Personal care startup WishCare gets Rs 20 crore from Unilever Ventures

Science and efficacy-based Indian beauty brand WishCare has raised Rs 20 crore in its first institutional round of funding from Unilever Ventures, the venture and growth capital arm of Unilever, the company announced on Wednesday, November 8.
 
WishCare was founded by Stuti Kothari (ex-JP Morgan), Ankit Kothari (ex-Google) and Ayush Kothari (Finance Consultant) in 2019. This is a D2C personal care brand that claims to have over 10 lakh customers in over 15 distinctive marketplaces.
 
The startup plans to use external funding for research and development and focuses on formulating high-efficacy products fortified with clinically tested ingredients.
 
"WishCare has built a suite of evidence-based products that have shown rapid growth, and we’re looking forward to supporting the founders to build a long-lasting brand," said Pawan Chaturvedi, Partner at Unilever Ventures.
 
WishCare is available at more than 15 marketplaces, including Nykaa, Amazon, Flipkart, Purplle, Myntra, etc., along with its own D2C website. The company's products include a series of haircare and skincare products, ranging from bond repair hair treatments, hair growth serums, face serums, sunscreens, and active-based body lotions that are well-researched and formulated with clinically proven effective ingredients.
 
"Our focus has always been to understand the needs of consumers and co-create innovative and result-driven products with them. We use nature-mimicking scientific, clinically tested, and research-backed ingredients to solve the customer’s concerns, which has enabled us to gain their trust. As we enter the next phase of growth, we look forward to working together with Unilever Ventures to help the brand set new benchmarks in the industry," commented Stuti Kothari, Co-Founder of WishCare.

Recent developments in the startup space
 
On November 7, B2B logistics service provider Xpressbees announced that it had raised $80 million from Teachers' Venture Growth (TVG), the investment arm of Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan.
 
The same day, cybersecurity firm Sequretek raised $8 million in its Series A round of funding, which was led by Omidyar Network India.
 
Meanwhile, Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology (MeitY) secretary S. Krishnan launched the LEAP AHEAD initiative, a collaboration of Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) and The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) on Monday, November 6, at the LEAP AHEAD summit in Delhi.