BiteSpeed Raises $1.9 Million Seed Funding From Sequoia India's Surge The round saw participation from First Cheque, Whiteboard Capital and angels including CRED founder Kunal Shah and Teachable founder Ankur Nagpal

SaaS platform BiteSpeed has announced that they have raised $1.9 Mn in seed funding led by Sequoia India's Surge, with participation from First Cheque, Whiteboard Capital and Angels including CRED founder Kunal Shah and Teachable founder Ankur Nagpal. BiteSpeed provides e-commerce brands with the tools to help them embrace conversational commerce as the future of selling online.

BiteSpeed facilitates retargeting and retention of customers through WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, which have open and conversion rates that are ten times higher when compared to other online alternatives. BiteSpeed provides the tools for any e-commerce brand to be able to sell and engage with their customers on these chat apps. This, the startup claims, helps brands drive an estimated 10 per cent of revenue through chat as a channel, reduce customer acquisition costs and increase lifetime value.

"The past decade of e-commerce brands were built on acquiring customers through Facebook or Google Ads, and retaining them through email marketing. However, with chat apps like WhatsApp and Instagram taking centre stage in recent times, our bet is that the future of commerce is conversational. At BiteSpeed, we're building the conversational commerce stack for e-commerce brands to engage and sell to their customers on chat. Since our launch in October 2019, we're grateful to now be working with over 1,500 brands in more than 50 countries around the globe. With the funds raised, we look forward to hiring across our tech, marketing and product teams as well as expanding our presence in the United States, Europe and Latin America," said Vinayak Aggarwal, founder, BiteSpeed.

BiteSpeed, founded in June 2019 by Vinayak Aggarwal in Gurgaon, is part of Surge's sixth cohort of 20 companies.