Metaverse Startups Watch List: India
List of Early stage Metaverse startups that have recently closed funding in India.
1. IKonz
Founded 2021
Website: www.ikonz.club
Founder Abinav Kalidindi, Prasad Vanga, Rana Duggubati
Description: Developer of a wealth-building platform intended to bring culture’s biggest icons & iconic IP into the Metaverse through NFTs. The company specializes in navigating the complexities of the technology and understanding the different means of monetization and upscaling, enabling IP owners, artists, and other established icons to manage, sell and monetize digital assets.
Recent Funding: The company raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding in a deal led by Village Global and Woodstock Fund on March 7, 2022. Polygon Studios also participated in the round. The funds will be used to ramp up artistic talent from across the globe and hire top tech talent to build out its metaverse and drop NFTs from its various IP partners.
2. Invact
Founded 2021
Website www.invact.com
Founder: Manish Maheshwari & Tanay Pratap
Description: Operator of an immersive university-like platform intended to create employability via quality education. The company’s platform combines the virtual world with the real world to offer an alternate MBA program that focuses on core business function and job skills such as marketing, product management, and many more, enabling freshers and professionals to avail socially immersive learning experiences from the comfort of their couch.
Recent Financing Status(as of 21-Feb-2022): The company raised $5 million of seed funding in a deal led by Arkam Ventures on February 7, 2022, putting the company’s pre-money valuation at $28 million. Antler India, and 68 other investors also participated in the round.
3. LOKA (Social/Platform Software)
Founded 2020
Website www.lokaworld.app
Founder: Krishnan Sunderarajan
Description: Developer of a metaverse application intended to enable users to interact with different people all around the world. The company’s platform offers a metaverse multiplayer gaming application that provides real locations and experiences to the user and is designed for social engagement, gaming, E-commerce, content & entertainment, enabling users to get a real experience of gaming and social engagement.
Recent Funding: The company raised INR 1.33 million of angel funding from Anupam Mittal on March 2, 2022, putting the company’s pre-money valuation at INR 15.30 million.
4. Atirath Gaming Technology
Founded: 2017
Website: www.atirath.com
Founder: Shiva Bayyapunedi & Ramachandra Raju
Description: Developer of a gaming platform designed on an Indian mythology theme. The company’s platform creates fun and strategy-based games targeting smartphones bringing unique subcontinent cultural elements/themes with global appeal, helping players, content creators, and game publishers to connect with each other.
Most Recent Financing Status: The company raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding from Kalaari Capital on February 7, 2022. The funds will be used for strengthening company’s products, expand its team and prepare for the metaverse.
5. Wall App
Founded: 2021
Website: www.wall.app
Founder: Anuj Kodam
Description: Operator of a social discovery platform intended to offer communication in blockchain-based social communities. The company’s platform offers to converge cross-chain activities, digital collectibles, access to creators and artists, discovery activities in NFTs and DAOs, enabling users to bridge the gap between creator and community by creating a way they can communicate with each other without ads and revenue slicing from third parties.
Most Recent Financing Status: The company raised $1 million of seed funding from Woodstock Fund, Arcanum Capital and Lancer Capital on January 3, 2022. Tushar Aggarwal, Deepanshu Tripati, Ahmed Al-Balaghi, Aniket Jindal, Sachin Tomar, Prabhakar Reddy, Raghu Yarlagadda and Lumos labs also participated in the round. The funds will be used for organic and inorganic growth and for scaling product technology, marketing and customer acquisition.
6. Kudo Money
Website: www.kudo.money
Founder: Tejas Thole
Description: Developer of a blockchain technology designed to revolutionize how on-chain identity works for Metaverse and Defi. The company’s technology provides ready access to borrowing, airdrop and farming opportunities in ethereum, polygon, BSC and Solana ecosystems, enabling ecosystem stakeholders to participate in the protocol governance.
Most Recent Financing Status(as of 29-Dec-2021):The company raised $5 million of Series A venture funding from Bitcoin.com, Magnus Ventures and Black Dragon Capital on December 28, 2021. Lumo Labs, Insignius Capital, R8 Capital and other venture capitalists, crypto communities, media investors, and decentralized protocols from all over the world also participated in the round.
7. OneRare
Founded: 2021
Website: www.onerare.io
Founder: Supreet Raju & Gaurav Gupta
Description: Developer of a metaverse designed for the global food and beverage Industry. The company has built the first tokenization layer that celebrates food in web3, enabling users to access immersive and gamified experiences.
