Climate tech startup ‘Varaha’ raises capital, looking to expand across South Asia
Varaha, a climate tech startup raised seed funding of $4 million in a round by Orios Venture Partners. Other firms who participated were Omnivore, RTP Global, Better Capital, and CRED. The company promised to use fresh funds to hire talent and is looking to spread its operation across South Asia.
Varaha, a Gurgaon and Bengaluru-based startup was founded by Madhur Jain, Ankita Garg, and Vishal Kuchanur in February 2022. By creating carbon credits that increase their income and reduce operating costs the company is helping farmers to follow regenerative agricultural practices. It has a platform where they enroll farmers, quantify greenhouse gases, and carbon credits and then sell these credits to buyers.
Varaha currently has its presence in 6 states in India and claims to have signed MoUs with various institutes. Through agroforestry, Varaha has covered a land area of over 1.32 lakh acres through its solutions which are nature-based such as agroforestry, forest conservation, and reforestation activities including a few others. According to the company’s website, they have “sequestered over 3.5 Lakh tonnes of CO2 and saved 1.55 Lakh Mn liters of water till date.
The startup is competing with firms such as EKI energy and Nurture Farm. According to a report, the carbon credit market in India is possibly going to see a rise to about $2.4 Trillion by the year 2027 clocking a CAGR of nearly 31% between 2020 to 2070.
