Despite news about laying off employees to cut costs, Indian startups raised $12.1bn through 672 venture capital (VC) funding deals announced during January-April 2022, reveals GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

An analysis of GlobalData’s Financial Deals Database reveals that this was the second highest VC funding amount raised by any Asia-Pacific (APAC) country during the period. Apart from being a key APAC market, India is also a key global market for VC funding and ranks among the top five.

Interestingly, when most of the key global markets such as the US, China and the UK witnessed subdued VC funding activity in April compared to the previous month, India was a notable exception to witness a growth of 28.6% in funding value despite decline in deals volume.

Some of the notable VC funding deals announced in India during April include US$805m funding raised by Verse Innovation (Josh), US$200m capital raising by Tech4Billion Media (Chingari), US$180m raised by Roppen Transportation Services (Rapido), US$135m raised by CoinDCX, and US$130m raised by Isprava.

Aurojyoti Bose, Lead Analyst at GlobalData, comments: “The growth becomes even more significant with news related to layoffs by several Indian startups doing the rounds with the likelihood of raising concerns for investors on success of startups. However, the trend suggests that investors continue to remain bullish on promising startups with good ideas as some of these were successful in raising sizeable capital.”