The year 2024 has been a mixed bag for India’s startup ecosystem. While the number of startup IPOs, unicorns, and capital inflows has risen, the aftershocks of the funding winter have persisted throughout the year.
Continuing the trend of startup closures witnessed in 2023, as many as 12 funded startups have already shut shop in 2024, despite raising millions in funding and securing other resources.
“This year, we are witnessing a natural weeding out of unsustainable models, which is crucial for building stronger, more resilient startups. Shutdowns are still happening, often due to business models lacking long-term viability or the ability to adapt to evolving market dynamics,” said Ninad Karpe, the founder of 100X.VC.
Karpe emphasised that these closures are not indicative of a struggling economy but rather the maturity of the ecosystem, where only the most adaptable and resilient businesses thrive.
For context, more than 15 startups across various sectors shut down last year, largely due to high cash burn, low customer retention, and mounting operational costs.
In contrast, the major reasons for startup shutdowns this year have been the inability to scale (due to capital constraints), difficulties in finding product-market fit, cash crunch, regulatory hurdles, and funding shortages.
“During the pandemic, many companies capitalised on temporary demand and easy money, but as normalcy returned, cracks in their foundations became evident. This clean-up is both necessary and healthy for the ecosystem,” said Gaurav, founder and managing partner at Aroa Venture Partners
Notably, sectors that bore the worst brunt of shutdowns in 2024 include agritech, fintech, edtech, and healthtech. While the demise of Koo was in the making for some time, Toplyne, and Kenko Health were some of the most surprising shutdowns of 2024.
Despite showing early potential and receiving strong investor support, many of these companies succumbed to funding shortages, regulatory crackdowns or even rumblings in their respective sectors. And there is much more at play that sank the boats of many Indian startups this year.
As 2024 nears its end, we have compiled a list of Indian startups that wound up operations this year and the reasons behind their closures.
Here Are The 12 Startup Casualties Of 2024…
Note: The list has been compiled in alphabetical order.
Bluelearn Shuts Ops Amid Edtech Woes
After more than three years since its launch, social learning platform Bluelearn shut down operations in July, due to challenges in building a venture-scale business and difficulties in achieving fast growth.
Founded in 2021 by Harish Uthayakumar and Shreyans Sancheti, Bluelearn started as a telegram channel for students to help each other with common questions. The edtech startup claimed to have a community of over 1,50,000 members from over 5,500 colleges and startups across more than 20 countries.
In its lifetime, the Bengaluru-based startup raised $3.95 Mn from Elevation Capital, Lightspeed and others.
GoldPe Hit By Flawed Biz Model And Cash Crunch
Cofounded by Parth Shah and Yaagni Raolji, Ahmedabad-based fintech startup GoldPe decided to shut its shop just one year after its inception due to the absence of a sustainable revenue stream, a flawed business model, and cash flow issues.
The startup faced challenges in raising additional capital to sustain operations. The cofounders had secured INR 71 Lakh from 100X.VC and a group of angel investors for their first venture, SPAC, in 2022. However, with the initial funding running out, the duo actively sought fresh investments to keep GoldPe afloat but were unsuccessful. The startup could only generate INR 1.5 Lakh in revenue in one year.
Founded in April 2023, GoldPe allowed users to invest in digital gold and leverage its prize-linked savings (PLS) offering for windfall gains. It had a total user base of 2.25 Lakh individuals.
GoldPe earned a 3% commission selling digital gold in partnership with integrated gold player Augmont. It then utilised a third of this revenue to fund weekly draws in which users could win up to INR 10 Lakh upon buying digital gold worth INR 100 and above.
The startup had plans to expand into saving assets other than digital gold after it had achieved a user base of 5 Lakh. These assets would have included fixed deposits (FDs) and recurring deposits (RDs).
Agritech Startup Greenikk Succumbes To Mounting Losses
Banana cultivation-focussed agritech startup Greenikk shut down in September due to its inability to find product-market fit and mounting losses. Despite developing an app and positioning itself as an ecosystem facilitator, the startup was ultimately perceived as just another vendor offering working capital.
At the time, Greenikk cofounder and CEO Fariq Naushad told Inc42 that loan defaults by borrowers were one of the major reasons behind the decision to wind up operations.
Founded in 2020 by Naushad and Previn Jacob, Greenikk was building a digital ecosystem around banana cultivation. From farmers, processing units, and commission agents to bulk B2B buyers and fibre buyers, it aimed to solve the problems of the entire banana value chain through its full-stack solution.
The startup also ran enablement centres to provide farmers with financing, seeds, crop advisory, insurance coverage, agri inputs, weather forecasts, and market connections. In its lifetime, the startup raised a total of INR 8.4 Cr from 100Unicorns.
