When Aayushi Khandelwal and her co-founders started Anveshan, the pitch was deceptively simple: sell pure, traditionally made staples—ghee, honey, cold-pressed oils—directly to Indian consumers who'd grown wary of what's actually in their kitchens. The execution? Considerably more complex.
The Gurugram-based food brand just closed a Rs 121 crore fundraise (roughly $12.7 million), a Series B round that nearly doubles its valuation to Rs 846 crore, or about $89 million. It's a notable bet in what industry observers describe as India's increasingly crowded clean-label foods sector, where everyone from legacy FMCG giants to Instagram-native startups is racing to claim the "authentic" mantle. What Anveshan is wagering on—and what appears to have drawn backers ranging from Vertex Ventures to the World Bank Group's investment arm—is that technology, not just nostalgia, will win the transparency wars.
Following the Money
Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia and India led the round with approximately Rs 75 crore, joined by the International Finance Corporation, which put in around Rs 31 crore. Wipro Enterprises, through its consumer-focused venture arm, contributed Rs 5.9 crore, while early-stage firm Titan Capital added roughly Rs 6 crore. The investor roster also includes boAt co-founders Aman Gupta and Sameer Mehta, Swiggy's Sri Harsha Majety, and smaller checks from ALTrust and Force Ventures.
Regulatory filings indicate the round was structured as 2,853 compulsorily convertible preference shares priced at Rs 4,23,952 apiece. Post-raise, Vertex holds about 8.87% of the company, IFC around 3.66%, Wipro roughly 3.69%, and Titan Capital close to 3.25%. The three founders—Khandelwal, Akhil Kansal, and Kuldeep Parewa, all IIT Guwahati graduates—retain approximately 47.63% collectively, a stake that suggests they've managed to scale without ceding majority control.
That's become harder to do in consumer brands, where capital requirements tend to escalate as companies chase distribution and marketing reach.
More Than Marketing: The Tech Layer
Anveshan's core products aren't exotic. A2 cow ghee, wood-pressed mustard oil, unprocessed honey, stone-ground flour—these are items you'd find at any premium grocer or farmer's market. The company's angle is in how it backs up its claims.
According to the startup, each product undergoes more than 17 laboratory tests per batch, sourced from a network of over 7,000 farmers and processed in micro-units located near farms to minimize transit time and preserve freshness. The real differentiator, though—or at least the one investors seem most intrigued by—is what Anveshan calls "deep traceability."
The company says it layers image processing, spectroscopy, blockchain ledgers, and IoT sensors to create an end-to-end record of each product's journey, from field to kitchen. Customers can, in theory, scan a QR code and trace their jar of ghee back to the specific cow herd and processing date. It's a bold promise in a market where adulteration scandals periodically rattle consumer confidence, and where regulatory oversight remains patchy despite recent government efforts.
Whether that technology truly delivers at scale—or is mostly a compelling story for pitch decks—remains to be seen. Blockchain in food supply chains has been tried before, with mixed results and frequent skepticism about whether the complexity justifies the outcome. But Anveshan's backers, particularly IFC and Wipro, presumably did their homework.
The Numbers, and the Losses
Revenue growth has been brisk, according to media reports citing regulatory filings. Anveshan reported Rs 77.08 crore in top-line sales in its most recent fiscal year, up from Rs 46.84 crore the prior year—a jump of roughly 65%. The company is now stocked on BigBasket, Blinkit, and Amazon India, alongside its own direct channels, giving it reasonable ubiquity in the quick-commerce and e-grocery universe.
Losses, however, widened alongside that growth: Rs 11.88 crore, compared to Rs 5.74 crore the year before. That's not unusual for a young consumer brand pouring money into customer acquisition, inventory, and distribution infrastructure. But it does underscore the reality that Anveshan will need to show a credible path to profitability, perhaps sooner than the founders initially expected.
The company's headcount sits in the 51-to-200 range, per LinkedIn data—a sign it's still in the phase of rapid hiring and operational buildout.
The Tailwinds (and the Crowded Field)
Timing may be on Anveshan's side. India's food regulator, the FSSAI, has been pushing for QR code-based traceability at food premises, part of a broader effort to modernize safety standards. Consumer sentiment, meanwhile, has shifted noticeably. Recent surveys from market research firms like NIQ and PwC suggest Indian shoppers—especially urban, affluent ones—increasingly demand transparency about sourcing and production methods. They want to know where their food comes from, and they're willing to pay a premium for proof.
Still, Anveshan isn't operating in a vacuum. The traditional foods space has gotten crowded fast. Competitors range from well-funded startups like Conscious Food and Two Brothers Organic Farms to legacy players rebranding their premium lines. Even Amul, the dairy behemoth, has started emphasizing traceability in some product lines. Standing out will require more than good intentions and a slick app interface.
What Comes Next
According to the company, the fresh capital will go toward scaling distribution, expanding the product catalog, and deepening relationships with the farmer network—standard playbook stuff for a growth-stage consumer brand. Anveshan's funding history has been steady if unremarkable: a pre-seed from Titan Capital in late 2020, a seed round led by DSG Consumer Partners in 2021, a pre-Series A in 2022, and a Series A led by Wipro's consumer arm in early 2025. This Series B marks the company's largest single infusion and pushes it into a different weight class.
Whether Anveshan can leverage its technology story into sustainable market share—and eventually, profitability—is the question investors are betting on. For now, the founders have bought themselves runway. What they do with it, in a market that rewards both authenticity and efficiency, will determine if blockchain-backed ghee is a genuine innovation or just another premium product in a very crowded aisle.
