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Work-Fulfilment startup Awign has raised pre-series B funding from existing investors Unitus Ventures, Michael and Susan Dell Foundation and Eagle10 Ventures

Written by Capria Admin
November 27, 2020
  • Onboarded Over 90,000 Gig Workers beginning of pandemic – March 2020
  • Fulfilled over a million tasks in the same period

Bengaluru, November 27th: On a mission to address the gaps in the deep-rooted unemployment and underemployment issues, job-tech startup Awign has raised an undisclosed amount in pre-series B funding from existing investors Unitus Ventures, Michael and Susan Dell Foundation and Eagle10 Ventures. Since inception in 2016, Awign has raised USD 4 million. Currently, Awign manages a diverse fleet of trained gig workforce across more than 7,000 pin codes in India, last mile delivery and work-fulfilment startup Awign has touched over 150,000 lives across India, from villages to major metros, and grown 25 times in the past 2 years.

Annanya Sarthak, Co-Founder and CEO, Awign, states, “In the new normal, strong on-ground last mile assignments and supply-chain support emerged as the backbone of many businesses. As the country adapts to the steadiness of a less-contact world, we see large-scale demand for conventional – last mile delivery, retail / restaurant audits etc., and new gigs – online video content monitoring, online exam proctoring etc. This has confirmed the outlook we had about rapidly deploying demand-based gig jobs across the country. We want to emerge as the largest platform in the world for the gig workforce. We are encouraged by the reinforced trust from our investors, which definitely fuelled up our energy to support demands of the changing nature of businesses.”

Capria - 20191212114615 AwignFoundersTeam
Founders of Awign

He also added, “The funds will be utilised to increase Awign’s presence in more than 15,000 pin codes, execute 10 million tasks in 2 years, and introduce new products to adapt and suit rapidly evolving business needs. Demonstrating the impact Awign has created for the gig workforce, the average income of supply-chain partners has doubled in the past one year – from pre-pandemic levels.”

Will Poole, Co-Founder and Managing Partner, Unitus Ventures, highlights,

Awign has shown consistent evolution of its product’s efficacy, has strengthened it’s gig supply side and is rapidly building trust on the demand side. This has made them ready for the changing demands and scale requirements of some of India’s largest businesses.

“They also demonstrated immense resiliency during the pandemic. Their revenues dropped by 96% during lockdown. By managing costs and addressing new customer requirements, they recovered to pre-Covid levels in just 6 months. This proved their mettle as a gig economy leader and has reaffirmed our confidence in the business.”

How Awign pulled off over 5 million tasks in 2 years

Started by IIT-alumni Annanya Sarthak, Gurpreet Singh and Praveen Sah in 2016, Awign fulfils ground work through its trained and skilled network of gig workers. The platform is built to solve and scale the issues of the last mile of work for enterprises across segments of auditing, diligence, new business development, assessments and proctoring and digital gigs – any task that businesses require support with scale. Awign’s gig candidates are trained and engaged to complete these tasks on the platform. Businesses are billed for outcomes, not work hours, and this is mutually beneficial. Their services have been utilised by businesses in edtech, content marketing platforms, hospitality, e-commerce, mobility, IT, BFSI, Fin-tech and more. Today, Awign’s clientele include Swiggy, ITC, Big Basket, Britannia and Aditya Birla Capital.

Resiliency during the pandemic

Awign created a unique compliance platform called Awign Covid Compliance Platform (ACCP) at the onset of the first lockdown. To ensure that the government guidelines and compliant measures are followed by organizations, Awign introduced Covid-compliant Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), which were deployed across the vast network of gig workers to carry out physical audits of enforcement measures. Awign’s clients found it useful and the platform scaled fast. It impacted more than a million employees by getting them back to their workspaces in a safe, controlled and monitored environment.

Awign also recently launched their Great Indian Job Fest ’20 (GIJF ’20) offering 30,000 flexible positions across 7000+ pin codes in a 10-day period. This is a first of its kind initiative to cater to the burgeoning requirements by businesses post pandemic.

This year, the economic downturn and pandemic have slowed down the investments. The number of startups funded beyond the seed round in the job-tech sector were a handful. Awign’s leadership position in this category is established by their ability to raise funds when market sentiments remain bleak. With the rise of e-commerce buyers and the high export and import of goods, India is expected to contribute to the increasing demand for last-mile delivery in the APAC region.

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About Awign

Starting in 2016, Awign has emerged as the largest work-fulfilment platform driven by the gig economy for both the enterprises and India’s gig workers.

Awign works with enterprises to take up intricate work across the service lines of auditing, diligence, assessments, proctoring, last-mile delivery, new business development and digital gigs, which have to be done in distributed locations pan-India at a large scale. They break it down into simpler tasks and get them done – end to end – through highly trained gig workers. They have completed tasks in 400 cities pan-India. Awign also manages the job cycle for gig workers end to end, from selecting qualified gig workers to training them to complete tasks competently in their locality. Awign also bills their enterprise customers only on the outcomes and not on the work hours.

Since 2016, Awign is solving the problem of unemployment, underemployment, and lack of skills in India and has completed over 5 million tasks, having uplifted over 150,000 careers and have marked their presence in more than 400 cities in India. More about Awign >

About Unitus Ventures

Unitus Ventures is the leading venture fund in India that supports early stage fintech, healthcare, and jobtech startups with India scale and global potential. Launched in 2012, Unitus Ventures is a founding member of Capria Network, the leading global network of emerging market fund managers collaborating to deliver superior returns and scaled impact. Unitus Ventures is based in Bangalore and Seattle. More about: https://staging1.unitus.vc and http://capria.vc/network

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