Startup news and updates: daily roundup (December 13, 2022)
YourStory presents the daily news roundup from the Indian startup ecosystem and beyond. Here's the roundup for Tuesday, December 13, 2022.
Skill-based gaming company Zupee appoints Maneesh Goel as CFO
, an online real money gaming company offering skill-based casual and board games, on Tuesday announced the appointment of Maneesh Goel as its Chief Financial Officer (CFO).
Maneesh comes with more than 20 years of experience in a wide range of finance and business functions within a host of diverse industries, having held senior positions from CFO, CEO, and board member positions. Maneesh joins Zupee from having worked with prominent brands like PayU, Den Snapdeal TV Shop, Dell, and Times Internet, to name a few.
As the chief financial officer, Goel will lead Zupee’s CFO function and help drive profitability with scale as well as strengthen controls and governance processes and contribute to the brands’ ongoing growth journey. With this appointment, Zupee stands to benefit from his expertise in the understanding of organisational design, culture, scaling businesses, creating agile and efficient processes as well as corporate governance.
Since its inception in 2018, Zupee has significantly grown with over 95% market share in the casual and boardgame segment and has been installed by over 70 million users and employs over 300 individuals.
CleverTap appoints Samer Saad as Regional Sales Director for META region
, the retention cloud, has appointed Samer Saad as the Regional Sales Director for its META Region and will be based out of Dubai.
Samer has over a decade of experience in building and scaling sales teams across the MEA region. He joins from Appsflyer, where he was the Regional Manager for the MEA region, and has led partnership sales and agency roles across Criteo and Yahoo!.
“We are all excited to have Samer onboard! With 120+ existing customers in the region, we have a robust foundation to further scale in the region. I am confident that Samer will help us embark on the next phase of our growth journey in the META region,” said Vikrant Chowdhary, Chief Growth Officer, CleverTap.
“I am thrilled to join CleverTap as it has emerged as the global leader in the retention cloud category. The SaaS industry is one of the most promising across the world, and I am looking forward to being a part of the CleverTap journey, in becoming the preferred retention cloud partner for all digital native brands in the META region,” said Samer Saad, Regional Sales Director, META, CleverTap.
Smartr Logistics announces the launch of a new pan-India ground express service ‘Wheelex’
has introduced a ground express service–‘Wheelex’ offering express door-to-door logistics service in addition to its existing Air Express (Aerex) products.
“Aligning with the government’s ambition for India’s logistics industry, Smartr introduced Wheelex to provide the best quality services at affordable rates. The National Logistics Policy, announced by the Government in September 2022, aims to streamline and digitise the logistics services in the country and Smartr is addressing the market demands to reduce the overall cost of logistics by utilizing optimum technology for efficient, speedy, and on-time delivery,” said Yogesh Dhingra, Founder, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Smartr Logistics.
Smartr has customised Wheelex into four distinct express services–Wheelex Kargo (B2B), Wheelex Share (Part Truck Load), Wheelex Jumbo (Full Truck Load), and Wheelex eComm. The service caters to a diverse range of express logistics requirements for all segments of customers like garments, retail, FMCG, electronics, pharma, automotive, telecom, home appliances, office supplies and more.
Neuron Energy to invest Rs 50 Cr in Lithium-Ion battery pack business vertical
, a manufacturer of lithium-ion for electric 2W and 3W in India, plans to invest Rs 50 crore in the Li-Ion battery pack segment. The investment will be split between Rs 35 crore of working capital financing and Rs 15 crore of equity from the promoters and strategic partners.
This move by the company is to cater to the increasing demand in their order book. Neuron also has plans for backward integration into stocking raw materials and handling production along with a contract manufacturer in the near future.
Besides increasing capacity, 40 percent of the investment will be used to fulfill orders from large OEMs. As part of its growth strategy, the company intends to focus on the battery pack business. The investment is also expected to increase cash flow considering Neuron has always been a profitable company.
