January 19, 2021

By Lynda Kiernan, Global AgInvesting Media

Gurugram and Patna, India-based online end-to-end agribusiness services platform DeHaat, announced it has closed on $30 million in funding led by Prosus Ventures. The round also saw participation from RTP Global and existing investors Omnivore Partners, Sequoia India, the Dutch development bank FMO, and AgFunder.

This capital follows a $12 million Series A closed by the startup in April 2020 that was led by Sequoia India and included FMO, Omnivore, and AgFunder, and $4 million in pre-Series A financing raised in March 2019 led by Omnivore and AgFunder. 

India is a top global producer of many agricultural products – producing 81.285 metric tons of fruit and 162.187 metric tons of vegetables, or approximately 14 percent of the global supply – according to the research article Scope of Supply Chain Management in Fruits and Vegetables in India, published in the Journal of Food Processing & Technology.  However, due to inefficiencies throughout the country’s supply chain, India sees food waste of up to 67 million tons each year – more than the total food production of Great Britain, reports Zee News.

Often in the agricultural investment field, challenges are seen as opportunities for innovation and return on investment – and increasingly, investors are seeing these inefficiencies in India’s supply chain as a means to not only have a positive social impact, but as a path to positive returns.

Founded in 2012 by Amrendra Singh, Shyam Sundar, Adarsh Srivastav, and Shashank Kumar – alumni of IIT Delhi, IIT Kharagpur, IIM Ahmedabad, and other top institutes, DeHaat (which means “village” in Hindi) is one of agtech’s fastest-growing startups and one of the few offering an end-to-end platform providing farmers customized advisory services, agricultural inputs, financial advisory services, and marketing facilitation.

“Through its end-to-end agricultural services offerings, DeHaat will have a major societal impact in India, improving the earning potential for Indian farmers and overall yield for the sector while also enabling micro-entrepreneurs all over the country, including in rural areas where there is often less income opportunity,” said Ashutosh Aharma, head of India Investments, Prosus Ventures.

Leveraging AI-enabled technologies, DeHaat’s aim is to revolutionize supply chains and raise production efficiency by offering a full-stack platform offering access to more than 4,000 agricultural inputs and AI-driven customized crop advisory for pest and disease management delivered via mobile app and call centers. It also aggregates corn, wheat, rice, bajra, fruits, and vegetables from farmers connected to its network, supplying to more than 500 commodity bulk buyers that include retail chains, FMCG giants, SME food processors, and e-commerce players.

“Prosus Ventures invests in industries around the world where innovation can significantly address big societal needs,” said Sharma. “DeHaat is catering to a massive market in India with the agriculture sector worth more than $350 billion to the country’s economy and consisting of an estimated 140 million+ farmers.”

With a team of 60, DeHaat has developed web and mobile interfaces that deliver 100 percent transparency to farmers in regard to both input companies and bulk agricultural buyers. And over the past two years has seen annual growth exceeding 3.5X, while also building out a rural retail network of more than 1,300 micro-entrepreneurs that handle last mile delivery, serving more than 360,000 farmers (up from 210,000 in April 2020) across the eastern states of Bihar, UP, Jharkhand, and Odisha.

“We have been watching DeHaat for 18 months and have been impressed with the speed of development that the team is demonstrating,” said Galina Chifina, partner, RTP Global. “Agritech is exploding in India and DeHaat is building a unique infrastructure platform and is one of the only companies delivering an end-to-end solution for the farming community in India. It is a challenging market and Shashank and the team have the expertise needed to scale. We’re excited to be onboard and lend our support.”

With the capital raised through this latest round, the company plans to strengthen its technology platform and expand its geographic reach into new regions of India to meet its goal to aggregate 10 million Indian farmers by integrating a digital marketplace with a rural network of last-mile service, delivery centers, and services.

– Lynda Kiernan is editor with GAI Media, and is managing editor and daily contributor for Global AgInvesting’s AgInvesting Weekly News and  Agtech Intel News, and HighQuest Group’s Oilseed & Grain News. She is also a contributor to the GAI Gazette. She can be reached at lkiernan@globalaginvesting.com.