolution index score or because they have strong momentum in their digital activities; 2) Countries that represent a reasonable spread in terms of region and socio-economic position; and 3) Countries that provided us with a solid data and evidence base to do the analyses.

Finally, an important consideration in determining accessibility is privacy. Privacy concerns and data protection regulations can help or hinder the abilities for algorithms to develop new capabilities. We take the position for this analysis that an established framework for ensuring privacy and data protection and openness to the mobility of data is a net benefit and a positive contributor to the development of AI over the long term. As an example, consider the problem of fraud detection in financial transactions. Applications that draw upon insights from diverse geographic locations and multiple usage contexts help establish patterns of trustworthiness and help flag security risks; such applications benefit from systems that meet the accessibility criterion. That said, we acknowledge that in the near-term there could be some countries – China being the pre-eminent example – where data-sharing between public and private sector agencies with very little mobility beyond the national borders could violate privacy and openness norms and yet yield a temporary advantage in training algorithms inside a “walled garden.”

Which of these criteria should be used in assessing a potential new world order, based on data? We believe accessibility should remain a foundational criterion. If one were to take the point of view that the biggest and highest impact AI applications are the ones that serve the greatest public purpose, access to data is key. In its recent study of AI for the public good, McKinsey cites access as one of the principal barriers: of the 18 bottlenecks identified by McKinsey, six relate to data availability, volume, quality, and usability.

This chart below shows what happens when the 30 countries we studied were mapped using two of our criteria:

While the U.S. scores well on all three criteria – and this might seem counter-intuitive to prevailing wisdom — China operates with a handicap if global accessibility of the data is considered essential for creating successful AI applications in the future. If the EU (currently including the UK) were to act as a collective, it represents a key producer that could rival the U.S. Besides, China, other BRIC nations, Brazil, India, Russia, could emerge as strong tier two contenders, largely on the strengths of raw data they produce; however, they too would be handicapped by accessibility concerns.

A different set of implications emerge for smaller countries, such as New Zealand, or those unaffiliated with larger economic unions, such as South Korea, but with high openness and mobility in data flows; such countries would benefit from establishing trade agreements in data with other “open” countries and thereby overcome their natural limitations, either in terms of number of users or in terms of total broadband consumed within the country. The forms such trade or data-sharing agreements might take is yet to be determined; however, we can envision that they could be a distinct possibility especially when we recognize that gross data product has value just like any other product that is freely traded today.

Of course, the direction of high-value AI applications is still emerging. There is also a risk of AI itself being over-hyped, misunderstood, and set up for disappointments down the road. But it’s clear that many important applications are already in use and more are coming. Our analytical framework is flexible enough to account for such fluidity. If we use a different set of criteria as being more relevant for driving successful AI applications, we find a different picture emerging. The chart below offers one such possibility, where only complexity and accessibility are considered.

When viewed in this manner, there is a more linear structuring of this “new” data-driven world order. The high broadband consumption per capita and institutionally open countries (in the top right hand portion of the graphic) emerge as the clear winners. One can imagine a scenario where the high complexity and mobility of data flows in the top-right of the graphic allow for a more productive “free-trade” zone, where countries mutually benefit from tapping into each other’s data reservoirs.

Finally, we considered a scenario where all four criteria ought to be considered important. If we assign equivalent weights to all four, a ranking of “new” data producers and an updated world order emerges.

1. United States

2. United Kingdom

3. China

4. Switzerland

5. South Korea

6. France

7. Canada

8. Sweden

9. Australia

10. Czech Republic

11. Japan

12. New Zealand

13. Germany

14. Spain

15. Ireland

16. Italy

17. Portugal

18. Mexico

19. Argentina

20. Chile

21. Poland

22. Brazil

23. Greece

24. India

25. South Africa

26. Hungary

27. Malaysia

28. Russia

29. Turkey

30. Indonesia

Of course, these segmentations provide insight into where the major data producers are based on a set of assumptions about what will be important for the highest-value applications in the future. Our purpose was to acknowledge the uncertainties and show how alternative assumptions yield different scenarios for the world order. A different segmentation and ranking would emerge if were to ask a different set of questions focused on the outcomes, such as economic or geopolitical value through AI that might be assigned to each country or how countries rank in terms of ease of doing digital business currently as they prepare for such a future. We are developing these in future research projects.

Data is the fuel of the new economy, and even more so of the economy to come. In declaring back in 2017 that the world’s most valuable resource is no longer oil, but data, The Economist said: “Whether you are going for a run, watching TV or even just sitting in traffic, virtually every activity creates a digital trace — more raw material for the data distilleries.” Algorithms trained by all these digital traces will be globally transformational. It’s possible that a new world order will emerge from it, along with a new “GDP” — gross data product —that captures an emerging measure of wealth and power of nations. It is time we identified what the field looks like now that new competitive and collaborative opportunities are developing.