The Depot network will remain the same for the next six months in Mumbai, Delhi, Chennai, and Kolkata. In the near future, Neuron may venture into battery research for deep technology as a result of the increase in its R&D team. As part of its expansion plans, Neuron has planned to construct a mega-plant by 2025 that will serve the EV2W and EV3W segments.
IppoPay Technologies appoints Raghu Venkat as Chief Product Officer
Chennai-based has appointed Raghu Venkat as its Chief Product Officer. Raghu brings with him innovative product development experience of over two decades of building testable, usable, and scalable products.
In his previous startup Actyv.ai as a co-founder and CTO, he oversaw Engineering, Product, and Data Science to lay the foundation for building embedded financial products. At Evive, he built the Product and Engineering team from the ground up for the healthcare product, achieved over $40+ million in funding, and helped secure the product with hi-trust certification.
Sudeep Nagar, Co-founder, BlueStone
BlueStone elevates Sudeep Nagar as Co-founder
omnichannel fine jewellery brands said that it has elevated Sudeep Nagar, its Chief Operating Officer, as its co-founder. Sudeep joins Gaurav Singh Kushwaha, the CEO, as the second co-founder of the Bengaluru-based retail venture.
An alumnus of IIM Ahmedabad, Sudeep joined BlueStone a decade ago, in December 2012, with extensive experience in software and luxury real estate. Since then, he has been instrumental in making BlueStone a vertically and digitally integrated organisation.
BluSmart and Truecaller partner to add trust to consumer identity and communication
has partnered with for Business to establish and add trust to identity and communication with users and drivers.
The collaboration is in line to enhance the overall user experience by leveraging Truecaller’s expertise. With Truecaller Business Solutions, BluSmart claims it has increased its calling efficiency to 82%, making communication more seamless and bringing a noteworthy change in user perception with a branded caller id.
FIEO partners with Shiprocket to provide end-to-end ecommerce export shipping solutions to Indian MSMEs
The Federation of Indian Export Organisations (FIEO) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with to support micro, small, and medium enterprise (MSME) exporters in India to showcase their products on the Indian Business Portal.
FIEO member exporters will be able to choose premium economy and express options under the Shiprocket panel. In addition to this, for the prompt resolution of the enquiries and service issues of the FIEO members, a dedicated helpdesk is established.
To avail of these benefits, the exporter shall submit the details by clicking on the Shiprocket banner hosted on the homepage of the business portal. A flat 15% discount can be availed on international shipment tariffs by FIEO members and SMEs registered on Indian Business Portal (IBP) to start ecommerce exports in a cost-competitive way.
Mohan Sitaram joins Shadowfax as Chief Human Resources Officer
, a third-party logistics platform for last-mile delivery, has appointed Mohan Sitaram as Chief Human Resources Officer. This comes as a strategic move to help the organisation enhance talent and organisational capabilities.
Mohan comes with more than 25 years of HR experience in Banking, IT Services, and product companies. In the past, he has worked for Mindtree, HCL, Subex, and ANZ Group. Mohan is also on the board of Whiteswan Foundation, a not-for-profit company with the largest knowledge repository on mental health in India with more than a million users.
Practo adds over 9,000 new clinics and hospitals to its network
’s appointment booking business has added over 9,000 new clinics and hospitals in the last two years. With this new addition across 750 pin codes, the total number of partner hospitals and clinics in its appointment booking network stands at close to 80,000. More than 94% of new pin codes added were in Tier II cities, indicating the company's growing focus and presence beyond metros.
In addition to that, Practo has also onboarded more than 12,000+ new healthcare professionals across specialities to its network. With this, Dentistry, Dermatology, and General Practice are now the top three specialities with respect to the total number of healthcare professionals.
Upriver announces its foray into the financial services for online sellers
, an online channel management and sales acceleration agency, said it has entered financial services for online sellers.
Upriver will now offer business loans ranging from Rs 5 lakh to Rs 15 crore to ecommerce merchants. An entire bouquet of short to medium-term loan offerings, including secured and unsecured loans, will be available to sellers to address their growth and working capital issues.
(This article will be updated with the latest news throughout the day.)
Edited by Megha Reddy