The startup aspired to become the DeHaat of banana cultivation, providing end-to-end agricultural services. However, Greenikk’s ambitions fell short as it struggled to scale beyond its financial services arm.
GenAI Startup InsurStaq.ai Ceases Ops Amid Scaling Struggles
Despite being part of the ongoing boom in the generative AI (GenAI) sector in India, Delhi NCR-based startup InsurStaq.ai decided to shut down its operations in September due to challenges faced in scaling the business.
While further details remain unknown, the founder of InsurStaq.ai, Mayan Kansal, shared on LinkedIn, “After more than a year of building, learning, and growing alongside some of the brightest minds in the insurance industry, we’ve made the difficult decision to shut down InsurStaq.”
“We set out to revolutionise GenAI applications for the insurance world and, along the way, built cutting-edge products, achieved enterprise-ready compliance and were recognised as one of the hottest AI startups by media houses and VCs alike,” he added.
However, after facing “some key challenges”, the team decided to wind up InsurStaq.ai.
Founded in 2022, InsurStaq.ai focussed on developing GenAI infrastructure tailored specifically for the insurance industry. Its first product was a sales co-pilot designed to help insurance professionals search for products, research compliance, and compare multiple offerings.
The startup also built customised AI workflows to assist professionals across various areas such as sales, support, compliance, research, and underwriting.
Last year, early-stage VC fund Faad Network invested in InsurStaq.ai through its Faad Accelerator Labs program, ‘FinShastra’.
Fintech Startup Investmint Shuts Amid Business Model Challenges
Yet another casualty of business model struggles is fintech startup Investmint, which chose to shut down operations a month ago.
Founded by Aakash Goel and Mohit Chitlangia in 2022, the fintech startup decided to wind down operations as it found it difficult to figure out a reliable business model.
“As of today, we’ve successfully concluded the process and returned over 25% of investor capital. While we couldn’t get to any meaningful stage, Chitlangia and I are incredibly thankful for the support from our investors, users, and all 30+ phenomenal teammates who gave it their all behind the mission,” Goel wrote in a LinkedIn post.
Reportedly, the startup was also exploring acquisition opportunities with well-capitalised wealth management companies.
Investmint assisted users in making investment decisions and managing wealth with data-backed signals. The Bengaluru-based startup raised around $2 Mn in seed funding led by Nexus Venture Partners to build the startup.
Kenko Runs Out Of Funds, Shuts
Peak XV, BEENEXT Backed Kenko Health decided to halt operations in August as it ran out of funds and couldn’t secure the insurance licence from the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI).
At the time of the shutdown, the cofounder Aniruddha Sen shared in an email, stating, “Unfortunately, the company has run out of funds, and we were unable to infuse equity capital in time due to various internal reasons. Our company has been taken to the NCLT by a debt fund that had extended a loan to us.”
Months after the shutdown, Sen alleged that red tape at the IRDAI was responsible for the events that led to the startup’s downfall.
The cofounder alleged that Kenko Health was sent on a “wild goose chase” by IRDAI for two years for an insurance licence, which led to the “destruction” of the company, its employees’ livelihoods and their collective dreams.
Founded in 2019, Kenko Health garnered significant attraction from investors and raised over $13.7 Mn from Peak XV Partners, Beenext, Orios Venture Partners, and angel backers like Jitendra Gupta, Kunal Shah, and Amrish Rau. The startup gained attention for its subscription-based health plans, offering OPD benefits, medicines, and healthcare products.
The startup’s revenue grew from INR 5 Cr in FY22 to INR 85 Cr in FY23. However, this revenue surge was overshadowed by mounting losses, which stood at INR 68 Cr during the same period.
Koo Shuts After Acquisition Talks Falter
Founded in 2020 by Aprameya Radhakrishna and Mayank Bidawatka, Bengaluru-based Koo was an Indian microblogging platform and a competitor to X (formerly Twitter). It announced its shutdown after prolonged acquisition discussions with online media firm Dailyhunt fell apart.
However, the biggest problem that led to the downfall of Koo was its failure to raise funds as investors tightened their purse strings amid a raging funding winter in the past two years.
Despite having raised over $50 Mn from prominent investors like Tiger Global, Accel, 3one4 Capital, Kalaari Capital, and Blume Ventures, the startup found no takers for its Series C round as the financials were not impressive enough.
Another big reason that contributed to its shutdown was its deteriorating financial health. From the start, the startup struggled with mounting losses and minimal revenue.
Between FY20 and FY22, Koo reported a net loss of INR 244 Cr, while earning only INR 21 Lakh in revenue. The company struggled to establish a viable revenue model and heavily relied on burning cash to acquire new users.
