Venture Catalysts and Nocking Point Advisors led a seed fundraising round of $400,000 for the B2B marketing platform FreeStand.
Significant angel investors Guneet Singh and Varun Singh Hooda, SucSEED Indovation, and IIM-Calcutta Innovation Park also took part in the round.
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Major FMCG companies like HUL, Nestle, Reckitt Benckiser, L’Oreal, Nivea, Piramal Healthcare, Cipla Health, and Emami have shown interest in the platform, demonstrating the effectiveness of its uniform sample experience and precise ROI calculations, as reported by Indian Retailer.
Konark Sharma, Co-Founder and CEO of FreeStand shared, “FreeStand’s tech supercharges what FMCG brands can accomplish with product sampling. Brands today can utilise the FreeStand platform to sample across multiple channels like Ad-Networks, E-Commerce and Quick Commerce, with the help of this capital we will be expanding our offering to include event and retail sampling channels. We will also be leveraging AI capabilities to enhance and further simplify our product experience for FMCG marketers.”
The features of FreeStand can be applied to a variety of channels, such as ad networks, e-commerce, and fast commerce, such as Swiggy, Flipkart, Zepto, Meta Platforms, contemporary retail chains, and others.
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Dr. Apoorva Ranjan Sharma, MD and CEO of Venture Catalysts said, “We are thrilled to announce our investment in FreeStand. As per various industry sources, in India, an estimated 20,000 products are sampled annually. With each brand distributing an average 300,000 samples across online and offline sales channels, this market is expected to grow to $1.5 billion – $3 billion by 2027 and this allows FreeStand’s innovative platform to emerge as a game-changer, offering a seamless and data-driven approach to executing sampling campaigns.”
About FreeStand
Co-founded by Sneh Soni, Kavach Chandra, and Konark Sharma, FreeStand is now an IIM Calcutta-incubated, VC-backed Technology Startup, offering an Industry-first SaaS Platform for FMCG Product Sampling.
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