The Venture Codex

Led · Seed · Feb 2026

Nailinit is building a modern nail-care brand that targets the high-frequency but under-branded manicure segment in India. Founded by Tanishq Ambegaokar and Shubham Singhal, the company sells nail products on quick-commerce platforms such as Zepto and Blinkit, with an upcoming launch on Instamart, and also maintains an Amazon storefront to support an omnichannel strategy. Its value proposition centers on eliminating the hassle of salon visits by providing convenient, at-home nail solutions combined with content-native, community-led engagement. The brand positions itself at the intersection of beauty, self-expression, and community, aiming to deliver both products and culture-driven experiences. With fresh capital, Nailinit intends to expand distribution across additional quick-commerce and direct-to-consumer channels, deepen community-focused brand building, and accelerate product innovation in nail care. The company plans to scale thoughtfully while continuing to invest in category creation and cultural relevance. Financially, Nailinit has secured Rs 2.5–3 crore in its first external funding round, giving it resources to pursue these growth initiatives.

Participated · Series A · Sep 2025

OnFinance AI is a Bengaluru-based startup founded in 2023 by Anuj and Priyesh Srivastava to bring domain-specific generative AI to the BFSI industry. Its flagship ComplianceOS platform is powered by NeoGPT, India’s first BFSI-focused large language model trained on more than 300 million regulatory tokens, and offers over 70 intelligent agents to interpret regulations, monitor compliance, and streamline internal workflows. The company also sells InvestigativeOS, which delivers specialized capabilities such as KYC compliance, cyber-security framework adherence, vendor risk assessment, and AI-driven market-abuse surveillance. By turning traditionally manual compliance tasks into automated, data-driven processes, OnFinance AI helps banks, insurers, and asset managers maintain regulatory clarity while focusing on innovation. The startup plans to expand its proprietary models, accelerate R&D, and scale hiring in engineering and AI research. It also intends to enter international markets to broaden its customer base. Including the latest Pre-Series A round, OnFinance AI has raised a total of approximately $5.25 million in equity funding to date.

Participated · Seed · Apr 2025

Mugafi is an AI-powered platform designed to support creators in the media and entertainment industry, offering tools for learning, developing, and monetizing intellectual properties. Its flagship tool, VED, is an AI assistant that helps writers, filmmakers, and other creators with idea generation, plot structuring, character development, and dialogue crafting. The platform also provides a network for artists to connect with industry professionals such as singers, lyricists, and composers to foster collaboration and career growth. Mugafi plans to use its recent funding to further develop its AI tools, expand into new markets, and scale operations by hiring top-tier talent. The company is based in Gurugram, India. Financially, Mugafi completed a $3.0M seed funding round in April 2025.

Participated · Seed · Sep 2024

Zivy is an AI-driven startup founded in 2023 and based in Bangalore that builds a personalized copilot for managers and team leads. Its initial product integrates with Slack, analyzes conversation and task context, consolidates messages from multiple work apps into a single platform, and intelligently categorizes them. The company raised $1.2M in a pre-seed round in September 2024. The round was led by Blume Ventures with participation from Paradigm Shift Capital, iSeed, Everywhere Ventures, Indian Silicon Valley, Marsshot Ventures and several angel investors. Zivy plans to use the funds to advance product development and expand its R&D team. The product aims to help managers stay organized and manage work more effectively by centralizing communication and surfacing relevant context and tasks via AI.

Participated · Equity · Dec 2023

Airblack is an outcome-focused skill-learning platform that emphasizes mobile-first delivery and a learning-by-doing pedagogy, with courses accredited by the Government of India’s Beauty & Wellness Sector Skill Council and Skill India. The company focuses on beauty upskilling to empower women to become micro-entrepreneurs and access local jobs. Since launching three years ago, over 35,000 students across 300 cities have enrolled in its courses. Airblack plans to launch new virtual offerings, introduce new programmes, and open hybrid learning centres in 10 cities over the next year to broaden its geographic reach. The company says it has doubled down on driving student outcomes across Tier-I and Tier-II cities. Management has stated that expanding impact and becoming profitable are top priorities following the fundraise. Airblack operates a ‘do-it-together’ beauty skilling platform where curated experts teach live workshop-format courses to help learners upskill and become micro-entrepreneurs. The company says more than 25,000 learners have attended courses across 500+ cities and it delivers over 45,000 hours of live classes per month. Courses run from one day up to 120 days (long courses 30–120 days) with fees starting at Rs 150 for short courses and Rs 10,000 for long courses; Airblack reports an 80% course completion rate. The 100-member team is majority female (over 75%) with women holding 50% of leadership roles. Airblack reports an NPS of 72 and that over 35% of members purchase another course after completion. The company will use the Series A capital to accelerate expansion of its Beauty Club, launch new clubs, and invest in product, engineering and brand.