Indian startup funding landscape saw $82.2 million raise in the latest week across 17 deals, comprising 2 growth-stage rounds, 13 early-stage rounds and 2 undisclosed deals. Overall funding activity was lower than the prior week but there were 8 key leadership change hires, 4 new fund launches, 1 M&A deal and 1 ESOP buyback during the week.

Key Highlights

• Indian startups raised $82.2 million in 17 deals this week, which is half as much as the prior week, when startups raised around $164 million.
• Bengaluru claimed the top spot with 7 deals while fintech, edtech and ecommerce were the most active sectors with two deals each.

Growth-Stage Deals Total $21.1 Million

This week, startups in growth stage raised a total of $21.1 million in two offers. Quick commerce platform Apna Mart was the leader in the group, raising Rs 120 crore (about $12.7 million) in its Series C round, which was co-led by Accel India and Fundamentum, with Peak XV Partners joining the investment.

Sid's Farm, a dairy brand based in Hyderabad, followed with a pre-Series B round led by Omnivore, NSFO, Dodla Dairy, Next Bharat Ventures and LIO with a whopping investment of Rs 81 crore (around $8.4 million).

Early-Stage Startups Raise $61.1 Million

Early-stage startups collectively raised $61.1 million across 13 deals during the week. Arboreal Bioinnovations led the segment, securing Rs 230 crore (over $24 million) in a Series A round co-led by EAAA and Omnivore.

Aham Housing Finance raised Rs 100 crore in a follow-on funding round led by The Sanmar Group, while EV startup Omega Seiki Mobility raised Rs 50 crore from Securocorp Securities, Sangeeta Pareekh, Saket Aggarwal Family Office and Vanshika Sharma. Other notable early-stage deals came from healthtech startup Fixxly, Bengaluru-based AI startup Revspot, agriculture drone startup SUIND, and global student-living technology company House of Student, among others.

City and Sector-Wise Funding Trends

Bengaluru continued to dominate the startup funding with 7 deals during the week, followed by Delhi-NCR with 5 deals. Mumbai, Hyderabad and Chennai also recorded funding activity.

Sector-wise, fintech, edtech and e-commerce led with two deals each, while foodtech, FMCG, dairy tech, EV, proptech and AI also attracted investor interest. In terms of funding stages, seed rounds dominated with 7 deals, followed by 6 Series A deals, with Series C and pre-Series B rounds also seeing activity.

Weekly Funding Trend Shows 50% Decline

On a week-on-week basis, startup funding fell 50% to $82.2 million, down from approximately $164 million raised across 16 deals the previous week (July 20-25). That prior week itself had marked a 40% decline from the roughly $271 million raised by 19 startups the week before, pointing to a broader slowdown in funding momentum over the past few weeks.

The average funding over the last eight weeks stands at around $316 million, with an average of 21 deals per week, suggesting that despite the sharp weekly dip, the medium-term funding environment remains relatively steady.

New Fund Launches

Cactus Partners announced a second fund with a corpus of Rs 1600 crore and Inflexor Ventures closed the first phase of its third fund with Rs 400 crore against a corpus of Rs 1250 crore. Anicut Capital has launched a seed fund with an investment corpus of Rs 250 crore that invests in early-stage startups, while Groww's two co-founders are said to be preparing a second fund with a target corpus of Rs 400-500 crore.

Also Read: Indian Startup Funding Falls 40% to $164 Million in the Latest Week

M&A and ESOP Activity

Snitch, a D2C fashion brand, has recently acquired Berrylush, women's fashion brand, making its move for the women's fashion category, besides menswear.

In other news, the healthtech startup Temple, which is founded by Deepinder Goyal, has doubled its valuation to $375 million with a secondary sale of shares, marking its first-ever ESOP liquidity programme. The deal puts the company's value at nearly double its previous valuation of $190 million, which it had raised in an earlier effort.

Major Developments

Quick commerce major Zepto has reportedly postponed its IPO plans amid ongoing valuation discussions with investors and may instead raise over Rs 1,000 crore (around $105 million) through a pre-IPO round, with existing investors including Glade Brook, General Catalyst, Goodwater Capital and Nexus Venture Partners expected to participate.

In other developments, India's physical AI sector attracted $155 million in funding in 2026 as robotics and real-world data applications gain traction, according to an Entrackr report. The Delhi High Court also halted Unity Small Finance Bank's share capital plan amid its ongoing dispute with BharatPe.

Stock broking platform Lemonn (Nu Investors Technologies) reported revenue growth of over 800% year-on-year to Rs 8.97 crore in May 2026, driven by a surge in retail investor participation, with retail order volumes growing over 9 times and active retail traders rising more than 5 times during the period.

Elsewhere, Stable Money's AMFI suspension was lifted ahead of schedule, nearly two months into its six-month suspension period, allowing the platform to resume mutual fund transactions for existing investors. Fusion Klassroom Edutech also raised Rs 11.08 crore from anchor investors ahead of its IPO.

Instamart appointed former Myntra CEO Nandita Sinha as its Chief Executive Officer, while Nykaa named former Instamart COO Ankit Jain to head its quick commerce arm, Nykaa Now. JITO Incubation and Innovation Foundation (JIIF) appointed Anshu Jain as Chief Operating Officer, and Neo Group named Anirban Banerjee as Co-founder and Chief People and Transformation Officer.

New Product Launches and Partnerships

The week also saw several notable product launches. PhonePe introduced PulsePro, a new enterprise market intelligence tool, while Flipkart partnered with Netflix to offer Flipkart Plus members a Netflix Mobile Plan through everyday shopping, without requiring a separate subscription - a first-of-its-kind integration in India, going live from August 1, 2026.

NYVO launched a fee-only financial advisory platform aimed at closing India's investment advisory gap, while Avaana-backed Dreamfly Innovations announced plans for a 200 MWh aviation battery manufacturing facility in North Bengaluru. Flipkart also rolled out Flipkart Pay Later, a flexible credit offering in partnership with PayU Finance, providing repayment options ranging from 30-day pay-later windows to EMIs of up to 12 months. Separately, cross-border payments platform Xflow launched India's first FX forecast app on ChatGPT for businesses.