Lookup raises $2.5 mn in Vinod Khosla-led Series A funding

Other investors include Twitter co-founder Biz Stone, Catamaran Ventures

Bengaluru-based Lookup, a free and secure messaging app that connects shoppers with local businesses has raised $2.5 million Series A funding. The funding round was led by Vinod Khosla's personal fund Khosla Impact which also saw participation from Twitter co-founder Biz Stone, Narayana Murthy's Catamaran Ventures and Global Founders Capital, the European investment fund from Rocket Internet's Samwer brothers.

Other participants included Geneva-based ACE & Company, Singapore based M&S partners, New Look fashion chain founder Tom Singh, Lookout founder Kevin Mahaffey and LivSpace founder and former Google Local head Anuj Srivastava.

In January this year, Lookup had raised a total of $382,000 in its seed round from Infosys co-founder Kris Gopalakrishnan, DeNA Japan, Beenos founder Teruhide Sato and MKS Switzerland SA. They also participated in the current round.

It currently operates in three cities, Bengaluru, Mumbai and Delhi. The funds will be employed to expand Lookup's merchant base, in order to enhance convenience for its users and to branch out into newer geographies.

The app will soon make its presence in Dubai in partnership with Etisalat and has recently introduced hyper-local deliveries in association with RoadRunnr where users can get all products from local stores delivered on time through Lookup.

"Thrilled to have such prestigious names investing in Lookup. It uses chat to disrupt local commerce in India, which is a $750-billion industry. India has the highest shop density in the world with over 45 million local businesses," said Deepak Ravindran, founder and chief executive officer of Lookup.

Commenting on the investment, Vinod Khosla said that Khosla Impact funded Lookup to connect 40 million small businesses to consumers.

Lookup app is available on both Android and iOS versions. It has recently launched a vendor assistance helpline where businesses can give a missed call to 7676566867 (7676-LOOKUP) to get verified on Lookup.

The company is also working on a concept called Offline API where people can get access to anything on demand from any local store.