Veranda set to tap market for funds
The output takes care of India and export to 25 countries like Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh, Qatar and Latin American nations. South American countries are serviced by B Mobile, a brand it acquired in 2021.
As the only Indian player among global smartphone brands in the country, Lava intends to channel the raised funds
BRAND will channel funds towards R&D focused on software for its phones, and brand building operates in price segments up to ₹25,000 where all its models are 5G-enabled.
Lava’s existing capacity will be used for making the ProWatch brand of smartwatches which is planned for retail next month. It is also building its app for the watch, Raina said. The company will follow the same principle of giving a near-stock Android experience to consumers, removing bloatware or pre-downloaded apps that come with the device, across all its smartphones and the new watch models, he added.
“We feel we have a good chance to break into this market because we’ll be competing with Indian brands. And we’ve been the survivor among all Indian mobile phone brands,” he said.
Lava began selling smartphones in 2010, when it competed with Indian brands Micromax, Karbonn, Intex and global brands like Nokia and Samsung. It is the only Indian brand among the lot which continues to sell phones as of today.
LAVA will remove bloatware or predownloaded apps in new watch models and all smartphones
towards research & development (R&D) focused on software for its phones, and brand building to compete with its peers, a majority of which are Chinese.
Lava has a 2% market share as of December 2023 in the smartphone market. It doubled this share over the previous year on the back of Blaze 5G, its 5G device below ₹10,000, targeting the mass market. It
Education-focused Veranda Learning Solutions Ltd is in talks with multiple investors to raise a larger portion of equity capital in the ongoing fundraising round from which it has already raised a substantial debt, two people aware of the development told VCCircle.
Publicly-listed Veranda Learning, which recently raised up to ₹545 crore ($65.5 million) in debt from Asia-focussed alternative investment firm BPEA Credit, was looking to bag nearly ₹300 crore in equity till last year.
“Besides the recent debt funding, Veranda is now looking to raise ₹1,000-1,200 crore in equity ($12-14.4 million),” said one of the persons quoted above, asking not to be named. The funds will be primarily raised by Veranda’s subsidiaries—Veranda XL Learning Solutions Pvt. Ltd and Veranda Race Learning Solutions Pvt. Ltd—via equity linked papers. Veranda has appointed Anand Rathi Financial Services as merchant banker for equity fundraising. An email sent to Veranda Learning didn’t elicit a response till the time of publishing.
Veranda Learning plans to use most of the funds for inorganic growth via mergers and acquisitions (M&As), the person said.
The company, which is the edtech venture of Chennaibased business family Kalpathi Group, has been on an acquisition spree, especially after its public market debut in 2022.