The Chennai-headquartered startup focused on the aquaculture industry, has raised $15 million in a Series A round of funding led by Lok Capital. This funding round also saw participation from Louis Dreyfus Company Ventures and Suneight Investment along with existing investors including Omnivore, Rebright Partners, Flourish Ventures, HATCH, and other debt investors.

Founded in 2017, Aquaconnect leverages technology like AI and satellite remote sensing. The company plans to use this funding round to widen its reach in the valued chain of the aquaculture industry. Aquaconnect aims to grow stronger in the pre-harvest chain by tripling its AquaPartners network to provide services to the fish and shrimp farmers.

“We’ve added about 500 AquaPartners in the last 12 months and this phygital network has helped us scale phenomenally across six major aquaculture production states," said Aquaconnect Founder and CEO Rajamanohar Somasundaram. "In the next 12 months, we are set to triple our AquaPartners’ network across India and optimize our service offerings.”

In the post-harvest chain, the company aims to scale its seafood market linkage across domestic markets in India. Further, Aquaconnect plans to increase its seafood exports to markets like the US, China and Japan. Hari Krishnan, Partner, Lok Capital said, “Aquaconnect, with its deeptech intervention, has the potential to disrupt the Indian aquaculture value chain and emerge as a key player in the growing blue food segment.”