Fintech secured the maximum number of deals i.e. 121, while, ecommerce took away the maximum funding with $2.1 Billion in investments.
Indian startups received a total funding of $11 billion across 743 deals last year, according to Inc42 Media’s latest report.
The number of deals declined by 21 per cent and the total funding amount decreased by 16 per cent in 2018 as compared to the previous year, the report said.
In 2017, four startups took away half the funding i.e. $6.9 billion, while in 2018, nine startups notch $5.4 billion of the total $11 billion, the report said.
As per the Inc42’s Annual Indian Tech Startup Funding Report, the year 2018 observed a significant drop — 40 per cent in comparison to 2017 — in funding deals in the early stage.
From 551 in 2017, the number of deals in the early stage came down to 331 in 2018. Growth-stage deals remained almost the same while late-stage deals registered an 18 per cent growth as compared to 2017.
The B2B-B2C model had the highest percentage share (41.1 per cent) in the total number of deals. Also, B2B-B2C bagged 52.68 per cent of the total amount invested in 2018.
However, the total investment in this model in 2018 — $5.7 billion — fell 27.46 per cent as compared to the previous year.
Some key highlights of the report
Fintech secured the maximum number of deals i.e. 121, while, ecommerce took away the maximum funding with $2.1 Bn in investments. Consumer services, healthtech, enterprisetech continues to shine.
Bengaluru scored 247 deals in 2018 followed by Delhi/NCR raking up a total of 224 deals. Other major cities such as Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad and Pune are growing well.
In 2018, both investor participation and unique investors came down by 17 per cent from 1.9K in 2017 to 1.6K in 2018 and 1.1K to 0.99K respectively. Interestingly, 90 per cent of angel investors have done just a single investment and just 1 per cent have done more than 3 investments in 2018.
The report also includes the list of “Top 10 Angel Investors” and “Top 10 Venture Capital Firms” for 2018.
Rajan Anandan and Binny Bansal became the top angels with 6 deals each, while Accel Partners India (28 deals) and Sequoia Capital India (24 deals) took the top slots amongst the VC firms.
In 2018, over 122 M&As were reported in the Indian Tech startup ecosystem.
Predictions for 2019
In 2019, Indian startups are expected to raise investments of $13.5 Bn through 936 deals.
However, the report noted that the funding gap observed in 2017 and 2018 will continue in 2019 where a handful of startups will be attracting a major chunk of the funding.
