ToBeHealthy Raises Funding from Ankur Capital to Revolutionize Snacking Market

Snack foods are a large part of India’s culture as is apparent from Frost and Sullivan’s INR 29,500 Crore estimate for the organized snacking segment in 2020. In addition to the market’s size, an equally important trend is the emerging demand for healthy snacking options which has been increasing at a rapid rate with the growth of increasing “out of home” lifestyles. An offering that provides, health, convenience and taste at the right price has a large opportunity to capture.
Launched in Oct 2017, “ToBeHealthy” is uniquely positioned where it offers to transform vegetables like Okra, Sweet Potato, Beetroot, Tomato and others into snacks using a unique technology, wherein it preserves 90% of the natural nutrients and fibres. This technology combined with the natural seasonings added to the products, not only makes the snacks healthy but also super tasty.
Started by IIT and IIM graduates, Mayank Gupta, Ritika Agrawal and Anuj Ghanghoria, “ToBeHealthy” provides its customers a range of healthy snack options which go beyond the typical low calorie model by delivering tasty products that also retain the nutritious content of the vegetables and fruits.
Based out of Delhi, within 1 year of launch, “ToBeHealthy” has increased its retail presence across 4 cities and is selling through their own web portal and various other e-commerce portals such as Amazon and others. The success of the product can be judged from that the brand has become a bestseller in the snacks category across various sales channels.
Mayank, a graduate from IIM Lucknow, has about three years of experience in the food and beverages domain, before diving into ToBeHealthy. He is joined by Ritika Agrawal, an MBA with about a decade of experience in brand and marketing and Anuj, an IIT Dhanbad graduate with about three years of experience as a co-founder of Chaatbox, an F&B startup in Bangalore.
ToBeHealthy has recently raised capital from Ankur Capital. They are an early stage fund that invests in transformative solutions for the next billion. They invest in non-conventional opportunities in these markets and have pioneered agritech investing in India. Commenting on the fundraise, Shiva Shanker, VP at Ankur Capital says “We are very excited about our investment in ToBeHealthy – the company’s innovative use of technologies fits well with our thesis around food processing and we were impressed with the scale they have reached in less than a year of the launch. We hope our experience and network will enable the company to strengthen the brand and become a leader in the industry.”
Mayank commented that “The funding will be primarily used to set up manufacturing, expanding retail presence and automating processes across verticals. With in-house manufacturing and economies of scale, we hope to expand deeper into the market and develop a wider range of innovative snacks.”