Unlu, India’s largest celebrity engagement platform raises INR 9cr in seed funding

New Delhi: Unlu, India’s largest celebrity engagement platform announced that they have raised a seed funding round led by marquee  venture capital firm, Nexus Venture Partners with participation from Mumbai Angels, TiE and Expert Dojo. Unlu has over 1 million users so far and focuses on celebrity engagements for consumers and brands with 2000+ celebrities on its platform. Unlu plans to utilise the funding to build technological base, support product development and fuel market expansion.
 
Unlu is a Delhi based startup founded in 2020, by Vipul Agrawal, Himanshu Periwal, Akshay Pruthi and Anurag Dalia. The team consists of a bunch of 2X Entrepreneurs, having worked with Amazon, ixigo, Vokal and are graduates of INSEAD, IIM Calcutta and Delhi University.
 
Vipul Agrawal, Co-founder, Unlu, shares, “We founded Unlu with a single minded focus to understand and exceed the expectations and needs of celebrities and fans and are excited to see the results and path forward.  We understand the needs of celebrities who have tight schedules but want  increased engagement with fans and need  a platform to share knowledge about the craft they have perfected. We aim to become the de-facto platform for celebrities. We are thrilled to join hands with Nexus, the topmost VC firm of India.”  
 
Mr. Anup Gupta, Managing Director, Nexus Venture Partners, said, “We are excited to partner with Unlu in their vision of using technology led innovations for significantly improving celebrity – fan engagements.”
 
Unlu offers multiple formats, the company has recently launched Unluclass - an edu-tainment platform which will announce one celebrity every week. Presently live with Johnny Lever, Ruskin Bond, Manoj Bajpayee and Shashank Khaitan, consumers can look forward to Unluclass offering more top tier celebrities who have expertise in various fields like sports, music, acting, fashion, comedy, writing, lifestyle, photography, etc.
 
“Our vision is to use technology to significantly enhance the experience of celebrities with consumers and brands in a win-win manner for all stakeholders. Our product allows users to engage with the likes of Manoj Bajpayee, Guru Randhawa, Saina Nehwal, and 2,000+ celebrities in various formats,” added, Himanshu Periwal, Co-founder, Unlu. 
 
Unlu also had a very strong growth on the B2B engagements with celebrities like Shaan, Salim-Sulaiman, Harbhajan Singh, engage with brands such as Flipkart, MPL, and Dr.Vaidya.
 
Nexus has been a pioneer of investing in market leading technology-led businesses for India. Some of its portfolio companies include Unacademy, Delhivery, Snapdeal, Turtlemint, Whitehat Jr, Zolo, Rapido, Paysense, Pratilipi, etc.