Last month, the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development announced a Rs 750 crore Indian agritech startup-focused fund. This scheme aims to help rural enterprises and startups in the agriculture sector. The program was launched to help startups and promote investment in technology-driven, innovative, and high-risk activities in the agriculture and farming sectors. NABVENTURES will manage this fund and invest in 84 agri-tech startups with Rs 25 crore per Agritech company.
The government introduced this scheme to enhance the agri-produce value chains by creating new rural ecosystem linkages & infrastructure. India has around 3,493 Agritech startups. tracxn reported. These startups will be offered mentorship and funds under this scheme to help them cover service costs such as packaging, and logistics. Here are some of the top 10 agritech startups in India this year.
Agrostar
Agrostar is an agritech startup that provides agri-inputs, content, and advice related to agriculture. The startup uses advanced technologies to offer expert advice, agricultural data, weather forecasts, and more. The company provides products like pumps, seeds, fertilizer, pesticides, and pesticides.
The startup has secured over 147 million USD across ten funding rounds since its inception in 2013, including $301k raised during its series E funding round. The company has investors including Accel, Bertelsmann India Investments, and Aavishkaar Capital. The AI startup faces competition from other companies in the same segment such as Gramophone, and DeHaat.
DeHaat
The startup provides an app-based platform for AI-enabled solutions. The company provides yield predictions and soil testing facilities. The startup uses artificial intelligence to monitor supply chain activity and offer customized agricultural financing solutions. The company enables farmers with credit and insurance for agricultural-related activities. The company has secured around $222 million across multiple funding rounds. The company has investors like Sequoia Capital and competes with other startups in this field like StarAgi and Agrostar.
Licious
Licious is an online platform that offers meat products. The startup provides an online meat shop for chicken, seafood, eggs, and meat. The company also produces plant-based meat and ready-to-cook products. The startup has secured around 490 million USD across all its funding rounds, this includes $914k raised during its series G funding round last year. The company has investors including Temasek, Mayfirls, and Avendus. Licious faces competition from companies including TenderCuts, Fresh to Home Foods, and ZappFresh
Godrej Agrovet
Godrej Agrovet provides several crop protection solutions and pesticides for various seeds. The company aims to enable farmers to take care of plants and crops. The agritech startup uses cutting-edge technologies to offer customized solutions with bio-stimulants, plant growth regulators, and organic manure. The startup secured $105 million during its funding round led by Temasek. Godrej Agrovet competes with Hain Celestial and other agri-tech companies.
Waycool
The agritech startup Waycool offers tech-enabled supply chain solutions for solving the challenges in agribusiness. The startup provides food development and distribution solutions across the agriculture sector. The company uses innovative technology to operate a complex supply chain and scale production. The startup has secured over $341 million across multiple rounds to date, including the series D funding round. The company receives investments from Lighstone, Lightbox, and Lightrock India.
FarMart
Farmart is an online B2B platform for farm produce. This app-based platform allows agri-retailers to provide farmers access to advisory, market linkages, and inputs. The company uses cutting-edge technologies and Artificial Intelligence to monitor agriculture-related activity and offer customized agricultural solutions to farmers. The startup aims to help farmers with the consultations. The Gurugram startup secured 48.3 million USD to date, including $2.8 million from responsibility during its series B funding round. It faces competition from other companies like Ninjacart and Agrostar.
Gramophone
App-based farming services and solution provider Gramophone is one of the leading agri-tech companies. The startup offers real-time advice from experts and enables farmers to purchase crop nutrition, seeds, implements, and agricultural hardware products. The mobile application provides information like weather forecasting, expense calculation, and market prices. The company secured $1.8 million in its series B funding round from Z3Partners with the participation of Asha and Siana Capital to expand its services. The startup faces competition from other agritech platforms such as Agrostar, StarAgri, and DeHaat.
Captain Fresh
Captain Fresh provides an online B2B marketplace for seafood products. The application offers seafood like crab, salmon, shrimp, lobsters, and more. The startup procures, processes, and distributes seafood products to retailers through its online platform. The company recently acquired Poland’s food and beverage manufacturing company, Koral. The startup has secured around 165 million USD since its inception, including $3 million raised from SBI investment during its series C funding round. The company faces competition from Farmart, Apnaklub, and Waycool.
Nijacart
This B2B platform offers fresh fruits and vegetables to customers. The startup provides a platform that helps agri-producers and farmers to connect with supermarkets groceries, wholesalers, and retailers to sell their produce. The company has raised over 508 million in funding across ten funding rounds. The startup recently secured $9.17 million from its existing investors in the series D funding round. The company has investors including Flipkart, Tiger Global Management, and. This B2B platform faces competition from other companies in the same segment such as Waycool, and Farmart.
Ecozen Solution
The company offers solar-powered irrigation pump controllers. The startup manufactures solar pumps and pump hubs using advanced technologies. The company provides Ecotron, a solar-powered pump controller with an analytics platform to enable the live-track frequency, motor, current, power consumption, and PV voltage performance reports. The startup raised 66.4 million USD across all funding rounds since its inception. Ecozen Solutions also raised funds from the Incred Credit Fund and DFC during its debt funding round. The company competes with other solar-powered pumping solution providers like Lorentz, Sunculture, and Khetworks.
Conclusion :
The Indian agritech industry has been growing rapidly for the past few years. India has around 1.4 lakh startups across various sectors. From these startups over 3.4k are agritech startups that have raised millions of dollars in the past years. The government of India has been launching several schemes in the past few years including funding programs and initiatives schemes to promote the Indian agritech startup ecosystem.
These companies are changing the country’s ecosystem and reshaping the workings of industries while contributing to the overall development of the Indian economy. The scaling up of these companies will create more job opportunities while strengthening India’s position as a global startup hub. The growth and profit from startups will help India solidify its position in the global agritech market.
The government is focused on making Indian startups grow and compete in the global market. The government of India allocated Rs 1.52 lakh crore in the Union budget for 2024-25 only focused on helping and promoting startups across the vegetable supply chain. The budget was used on farmer-producer organizations and startups for the vegetable supply chain. The scheme will also provide Kishan Credit Cards to farmers through this system.
