American multination retail company Walmart Inc and Flipkart Group on Monday announced that they have invested $145 million in agritech startup Ninjacart. Walmart Inc and Flipkart Group had also invested an undisclosed amount of funding in a Bengaluru-based company during October last year. Flipkart invested in Ninjacart for the third time and the fresh produce supply chain company has also been investing in several tech platforms and supply chain infrastructure over the past two years, as per reports.
Key Points
1. Both the retail giants, Walmart and Flipkart issued a statement which said that the investment will further accelerate Ninjacart's journey towards building technology and infrastructure to organise, empower and enhance the lives of millions of Agri value chain participants including farmers, resellers, retailers, consumers, and supply chain participants.
2. "The investment of USD 145 million from Flipkart and Walmart further validates and strengthens Ninjacart's vision to ensure better access to high-quality fresh produce for more retailers and consumers across India while also creating economic opportunities and better incomes for farmers in India," the companies added.
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3. Ninjacart is founded by Thirukumaran Nagarajan, Ashutosh Vikram, Kartheeswaran K K, Sharath Loganathan, and Vasudevan Chinnathambi in 2015. The agritech has successfully raised funds from investors like Tiger Global, Accel, Qualcomm, Nandan Nilekani, Steadview, Tanglin, and Syngenta, among others.
4. The fresh produce supply startup has helped over one lakh farmers across 150 villages in revenue generation and it still continues to closely work with the farmers. “India is at a cusp of formalising the agriculture industry, with the advent to better road connectivity, GST, seamless payments, digital infrastructure, etc," Ninjacart founder Thirukumaran Nagarajan said. He also added that their startup opens up a tremendous opportunity to organise our agri- ecosystem landscape like never before.
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5. Earlier this year, Ninjacart also signed an MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) with the Union Ministry of Agriculture and Farmer Welfare, to strengthen the market linkages and promote best practices in the farming sector.
