Brick&Bolt raises $10 million in funding from Accel and Celesta Capital

Global venture capital firms Accel and Celesta Capital have led a $10-million funding round in Sequoia Capital-backed Brick&Bolt to fund the custom-build homes platform’s growth initiatives.

The two global venture capital firms invested in the company as a part of its Series A2 funding round, Brick&Bolt said in a statement on January 10.

“With more than 85 percent of the construction still unorganised in India, Brick&Bolt is on a path to capture the massive and super-broken market using our technology and processes,” co-founder Jayesh Rajpurohit said.

The startup plans to use the funds to enhance its tech stack and strengthen its leadership team, the company said. Brick&Bolt also plans to expand to more than 12 cities over the next 15 months.

The Indian real estate is earmarked to be a $650-billion market by 2025 and a $1 trillion worth sector in 2030, Rajpurohit said.

“Our technology with workflow automation, BIM (building information modelling) modelling and suite of over 16 tech applications uniquely positions us to scale at a rapid pace with predictable delivery,” he added.

The company was also in line to supply building materials for captive projects and contracts.

Founded in 2018 by Rajpurohit and Arpit Rajpurohit, Brick&Bolt operates like an e-commerce platform and provides end-to-end services, including home construction and building materials.

The company provides consumers with technological methods and processes that simplify home and commercial constructions.

This large, distributed market currently caters to small and medium property developers who are disorganised, often sub-scale, and operationally inefficient which leads to poor customer experience, cost overruns, rework, and stretched timelines, said Sudhir Rao, Managing Partner, India at Celesta Capital.

“The Brick&Bolt platform streamlines the entire process by bringing it together on a single platform,” he added.

Brick&Bolt raised $6 million before the current investment round from Sequoia’s Surge, Foundamental GmBH, HDFC Capital Advisors and Stride Ventures.

The company has an employee stock option program (ESOP) pool of about 9 percent, according to its cap table, sourced from Tracxn.

The company also has backing from angel investors, including Ramakant Sharma. In FY22, the company reported a 60 percent increase in its operating revenue to Rs 13.8 crore from a year earlier.

However, its net loss widened two-fold to Rs 11.6 crore from Rs 5.8 crore in FY21.

Brick&Bolt’s fundraise comes at a time when investors are looking beyond typical sectors amid a worsening funding winter.

In December, Moneycontrol reported that global investors, including Temasek, and Steadview Capital, were eyeing an investment in smart fan manufacturer Atomberg.