Bengaluru, India, March 11, 2019: StayAbode, a start-up that is building co-living spaces, has received an add on to pre Series A funding for an undisclosed amount from Voyage Group, Akatsuki and Incubate Fund. StayAbode currently has 1200 beds live across 19+ properties in Bengaluru with a further 1000 beds contracted to go live in the next 6 months and is operating at 97% occupancy and has plans to expand to other cities in due course.
StayAbode recently tied up with CP Developers and is working on Asia’s largest A grade co-living project in India, with 1400 people living in a community environment, in the heart of Bengaluru’s Whitefield – a professional hub neighboring ITPL and large MNCs with a working population of over 50,000 millennials.
Viral Chhajer, Co-founder & CEO, StayAbode, says, “We are very excited to bring the Voyage Group on board as an investor. We have taken some interesting steps in the business after signing on our first greenfield development in Whitefield, while we continue to grow through our brownfield projects in Bangalore. With this top up on our pre-series A fundraise we’re going to grow our operating base and make key hires for the next phase of growth of the company.”
Tatsuya Hase, GM, Investment Division at Voyage Group, says, ‘We picked StayAbode, as our first investment in the Indian market as we believe co-living is the future of millennial living in India and we believe StayAbode is well placed to create great value in it and we are excited about the future of the company.”
Tomoya Ogawa, CFO at Akatsuki, Inc. and Managing Director of AET Fund, adds, “Looking at the past business growth led by Viral and his team, we are now even more confident that co-living is the future of living for millennials and Generation Z, and StayAbode will continue to lead and shape this exciting market. We look forward to continue supporting the team to enable and accelerate their growth story.”
Nao Murakami, General Partner at Incubate Fund India, further adds, ”Since we made an investment in August 2017, we have been closely working with StayAbode team. Our trust on promoters and sureness of their success has been reinforced over the last year. We, at Incubate Fund, are big believers of co-living as a real estate play and we think StayAbode would be one of the few winners of this rising model in India. So we made a follow-on investment on this round as well.”
StayAbode is using design, technology, service and brand to build co-living spaces for the rental residential market at scale. StayAbode’s co-living spaces support lifestyle of the young, single sociable household, enabling a high level of comfort, convenience and a sense of community with shared spaces such as kitchens, common areas, game areas, music, art corners and places to dine and work. Utility bills are paid, linen washed and one cooks only when one feels like along with daily housekeeping. It’s like living in a boutique hotel with a community of like-minded individuals. Through this way of living, StayAbode uses real-estate efficiently giving property owners upto 100% higher yield on their properties.
StayAbode was founded in 2016 by Viral Chhajer, Varun Bhalla and Devashish Dalmiya who have strong backgrounds in marketing, technology and finance. The company has raised angel funding followed by a pre-series A round of funding in July 2018 from a consortium of investors including Anupam Mittal, Vineet Sekhsaria, Lets Venture Legacy Global Projects MD Sanjay Shenoy and Mridul Upreti (ex Joint MD JLL India).