19 Feb 2021

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McKinsey says Indian IT industry to touch $300-350 billion in five years

This growth of the Indian IT industry will come primarily on the back of digital services.

February 19, 2021,

The Indian IT industry is expected to touch the $300-$350 billion revenue mark over the next five years growing 10% a year. This will mean that the $194 billion Indian tech industry will be growing at a much faster clip than the 7.5% growth rate registered over the last five years, according to a soon-to-be-released report by McKinsey & Company. This growth of the Indian IT industry will come primarily on the back of digital services, which currently accounts for 30% of the industry’s revenue, but its share is expected to go up to 50% over the five years totalling to around $170 to $200 billion of revenue for the industry, said the report the highlights of which were presented on Thursday at the Nasscom annual Technology and Leadership Forum. UB Pravin Rao, chairman of Nasscom said, “One thing is very clear, we are pivoting into a hyper digital world and it has implications for technology service providers…” Rao who is also chief operating officer of Infosys added, “Today around 20 to 30% of our revenue is coming from digital. Obviously we have seen quite a bit of acceleration and this will only go further given the current pandemic situation.” The report said that to achieve the expected growth, there will have to be “multiple concerted actions” by the industry which will include investment by the Indian service providers in building and scaling digital technologies to create differentiated and scalable offerings at a global level. It will also include accelerating investments in reskilling the talent in new growth areas such as enterprise SAS ecosystem, Cybersecurity, data, artificial intelligence, 5G, IoT, product engineering etc. Noshir Kaka, senior partner at McKinsey & Company said that clients are of the view that technology is leading their recovery from the COVID pandemic. “We believe that technology spending is going to bounce back far faster than it has ever done from previous crises, and as a result we’re seeing again that acceleration and spending.” He added that the bounce back was visible in the order book of the actual work coming to all the industry participants lately. The report highlights also said that one of the biggest trends that will shape the future of technology will be that tech intensity will increase from 3% of revenue to 5% of revenue. This means that digital natives or reinventors will account for 75% of enterprise tech spending in the next five years. To capture this growth, service providers will have to consider changing their focus to new opportunity sets. Also, tech is accelerating fundamental shifts and business models worldwide. First is direct to consumer or direct to stakeholders and the second is ecosystems. These new business models are expected to account for about $150 billion opportunity for service providers going forward. Also, cloud, AI, and cybersecurity will accelerate the pivot to digital.

12 Feb 2021

bitcoin, blockchain, crypto currency, digital, digital currency, digital india, India, investments, Uncategorized admin 0 comment

Get ready for hefty penalty to legalize your crypto assets in India

The bill may allow holders of such currencies a transition period to exit the asset class before its anticipated ban.

NEW DELHI : The proposed cryptocurrency bill may allow holders of such currencies to exit the asset class before its anticipated ban but may put a heavy penalty on its conversion to a legal asset.

“The bill is yet to be finalized. The form and manner of declaration and how existing holders of the cryptocurrency should dispose of it will be prescribed either in the law or through the rules to be notified later,” a finance ministry official said on condition of anonymity. The Cryptocurrency and Regulation of Official Digital Currency Bill, 2021 is scheduled to be tabled in the ongoing budget session of Parliament. The bill is intended to “create a facilitative framework for the creation of the official digital currency to be issued by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). The bill also seeks to prohibit all private cryptocurrencies in India. However, it allows for certain exceptions to promote the underlying technology of cryptocurrency and its uses,” the Lok Sabha secretariat said in a bulletin.

The bill is likely to make mining, holding, selling, issuing, transferring, and using of cryptocurrency a punishable offence with a heavy fine or imprisonment or both.

“Certain media reports suggest that the government has decided to ban all private cryptocurrency and other key players of the industry. We would like to receive an intimation from the government on this. We would like to reiterate that the government of India is yet to release the draft of the proposed bill. As an exchange, we remain hopeful that the ministry of finance will definitely engage with the community before taking any harsh measures,” said Sumit Gupta, founder of cryptocurrency exchange CoinDCX.

Investments worth $24 million went into crypto firms in 2020, up from a mere $5 million in the previous year, as per data from analysis firm Venture Intelligence. Crypto firms in India have also experienced a successful year since the lockdown in March 2020. Crypto trading in India has become a formalized sector over the past few years, because of the rise of various crypto exchanges.

