Entrepreneurs Sidharth Rao and Madhu Sudhan have raised their first round of capital from angel investors and entrepreneurs to kickstart operations of their new venture, Punt Partners.
The first raise featured prominent names from the world of media and advertising, marketing, internet founders and leading funds.
These include Aakrit Vanish (Co-Founder, Haptik); Abishek Surendran (Partner, T2D3 Capital); Anand Jain (Co-Founder, CleverTap); Anupam Mittal (Founder, People Group); Arihant Patni (MD) Patni Financial Advisors; Ashish Gupta (MD, Helion Advisors); Ashish Hemrajani (CEO, BookMyShow); Deap Ubhi (Founder, Flip.ai); Deep Kalra (Founder, MakeMyTrip); Gulrez Alam (Co-Founder, Aarby Ads); Harish Bahl and Manish Vij of Smile Group; Kunal Shah (Founder, CRED); Mihir Jha (Partner, Point One Capital); Miten Sampat (CRED); Nabendu Bhattacharya (Founder, IdeaCafe); Parikshit Dar (Co-Founder, Bookmyshow); Phanindra Sama (Founder, Redbus); Rajan Navani (Founder and CEO, JetSynthesys); Rajat Gupta (Co-Founder, Mojocare); Rajesh Jain (Founder, Netcore); Ravish Ratnam, (Managing Partner, Point One Capital); Rohit Dadwal (MD, MMA Global); Sanket Shah (Co-Founder, Invideo); Santosh Desai (MD, Future Brands); Sarbvir Singh (CEO, Policybazaar); Shubham Mishra (Co-Founder, Pixis.ai); Suresh Kondamudi (Co-Founder, Clevertap); Vivek Bhargava and Gautam Mehra, (Co-Founders, ProfitWheel).
The round also saw participation from funds like Point OneCapital, Namma Capital and Real Time Angel Fund along with creative agency Talented.
Sarbvir Singh, CEO of PolicyBazaar and investor director on the board of Punt Partners, said, "I have worked with Madhu and Sidharth closely in the past as an investor and board member at Webchutney and as an investor in Madhu’s previous start-up as well. I have no doubt that Punt Partners is poised to capitalise on the opportunities that the evolving digital landscape is creating. Currently the mar-tech space is fragmented globally. With their prior experience in starting up, managing large teams combined with their execution capabilities, I am sure Punt Partners will create a strong impact in the market soon and I cannot wait to see their journey unfold.”
In a joint statement Rao and Sudhan said, "We are thrilled to have such a high-quality set of investors bullish about the opportunity at hand. The process of fundraising itself becomes an experience full of value-adds when you’re sitting across the table with seasoned angel investors and successful entrepreneurs like the ones we’re dealing with, many of whom we consider our friends. This round of capital infusion directly goes towards accelerating our global team expansion and operations rapidly.”
“Our immediate focus is to close some strategic partnerships, which we will be announcing in the coming months. We specially want to thank our former colleagues and friends who believed in our vision and decided to participate in this round”.
Rao was the former group CEO of Dentsu McGarryBowen Group and the co-founder of Dentsu Webchutney, which was the Global Agency of the Year at Cannes Lions in 2022. Sudhan has led growth teams at SaaS companies such as Lio, Sensehawk and has founded startups Loanzen and Voxapp. Earlier this year, the duo had announced the launch of Punt Partners, India’s first full-serviced mar-tech venture that uses first party data, technology and design to deliver better user retention for brands.