Funding Alert

Agritech startup Poshn raises INR 28.8 crore in seed funding led by Prime Venture Partners

• ByStartupStory     |    April 28, 2022

Poshn, an agritech platform, raised $3.8 million (Rs 28.8 crore) in a fundraising round headed by Prime Venture Partners, with Zephyr Peacock as a participant. The startup intends to use the new funds to expand quickly and hire across both engineering and business divisions.

Poshn, a procurement platform for bulk processed commodities, was founded in 2020 by Shashank Singh and Bhuvnesh Gupta in a severely fragmented agri-supply chain sector. By making wholesale trading smooth, the company hopes to organize the supply chain.

The company provides services for commodity wholesale trading, allowing wholesale purchasers to purchase from millers and stockists. It also provides logistical assistance to buyers and sellers, as well as flexible payment options. It has over 100 wholesaler partners in ecommerce, contemporary trade, and general trade, and has seen rapid adoption throughout the supply chain.

Poshn has grown 20X in the previous eight months and plans to grow at a rate of 25% MoM over the next year. The startup plans to use the new funds to expand and hire across engineering and business functions.

The procurement of commodities between food processing units (manufacturers, mills, repackers, etc.) and bulk buyers (wholesalers, modern trade, and B2B commerce platforms) is one of the most crucial aspects of this value chain. In India, over 500,000 food processing facilities offer enormous value that will be crucial for decades to come. Currently, wholesale buying and selling take place in silos, with a buyer purchasing from a limited number of brokers, each of whom has a limited number of sellers. Price discovery, on-time delivery, product quality, and working capital are all issues that purchasers face. Suppliers’ issues include demand predictability, timely payment, working capital management, and a limited and inelastic distribution network. With limited digitization, the sector has various hurdles in terms of credit and distribution channels, as well as fragmented supply units that make pricing, supplier, and commodity discovery difficult. Between the farmer and the store, there are usually 6-8 intermediates, some of whom bring genuine value to the product and the trade, but a high number of these intermediaries add to the supply chain’s inefficiency.

Poshn simplifies wholesale procurement by providing customers with a one-stop-shop for the best pricing from a variety of providers, as well as the assurance of on-time and hassle-free deliveries. Hundreds of thousands of food processing plants and more than two million wholesale buyers are facing issues, which Poshn is solving. By incorporating transparent pricing, quality control, on-time delivery, and working capital funding as needed, the platform adds a layer of confidence. Poshn assists buyers in procuring more and increasing their turnover by alleviating working capital constraints. Simultaneously, sellers can use the Poshn platform to develop their network and attract more buyers, resulting in more sales.

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