Goodera, a Bengaluru-based CSR and sustainability management platform, has today announced that it has raised $5.5 million in its Series A round of funding. The round was led by Nexus Venture Partners and Omidyar Network.
Along with them, former Head of Global Operations at Airbnb, Varsha Rao has also participated in the current funding round. Also, Naren Gupta, co-founder of Nexus Venture Partners, will join Goodera’s Board of Directors.
The startup will use the capital raised in this Series A round to further strengthen its product and expand its operations in India as well as in the US.
Commenting on the funding, Naren Gupta said,
As billions of dollars flow annually through the global ecosystem of social and community good, an innovative technology platform like Goodera enables corporates to measure and optimise their CSR and sustainability goals in a simple, transparent, and engaging manner.
Richa Bajpai, co-founder of the company, said,
CSR activities need to go beyond a quarterly report email with a picture of a poor child to answering real questions, such as where the money was spent and how effectively a programme was helping beneficiaries. Through the Goodera platform, the entire CSR lifecycle gets revived, from Excel sheets to automation and from automation to data insights so that corporates can make data-driven decisions.
Founded in 2014 by Abhishek Humbad and Richa Bajpai, Goodera helps companies manage their sustainability needs — from strategy development to on-ground implementation, to reporting and audit across the value chain.
Prior to this funding round, in February 2015, Goodera, which was then known as NextGen, raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Mumbai Angels and a group of angel investors based in Silicon Valley and India.
The platform is said to be leveraging cloud, mobile, voice and big data platform, embedded with strong domain expertise to enable, and empower corporate to manage their CSR and sustainability goals.
It claims that around 150 corporates use the Goodera platform in over 30 countries. Its clientele includes Amazon.com, Cargill, DELLEMC, Capgemini, and Tata Communications among others. The company claims to have about $150 million development capital under its management.
