Railofy Bags Additional INR 4 Cr In Seed Funding From Roots Ventures and Others The funding has come on the heels of it raising INR 7 crore from Chiratae Ventures earlier last month, taking the total seed funding amount raised to INR 11 crore
By Debarghya Sil •
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Railofy—a startup that provides travel guarantee to waitlisted (WL) or reservation against cancellation (RAC) passengers in the Indian Railways—on Wednesday announced that it has raised an additional INR 4 crore in a seed round from Roots Ventures, Astarc Ventures, Better Capital and others. The funding has come on the heels of it raising INR 7 crore from Chiratae Ventures earlier last month, taking the total seed funding amount raised to INR 11 crore.
The funding will be utilized to manage the upcoming festive season rush and bolster its presence across the country to enable protection for all train classes across 2,000 passenger trains by 2021. Currently, Railofy protection is available across both sleeper and air-conditioned classes for all special trains running at the moment.
Founded in 2019 by three friends Rohan Dedhia, Vaibhav Saraf and Hrishab Sangbhi, the startup is trying to solve the railway waiting problem that affects more than 300 million passengers trips every year. Railofy uses technology such as asset-light model to help waiting railway passengers to connect to other modes of transport at an affordable price.
The startup provides flight tickets to WL and RAC passengers if their tickets are not confirmed so that they can reach their destination.The firm for shorter distances provides buses at nominal prices if train ticket is not confirmed.
Since its launch in September, the startup claims to have issued thousands of protections especially to migrants traveling back to metros in search of jobs, students for upcoming entrance exams and travelers for the upcoming festive rush.
In a statement, founders said, at Railofy, they are committed to ensuring convenient, affordable, and timely travel for every railway passenger who has been waitlisted. They are seeing a good customer response even in the current pandemic, which testifies to the intensity of the problem faced by an average Indian when his train ticket is not confirmed.
Commenting on the investment Ravinder Vashist, partner, Roots Ventures, said, "Waitlist traveling is a long outstanding problem for rail passengers in India at the same time they struggle to find alternate modes of travel in such instances is draining without appropriate solutions. Railofy with its data-driven approach of underwriting and offering a unique solution to passengers in a large travel market in India is a startup ready to disrupt the travel insurance segment."