Most Recent Financing Status(as of 17-Nov-2021)The company raised $2 million of seed funding from Kangaroo Capital, Maven Capital and Tag Ventures on November 17, 2021. 20 other investors also participated in the round. The funds will be utilised for product development, marketing, as well as building utility for the NFTs which will be exchanged for real-life meals.
8. AcknoLedger
Founded: 2020
Website: www.acknoledger.com
Founder: Abhishek Rajpurohit, Kuntal Ganguly & Yash Dahenkar
Description: Developer of an online financial platform designed for NFT and Blockchain trading. The company enables indexing NFTs across gaming, metaverses and NFT marketplaces and is a global consortium that maps, monetizes and distributes Web 3.0 digital assets across all the metaverses and gaming NFTs, thereby providing consumers the insights for informed decision making.
Most Recent Financing Status(as of 18-Oct-2021): The company raised $1.53 million of seed funding from Mahadao, Nord Finance and Kangaroo Capital on October 16, 2021. Supra Oracles, Oasis Capital, Amesten Capital and 24 other investors also participated in the round. The funds will be used to expand, grow and partner with more fintech companies and to emerge from stealth mode in October 2021.
9. Revirt.Space
Founded: 2021
Website: revirt.space
Founder: Kunal Singh & Kunaal Punj
Description: Developer of a metaverse platform intended to function in virtual lands and spaces. The company offers customizable space to create and build virtual real estate as per needs and taste, walk in and out of conversations without having to schedule meetings, co-browse, and work with collaboration tools, allowing organizations and communities to work in their own virtual ecosystem.
Most Recent Financing Status(as of 16-Mar-2022)The company raised an undisclosed amount of venture funding from Multiply Ventures and Better Capital (India) on August 15, 2021.
10. Doss Games
Website: www.doss.games
Founder: Mukul Sharma & Tanmay Joshi
Description: Developer of metaverse creation app based in Karnataka, India. The company’s web 3.0 mobile Metaverse app offers users to mint their own social tokens, build-play and host personalized “Play-to-earn” multiplayer gaming tournaments and much more with easy-to-use no-code tools, helping creators to engage with their true fans/communities and monetize their talent/time in a unique way.
Most Recent Financing Status(as of 24-Jan-2022): The company raised INR 25 million of pre-seed funding in a deal led by Titan Capital on July 6, 2021. Maninder Gulati, Varun Alagh, Abhinav Sinha and other undisclosed investors also participated in the round. The fund will be used to strengthen their product, design and blockchain capabilities.
11. Dehidden
Founded: 2021
Website: www.dehidden.com
Founder: Dhruva Chakravarthi
Description: Developer of a no-code platform designed to access and launch immersive NFTs (Nonfungible tokens). The company’s platform allows users to launch smart NFT experiences in a completely visual canvas, with no code, helping creators to access NFT easily and also providing them with seamless experiences to unlock utilities for the NFT.
Most Recent Financing Status(as of 03-Feb-2022):The company raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding from Musha Ventures and Alvin Tse in approximately 2021.
12. Simulanis
Founded: 2013
Website: www.simulanis.com
Founder: Raman Talwar
Description: Developer of a virtual reality media platform designed to create 3D gaming and augmented reality-based tools for engineering learning. The company’s platform develops immersive and interactive 3D role-playing games, powered by next-to-real animations and compelling story-lines to train employees, enabling engineers, students and businesses to develop and retain practical knowledge.
Most Recent Financing Status(as of 19-Jul-2021):The company raised $24 million of seed funding from Hindustan Petroleum Corporation and ECF Group on November 14, 2019.
13. FanTrade (Entertainment Software)
Founded: 2021
Website: fantrade.app
Founder: Devayani Latey & Soham Garud
Description: Developer of a gaming application designed to make users to earn money by playing daily contests based on real-time crypto and stocks. The company’s application combines the fun and excitement of fantasy sports with the forecasting skills of stocks and crypto being a real-time game with curated rewards for winning, enabling users to earn real money which can be redeemed for rewards such as gift cards and discounts.
Most Recent Financing Status(as of 24-Feb-2022): The company raised $165,000 of angel funding on an undisclosed date.
14. Trace Network Labs
Founded: 2021
Website: www.trace.network
Founder: Lokesh Rao
Description: Developer of avatars for metaverse designed to enable brands to explore Web 3.0 products and services. The company’s system creates a personalized avatar to work, play and socialize in various virtual realities, enabling lifestyle for any multichain metaverse.
Most Recent Financing Status(as of 07-Mar-2022)Blocksync Ventures sold a stake in the company to an undisclosed buyer.
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