Agritech startup InfyU Labs has raised Rs 1.8 crore in a Seed round from IAN. The round was led by angel investors K.R.S. Jamwal, Sanjay Bansal and Vishnuraj Kunjur. Previously, the company had raised a small pre-Seed round from mentors Pranav Jha, RA Venkitachalam, Bhavesh Jha and Shyaam Ramamurthy.
The Gujarat-based startup will utilize the fresh capital infusion to deploy more devices to bring quality effectiveness and boost its R&D. A part of the funding will be used to expand its domain to pre-harvest fruits quality testing and increase its offering by including other perishable commodities.
IIT Madras alumnus Amit Srivastava and Ankit Chauhan launched InfyU Labs in 2019. The startup specializes in creating portable devices that determine the internal quality of fresh fruits without cutting them open.
How the device works
InfyU uses its proprietary solution, Infyzer - a handheld device – that determines the internal quality parameters, such as TSS (BRIX), acidity, ripeness, shelf life, etc. within seconds. The company provides an end-to-end IoT-based platform that allows the quality manager to quickly access the quality of incoming produce. It helps them to reduce perishable wastage, reduce logistic costs and optimize the storage time.
Amit Srivastava, Co-Founder, InfyU Labs said, “Our focus is to bring transparency and safety to the current food value chain by providing data-driven technological solutions at various nodes. We are extensively working towards improving the prediction model's accuracy by testing the effectiveness of the device under various breeds of fruits, regions of procurement, time of harvest, and many more. In fact, we are also planning to increase our technological domain to multispectral imaging and ultrasonic sensing which will further help in catering to the larger needs of the segment. This fundraise will enable us to achieve our future targets. The latest investment asserts investors’ confidence in our value proposition and growth potential.”
Sanjay Bansal, Lead Investor at IAN said, “Our investment in InfyU demonstrates IAN’s sector-agnostic approach and helps create high-growth sustainable companies with an impact.”
InfyU Labs to foray into fruit exports
Working in the Indian agriculture landscape, InfyU Labs aims to foray into the fruit export segment as well as deploy its devices at the pre-harvest level to identify and automate correct harvest time. The startup aims to capture the estimated $50 billion global market opportunity across Canada, US, and East Asia.
Early this year, InfyU Labs was awarded the “Emerging Agri Innovators Award” at FICCI Startup Awards. It has also been part of the Google for Startups SDG program, where only a few emerging startups from different countries get the chance of receiving mentorship support directly from Google mentors.
