Salesforce initial Investment in Indian Startup, HR Software

Salesforce is obtaining its initial investment in an Indian company, a human resources software (HR Software) that follows some of Asia’s largest tech startups.

The U.S. Salesforce enterprise arm is leading a $15 million financing round for Darwinbox, it’s beginning in India and its only investment in Asia outside of Japan.

Headquartered in Hyderabad, the startup has already proposed $35 million from backers including Lightspeed India, Sequoia Capital, and 3one4 Capital.

Darwinbox includes some of the world’s biggest brands and Asian startups among its consumers, including Puma, Nivea, Indonesian online mall Tokopedia, and Singapore’s Zilingo.

It expands touchless attendance systems and gives hiring and onboarding and employee engagement tools to more than a million 500 customers across 60 countries.

The startup last allocated funds in 2019 and has increased 300% since then, co-founder Jayant Paleti told. “Adoption of cloud-based services by companies was twice the global average before the pandemic,” Paleti stated in a phone interview. The former investment banker co-founded the startup in 2015 and a co-worker and a childhood friend, a former McKinsey consultant. “Since the pandemic, we are noticing a shift to the cloud within a few quarters that would have otherwise taken three or four years,” he continued.

Darwinbox had the capital on its balance sheet and wasn’t actively attending for an investor, but Salesforce’s value continues to its journey is “monumental”, Paleti said.

The latest financing round follows the company’s Series B round, established in September 2019 and led by Sequoia Capital India with participation from being investors Lightspeed India, Endiya Partners, and 3one4 Capital, taking the total investment in the company to $35 million. Darwinbox’s revenues have increased more than four-fold since the latest round of funding.