RBI’s UPI Ban On Co-Branding Arrangement Leads To Muvin’s Demise
The youth-focussed neobanking startup Muvin bit the dust in 2024 due to the Reserve Bank of India’s order forbidding UPI in a cobranding arrangement.
“muvin card program has been closed. Any available balance is being migrated to the issuer Livquik app. The migration is expected to be finished by 1st Feb and we would notify next steps to access your balance. Thank you for the support and we regret that muvin is unable to support your journey towards financial literacy,” a notification on the Muvin app read.
Cofounded by Vineet Gupta and Mukund Rao, neobanking platform Muvin acquired customers, performed KYC, and offered prepaid cards to students, enabling payments via its prepaid payment instrument (PPI) issuer.
The startup had partnered with Livquick, a registered non-bank PPI issuer, to offer cobranded prepaid cards to its customers. It had raised $4 Mn from WaterBridge Ventures.
My Tirth India Succumbed Due To Funding Crunch
After the demise of its principal shareholder and investor Subrata Roy, spiritual tech startup My Tirth India decided to “temporarily” shut operations in August due to a shortage of funds. Roy, the founder and managing director of Sahara India Pariwar, had invested nearly $1 Mn into the startup.
While the website is still active, the founder, Indraneel Dasgupta, informed Inc42 that My Tirth India had to shut down due to factors beyond its control. “Despite impressive growth in both figures and reach, scaling became impossible due to a lack of funds.”
Founded in 2019 by Dasgupta, My Tirth India offered a one-stop solution for pilgrims and tourists to travel around India’s top religious destinations. Besides, it also sold spiritual products.
It offered a wide range of services like travel loans, online pooja, prasad delivery, astrology, and spiritual blog posts.
The startup’s net loss more than doubled to INR 2.68 Cr in FY23 from INR 1.2 Cr in the previous fiscal year. Revenue from operations surged to INR 3.3 Cr from INR 89 Lakh in FY22, as per the data available on Tofler.
Scaling And User Retention Challenges Prompt Nintee’s Shutdown
In April, AI-powered digital health platform Nintee announced its closure, all while returning the remaining capital to investors. Cofounder and CEO Paras Chopra attributed the shutdown of the Peak XV Partners-backed startup to challenges with user retention and scaling. The decision came a year after the startup raised $3 Mn from undisclosed investors.
Founded by Chopra in 2022, Nintee offered an AI-powered tool for personal growth. The platform was backed by WeFounder Circle, Neon Fund, CRED founder Kunal Shah and a clutch of other angel investors.
According to the CEO, his attempts to pivot to an education and learning-led model also failed to revive the platform’s flailing user numbers.
Stoa Shuts Ops After Struggling To Scale Offline
Known as a pioneer in offering alternative MBA programmes, Bengaluru-based edtech startup Stoa shut down in November after four years of operations.
Founded in 2020 by Kulkarni, Raj Kunkolienkar, and Manoj Kambadur, Stoa offered affordable online business education programmes for working professionals. Its curriculum emphasised practical business skills over traditional academics and served over 1,500 students across 15 cohorts.
Despite building a strong brand and seeing substantial growth, Stoa refrained from foraying into offline learning, a decision that ultimately led to its closure.
Stoa raised $1.5 Mn in seed funding from notable investors, including Nithin Kamath, Kunal Shah, and Myntra’s Raveen Sastry.
Competing with platforms like Masters’ Union and Mesa School of Business, Stoa achieved significant financial milestones. It reported INR 15.9 Cr in FY23 revenues, up 160.6% from FY22, all while reducing losses by 43.8% to INR 43.9 Lakh. However, its FY24 performance remains unclear, as the financials are yet to be disclosed.
SaaS Startup Toplyne Shuts Door After 3.5 Years
SaaS startup Toplyne shut down operations in October after struggling to scale and secure product-market fit. Nearly 3.5 years after its 2021 launch, the founders chose to wind down the business and return capital to investors, citing the challenges of achieving sustainable growth.
Founded by Rishen Kapoor, Ruchin Kulkarni, and Rohit Khanna, Toplyne offered an AI-driven platform aimed at helping product-led companies convert free users into paying customers. The platform analysed customer data to create targetable audiences, enabling conversions through ads, in-app nudges, emails, sales efforts, and more.
Toplyne’s clients included prominent companies like Canva, Grafana, InVideo, BrowserStack, and Gather.Town.
Despite managing data for over 25 Mn, the startup couldn’t sustain itself.
Toplyne raised approximately $17.5 Mn in funding from investors such as Peak XV, Tiger Global, and Together Fund.
[Edited By Shishir Parasher]