UrbanClap raises INR 10 crores in seed funding

UrbanClap, India’s largest mobile services marketplace, has raised 10 crores in funding from SAIF Partners, Accel Partners and the founders of Snapdeal, Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal. The company, currently serving Delhi-NCR, plans to invest the funds in strengthening its technology and team, while scale the platform to more service categories and cities.

Started in October 2014 by Varun Khaitan (IIT Kanpur, BCG), Abhiraj Bhal (IIM Ahmedabad, IIT Kanpur, BCG) and Raghav Chandra (early Twitter engineer, UC Berkeley), UrbanClap is the simplest way to find and hire trusted services. Whether you are looking for a plumber, a wedding photographer, a yoga teacher, or an interior designer – basically any service professional to help you, you can find it on UrbanClap. You only need to take a few seconds, enter your needs on their Android app or www.urbanclap.com, and the platform will bring the right professionals to you.

The company’s ambition is to connect you to the best professional who can do exactly what you want at a price you are comfortable paying. It describes the product as a serendipitous experience.

Commenting on the fundraise, Raghav Chandra, the co-founder said, “We have a deep understanding of the local services problem on both the customer and professional side. Our smartphone based matchmaking solution is very elegant and helps you find the right professionals with no effort at all. It is as easy as a clap! The platform is already making thousands of successful connections every week and with the backing of our investors, we plan to scale the platform across hundreds of services and multiple cities”

Subrata Mitra, Partner, Accel India, said, “Being early investors in product ecommerce in India, we believe in the power of a marketplace for services. Meeting the UrbanClap team, we realized how the problem of local services is elegantly solved with smartphone based reverse auction/booking solution as opposed to a classifieds list. The team has a deep understanding of the problems of the providers and customers and it reflects in their product. The level of engagement of providers is very high, which is a key ingredient to the success of any marketplace.”

Mukul Singhal, SAIF Partners, said, “We see immense potential in a mobile based marketplace to help consumers find and hire any service. A product like UrbanClap works beautifully – consumers just need to enter their requirements and the technology does the work to bring interested professionals to them. We have seen the UrbanClap team since their early days – they have deep passion for the problem and building a large business out of it. We are very happy to back them as they grow the platform to more services and cities”