17 Jan 2021

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Digit Insurance Becomes India’s First Unicorn Of 2021 With $18 million Fundraise

By Brisk Avenue: 17/01/2021

The organization digit insurance protection raised its first outside subsidizing round a year ago at a valuation of $870 Mn

It has raised about $200 Mn till date.

Digit Insurance professes to have noticed a 31.9% development rate over the most recent nine months

Bengaluru-based insurtech startup Digit Insurance has become the main Indian startup to enter the unicorn club in 2021, in the wake of raising INR 135 Cr ($18 Mn) from existing speculators at a valuation of $1.9 Bn. It has raised the financing as development cash-flow to meet the dissolvability edge prerequisite, following a 31.9% development over the most recent nine months.

Digit Insurance has raised about $200 million till date from marquee financial specialists A91 Partners, Faering Capital and TVS Capital, which own about 11% stake in the organization. It raised its first outer subsidizing round last January at a post-cash valuation of about $870 Mn. The organization had raised $84 Mn (INR 614 Cr at current change rate) as a piece of this round, in which Indian cricketer Virat Kohli and Bollywood entertainer Anushka Sharma implanted about $340K (INR 2.5 Cr).

Before this, the organization depended on an inward capital implantation from Fairfax Holdings. The advertisers have put more than $142 mn in Digit Insurance in 2017 and 2018, and own about 88% stake in the organization. “Our technique was to improve items and measure and back it up with great assistance. This is working for us to accomplish development,” Goyal clarified

Established in 2016, Digit Insurance is a tech-driven general insurance agency that offers altered arrangements on wellbeing, auto, travel, cell phones, business properties, for example, stores and occasion homes. It extended its business during the pandemic by offering new items like fixed advantage cover for Covid-19 under Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority’s (IRDAI) sandbox activity.

The organization asserts that it was going to connect with in excess of 20 Lakh Indian through their Digit Group Illness Insurance item, which offered assurance against Covid-19 and 7 Vector-borne sicknesses like dengue, jungle fever, filariasis, ala azar, chikungunya, Japanese encephalitis and the zika infection.

As indicated by an IBEF report, the Indian protection industry was relied upon to reach $280 Bn before the finish of 2020 and develop at a build yearly development rate (CAGR) of 12-15% throughout the following three to five years. The market is required to develop as the Indian government pushes for protection infiltration and multiplication of protection plans. As indicated by BlackSoil’s fellow benefactor and chief Ankur Bansal, the insurtech will be a top choice among speculators in 2021 as the portion is required to develop.

12 Jan 2021

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Startup Funding Options in India

Planning to launch your own start-up? Now is the time. India is in its best ever phase of startup ecosystem and the economic environment is favoring the aspiring minds. However, careful planning and futuristic approach are imperative to ensure your startup don’t end like the 94% that shut down their shutters within the first year of operation.

Funding is an extremely significant aspect in line with meeting the vision of a business. Funding and fundraising, both are fundamental modern business scenarios that support the growth of a startup. The first round of funding, popularly known as seed funding forms the basis of fundraising. It is followed by series A, B and C rounds of funding. While the seed funding typically refers to the basic, initial round of funding, series A, B, and C differ in the business maturity and the type of investors involved. The series funding helps in the evolvement of a startup to a full-fledged organization by helping it with calculated funds at crucial steps.

Here are a few successful startup funding options in India that will help you support your business with the indispensable finance requirements.

Go for Crowdfunding

The concept of crowdfunding is quite similar to mutual funds on a basic level. In this option, more than one investor is involved and they offer a fixed amount of money based on your business idea, goal, plan of action, and plans of making a profit. All you need to have are people who truly believe in your business idea.

Crowdfunding is gaining popularity as it ascertains the belief that your idea is also believed by other experienced players in the market. Crowdfunding also helps you in getting the crucial funds from the idea stage itself. You can gather crowdfunding from friends, family, and entrepreneurs who believe in your business concept and have the means to come together and fund your aspiration.

Consider Self-funding

Popularly known as bootstrapping, it is an ideal plan of action when it is hard to convince others of your business idea and vision. Often investors ask for traction before making an investment, the initial round of self-funding allows you to prove the feasibility of your idea and build confidence in the investors for a further round of funding.

Bootstrapping is a great idea for startup funding especially if the initial business requirement is small. It also gives you the freedom of being your own boss. You’re not answerable to anyone and it allows you to keep an eye on the revenue earnings as well.

Get in touch with the Venture Capitalists

A sure shot destination for big bets, venture capitalists offer you professionally managed funds who are looking for startups that have success potential. The best part about venture capital investments is the expertise and monitoring that they bring along. Ordinarily, VCs invest in equity and once the business releases its IPO or is acquired, they leave.

