B2B Platform AgriGator Raises Funding From Venture Catalysts And Ness Wadia The platform aims to devise the agriculture supply chain industry by providing an optimized and on-time logistics service to buyers and sellers
By Prabhjeet Bhatla •
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Integrated incubator and accelerator Venture Catalysts on Tuesday announced that it has recently led an undisclosed investment in business-to-business (B2B) digital supply chain platform AgriGator. The funding round was led by Manish Modi on behalf of Venture Catalysts and also saw participation from co-investor Ness Wadia.
The integrated incubator platform Venture Catalysts invests from $250,000-$1.5 million in early-stage startups that have the potential to create enduring value over a long period of time.
Founded in 2019 by Udit Sangwan and Charu Chaturvedi, AgriGator is a 100X.VC funded portfolio company and aims to provide a one-stop solution to the disorganization in the agricultural supply chain market by facilitating trade and logistics service between buyers, sellers, and carrier providers in return for a small commission on every transaction.
After buying from farmers, traders have traditionally depended on distributors or brokers to transport their grains from farms to mandis across states. Due to the high fees demanded by the brokers for arranging on-the-spot transportation, small scale traders and industries are forced to take loans. This is the need-gap what the platform maintains that they aim to address.
"Indian agriculture industry faces a lot of logistics trouble due to the lack of innovation and technological advancement. The capital infusion would help AgriGator improve on its technology and hence provide better logistics services for our consumers. With Venture Catalysts' support and belief in our vision, we will aggressively capture the market and scale the business pan-India," said Udit Sangwan, founder, AgriGator, while speaking on the investment.
Apart from being a full-stack supply chain solution for directly connecting wholesalers, grain traders, food processors, and logistic providers, the platform also enables shippers to arrange logistics from a wide network of carrier providers.
"Nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come. Disintermediation is the need of the hour in the vast and highly inefficient Agri supply chain industry. Technology can not only help bring much-needed efficiency in this unexplored space but can also empower buyers and sellers to grow their businesses exponentially. We believe in Udit and Charu's vision of creating a full-stack B2B digital supply chain solution and support it wholeheartedly," commented Manish Modi, managing partner, mastermind capital, and lead investor, Venture Catalysts.
The B2B platform further claims to simplify the whole process by providing a single click solution for finding trucks with a turnaround time of 15 minutes, hence eliminating the middleman and ensuring more transparency in the process.
"The passion and commitment demonstrated by Udit and Charu towards identifying supply chain bottlenecks and the resolve shown to address them are truly encouraging. Agriculture is in dire need of tech innovation like AgriGator. India needs many more entrepreneurs such as Udit and Charu to focus their energy on the agriculture space if India really desires to be a developed nation," stated Ness Wadia, industrialist, and co-investor in AgriGator.
With more than 2000 truck drivers' onboard and more than 500 traders and Industries, the platform only charges a commission of 3-5 per cent per truck shipment. It also provides timely payments, diesel discounts, priority loans, and fuel benefits to truckers which help them save 10-12 per cent on costs.
"100X.VC's belief in the value proposition of AgriGator is now affirmed by the new round of investment that they have raised. As a startup aiming to solve the vexatious problems afflicting the agricultural supply chain, 100X.VC invested in the pre-seed round knowing that the founders were in the right space and would execute effectively. We believe that AgriGator has immense potential to grow rapidly," concluded Ninad Karpe, partner, 100X.VC.
