WillJini closes $3.5M round without pitching a single VC
What's the deal? Indian estate-planning startup WillJini has closed its first external funding round at US$2.26M post-money valuation. The investors were SPJIMRDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom → MBA batchmates, friendsDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, and some of the company's own channel partners — mutual fund distributors who sell WillJini's services and chose to invest too. Not one venture capital firm heard a pitch.
Why now? The company spent 12 years building on client cash, growing monthly revenue from US$4.07K to US$67.9K over three years. "Every rupee came from clients who needed what we were building. That gave us the confidence to raise on our terms," says co-founder Jugal Popat.
What's the endgame? WillJini wants to make writing a will routine in a country where fewer than 1% of people have one. Founded in 2013 by lawyer Jatin Popat after business families kept asking him to draft their wills, it has served more than 20,000 families across 480 cities and 32 countries.
Who's backing it? Investors cite the size of the opportunity and their personal ties to the founders. "They approached us. They believed in the category before the market did," says Popat of the channel partners.
Priyesh Sampat, a Mumbai-based wealth advisor who invested, framed the gap bluntly: "Bharat has 1.4 billion people and crores of new crorepatis popping up, but almost no one has a succession plan."
The signal: An estimated $1.3 trillion in intergenerational wealth is expected to change hands in India over the next decade, according to EY-Julius BaerDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →. With most of that wealth passing without a will, WillJini's bet is that succession planning becomes a mainstream category — and its investor list suggests the earliest believers are the people already selling the product.
Read more: yourstory.com, businessbearings.com
Image credit: Generated with Gemini