Venture Capitalists usually look for startups with a good enough traction and a strong team. But if you’re opting for venture capital funding, be flexible enough to take their inputs and accept the close monitoring.

Try Angel Investment

There are individuals with surplus cash looking for investing in promising startups and earn their share once it grows to its potential. They can either work alone or collectively in a network to screen startups with huge potential. This funding option has business minds looking to earn interest out of your success and they may expect as high as 30% equity as well.

Although angel investment comes with its issues of high-interest expectations and lesser investments as compared to Venture capitalists; it is important to remember that Google, Yahoo, and even Alibaba were a result of Angel investing.

Conclusion

Funding is required to take the best advantage of the existing and upcoming market opportunities. Even if you initially go for bootstrapping, outside funding is required to sustain in the long run.

09 Jun 2020

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70% of Indian startups will run out of money in less than 3 months

70% of Indian new businesses will run out of cash in under 3 months An overabundance to tie down extra capital in the coming a long time to guide through the Covid pandemic, as per an industry report. 70% of new businesses in India, home to one of the world’s biggest startup biological systems, have under a quarter of a year of money runway in the bank, and another 22% have enough to scarcely make it to the furthest limit of the year, as indicated by a review directed by industry body Nasscom. Just 8% of new businesses that took an interest in Nasscom’s review said they had enough cash to make due for over nine months. 90% of new companies said they were confronting a decrease in incomes, while 30 to 40% said they were incidentally stopping their tasks or were currently shutting down. As new businesses stand up to exceptional occasions, many are considering finding a way to remain above water. About 54% of somewhere in the range of 250 respondents said they were hoping to rotate to new business openings, and 40% said they needed to broaden into development verticals, for example, medical care. The money crunch comes as financial specialists on the planet’s second biggest web market become mindful about composing new checks to youthful firms. In an open letter a month ago, a few unmistakable VC reserves cautioned new businesses that they may discover it particularly testing to bring new capital up in the following not many months. For certain new businesses, there are different variables at play, as well. Over 69% of business-to-business new companies, particularly those working in retail and fintech classes, state in the report that they are confronting delays in installments from their customers. This has left the greater part of such new businesses to implement pay cuts, decrease their advertising spends, and a fourth of them to change to a cheaper seller to set aside cash. New companies working in vehicle and travel areas are additionally seriously affected, with 78% of respondents saying they were reevaluating their plans of action and tweaking their items as per the current situation. In a call with correspondents on Tuesday, heads at Oyo disclosed new advances the spending dwelling startup had taken at its inns to guarantee security for administrators and clients. They additionally said they were trusting that New Delhi and state governments would permit more individuals to travel and remain at lodgings once more. More than 66% of new companies additionally said they were searching for arrangements that facilitated guidelines and spike government buys. Numerous likewise mentioned help in assessments for a couple of years. More than 66% of Indian new companies accept the effect of Covid will wait for as long as a year. (Nasscom) Recently, India declared a $266 billion improvement bundle to help resuscitate the slowed down economy. On Saturday, Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that new businesses excessively will have the option to get to a portion of this help — however subtleties stay meager on how they should go about it. Since 2017, India’s startup environment has developed reliably. A year ago, new companies in the nation raised a record $14.5 billion. “Out of nowhere, this prospering development adventure has abruptly been hit by a barricade… the COVID detour. There is no nation, business or living being that has not been influenced by the COVID pandemic. While governments have been working industriously to secure and spare living souls, organizations have been hit and independent ventures and new companies have been the most influenced,” said Debjani Ghosh, President of Nasscom, in the report.

18 Sep 2019

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India start-up scenario.

Why there is no better time than now to invest in startups

Investments in the Indian start-up ecosystem surged 322 per cent in July year-on-year. They rose to $5.61 billion last month, against $1.33 billion in July 2019, according to data from Tracxn, a firm that tracks investments and financials of private companies and start-ups. The funding that went into Jio Platforms’ alone accounted for nearly 87 per cent of the total amount

The number of companies that garnered the investment, though, fell to 82 last month, against 120 in the same period in 2019.

Top-funded sectors

The top-funded sectors include telecom ($4,854 million), enterprise infrastructure ($236.2 million), ed-tech ($164.95 million), real estate- and construction-tech ($78.1 million), retail ($57.42 million) and media and entertainment ($53.90 million). The consumer sector, which encompasses online and technology-enabled consumer-facing companies in the business-to-consumer (B2C) space, raised $183.47 million.

While Jio Platforms, Nxtra Data, Vedantu, Zolo and Toppr were the top five funded companies in July 2020, the most active investors – based on the number of deals in July – included Mumbai Angels, Matrix Partners India, Accel, LetsVenture and Unicorn India Ventures.