Indian browser Veera raises $6 million led by Ayon Capital

Fundraise: Homegrown internet browser Veera has raised $6 million in a seed round led by Ayon Capital, the company said on Thursday.

Other investors participating in the round include 6th Man Ventures, Folius Ventures, The Operating Group, iSeed Ventures and Cypher Capital.

Veera offers rewards based on engagement for browsing.

Angel investors in the round include Aalap Mahadevia of Briarwood Capital, Kabir Narang of Eduardo Saverin’s B Capital, Nikhil Mohta of ICICI Ventures, Kevin Hu of Brevan Howard amongst others.

Veera was founded in 2022 by Arjun Ghose, Rahul Pagidipati, Aditya Julka, and Kanu Gupta.

Arjun Ghose, CEO of Veera said, “This investment validates our vision to revolutionise the mobile internet experience in India. The overwhelming response

from users following the introduction of our rewards program and the launch of our super-fast browser has reinforced the need for a product like Veera in India.”

The company aims to utilise the funding for expanding their engineering team, product development, infrastructure and marketing to reach even more users across India, he added.

Veera crossed one lakh users soon after its launch in 2023, and also launched a gamified rewards program for boosting engagement.

Google commands the highest browser share at 64.73 per cent from over 5 billion users monthly as of this year, according to SEO platform Backlinko. This is followed by Apple’s Safari at 18.56 per cent, Microsoft Edge at 4.97 per cent and relatively older Firefox at 3.36 per cent.

India-specific data concludes Chrome is used by 87.5 percent of the users, followed by Opera at 3.99 per cent, Safari at 2.38 per cent and Alibaba Group’s UC Browser at 1.78 per cent, according to Statcounter.