Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Associations of India (CREDAI) and Venture Catalysts, have partnered to set up a $100 million PropTech fund. This fund will invest in startups and bring in innovative disruption in the real estate sector.
To be used in early to growth stage startups that will transform the realty industry through technology, data analytics, blockchain, AI and augmented reality, the fund will focus on startups catering to all the major segments of real-estate including residential, commercial, institutional and industrial.
The partnership comes amidst a transformative stage in the real estate industry experiencing a digital and technological evolution ushered in by innovative design, logistical advancements, and artificial intelligence-based tech.
“The real estate industry has been gradually stepping up to innovate for years and this is going to disrupt the industry even further. With the rapid development in the Prop Tech domain, the use of AR/VR or AI to help homebuyers expedite the process of closing deals will help provide developers with better liquidity as the processes gradually become more efficient, resulting in enhanced asset returns, decreased friction, and increased transparency. The large corpus will help deliver on the PM’s vision of ‘Make in India’ and help strengthen the promise of the startup community as India continues to emerge as one of the startup hubs globally,” said Harsh Vardhan Patodia, President, CREDAI.
CREDAI will provide startups with access to its network base of 13,000+ members from 256 different industrial fields in real estate such as developers, vendors, channel partners, and promoters amongst others. It will support portfolio startups with the right mentorship and work towards making the real estate sector more digitised.
“We are witnessing a revolution as we marked a 15,400% increase in the number of startups as it rose from 471 in 2016 to 72,993 by June 2022. While there has been a remarkable rise in the number of startups, it is integral to support the growth of these innovators to help drive the growth of the sector and even the nation. Also, with the advent of 5G, it is important to provide a platform for rising entrepreneurs to disrupt the industry and introduce innovative methods to overcome any challenges the industry currently faces,” said Boman Irani, President-Elect, CREDAI.
Talking about the need for a proptech fund, Anuj Golecha, Co-founder, Venture Catalysts said, “Real estate was one of the few sectors that witnessed adoption of technology even before the pandemic hit. However, post Covid era, this adoption has further increased to boost sales and experience both and hence there is a need for a dedicated fund that would help propel growth in the sector.”
Golecha further added that proptech in India has so far been limited to residential marketplaces such as Housing.com amongst others but technology is helping cater to all the important aspects of real estate right from searching for a residential property to helping technology plan large industrial spaces.
