Isthara raises $10 million in fresh funding led by Eagle Investments

• ByStartupStory     |    October 13, 2022

Isthara, India’s premier co-living brand and inventor of the Smart Food Court, has secured $10 million in new finance, backed by Eagle Investments of Dubai. With this latest round of fundraising, Isthara has already raised around $21 million.

Along with the senior leadership team, Gilbert James, co-founder and managing director of Isthara, and Krishna Kumar, co-founder of Isthara, are seen in the centre.Along with the senior leadership team, Gilbert James, co-founder and managing director of Isthara, and Krishna Kumar, co-founder of Isthara, are seen in the centre.

Isthara will use the fresh funding to enter the B2C retail food court market and increase its footprint in the co-living industry. Isthara now operates in the institutional smart food court and co-living space.

While Isthara has experienced tremendous growth in the B2B institutional cafeteria market, the company hopes to replicate this business success in the B2C market by introducing smart food courts in malls and other retail spaces. The company’s ultimate goal is to become the pan-India market leader in the food court market. The company will also be able to expand its customer base and not be constrained by a captive audience, as is the case with institutional cafeterias, thanks to its entry into the B2C food retail area. 

In the next three years, Isthara wants to grow the food court industry by 10X to 500 food courts in 30 cities, serving a million customers each month.The money will also be used to double the company’s capacity for beds in its co-living and student housing divisions to about 50,000 beds by 2025, and the company hopes to boost its income by ten times in the following three years.

Since its founding in 2017, Isthara has been redefining the co-living market by offering completely furnished shared housing for working professionals and students, along with a variety of amenities and high-end features. By creating the first digital smart food court business and reinventing traditional institutional food courts across educational institutions and corporations in 2020, the company forayed into a new market.

Promoter and Managing Director of Isthara Gilbert James said the following when discussing the new funding round: “We are excited to announce the completion of a new round of funding as we work to transform the extremely fragmented co-living and food court market. With the money we have raised, we will be able to expand our B2C portfolio, rapidly expand our operations into the retail food court market, and dominate the industry. We’ll continue to disrupt the market by improving our tech-enabled co-living options and strategically growing our co-living presence across the nation.”

Elias Kawar, Managing Director of Eagle Investments, commented on the investment and said, “We are honoured to have been the driving force behind Isthara’s most recent round of funding as it maintains its incredible growth trajectory and finds solutions to the problems faced by India’s growing urban millennial population. We are witnessing a fundamental shift as people from all walks of life are increasingly choosing tech-enabled and safety-focused co-living and food alternatives because to an increase in safety and hygiene concerns following the epidemic. Isthara is positioned to disrupt the co-living and retail food court segments with its distinctive business model, tech-focused solutions, and high scalability potential. We are thrilled to assist the company’s next growth phase as it makes new advancements in the Liv-Tech sector.”

Isthara secured finance in September 2021 from current backers JM Financial Private Equity and Eagle Proprietary Investments of Dubai. To bring cutting-edge tech solutions to the co-living and institutional cafeteria sectors, the company recently acquired software product engineering startup “Letsmobility.”

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