Apna, a platform for Blue-collar workers has become the latest entrant in the Indian unicorn club as it raised $100 million in a Series C fundraising round led by existing investor Tiger Global Management. This makes the company valued at $1.1 billion, almost double $570 million, the value estimated in June fundraise.
Just three months before, the startup raised $70 million in its Series B fundraising round, where Insight Partners and Tiger Global, both participated.
Besides Tiger Global, Owl Ventures, Insight Partners, Sequoia Capital India, Maverick Ventures and GSV Ventures also participated.
Nirmit Parikh, Co-founder and CEO, says that the company will use the proceeds in expansion, not only throughout India but also in international markets.| Also, the fund will be allocated for entering into the upskilling segment for the blue and grey-collared workforce. Blue and grey-collar workforce are generally those people who partake in manual labour jobs such as farming, manufacturing, logistics, construction, repair and maintenance, and retail. Their work can be of skilled or unskilled labour who are paid hourly or daily wages for their work.
Besides, the job platform plans to ramp up hiring across engineering and product functions.
The job platform, Apna– which does not make any money yet, was founded in June 2019 With the unprecedented amount of funding pouring in, it has become the 27th unicorn in 2021. It is one of the fastest Indian startups to achieve unicorn status.
“We have registered a 125-fold growth in our business and facilitated over 100 million interviews over the past 15 months. Over the last month alone, Apna facilitated over 18 million interviews, and we have been consistently showcasing strong performance…employment for the rising workforce is a large opportunity with almost 2.3 billion individuals falling under the category,” said Parikh.
Apna has over one crore users and caters to more than 150,000 small and medium business (SMB) employers and enterprises, that includes Zomato, Bharti AXA, Urban Company, BYJU’S, PhonePe, Burger King, and Delhivery, according to the company’s website.
The company website shows that it has over 50 lakh plus jobs available.
With the raised funds, by the end of 2022, the startup wants to scale up the user base to 250 million users, across 300 Indian cities, having a pool of 1 million employers on its platform.
By early 2022, the company plans to enter two geographical boundaries. Currently, the company is eying on the US, Southeast Asia, Middle East, and Africa for its geographical expansion.
“Apna’s viral adoption is driven by a novel social and interactive approach to connecting employers with job seekers. We expect job seekers in search of meaningful connections and vetted opportunities to drive Apna’s continued explosive growth across India – and the world,” said Griffin Schroeder, Partner, Tiger Global.
“We believe that Apna has the potential to fundamentally shift how companies approach hiring skilled professionals. By incorporating learning and upskilling offerings to drive strong outcomes for its user communities, Apna is building an end-to-end solution that has the potential to help individuals throughout their careers and not just in a single interaction. That repeated interaction and trust they are building on their platform can profoundly impact,” Amit Patel, managing director, Owl Ventures.
Apna will soon be providing white-collar job opportunities. It has IT jobs already listed on its platform over the past three months.