Mental Health-Tech Startup Betterspace Raises 4.5m to Develop and Expand

Raipur-based mental healthtech startup BetterSpace has raised ₹4.5 Million in its maiden pre-seed funding round led by prominent startup community-builder and accelerator PedalStart. Prior to this, the startup had remained majorly bootstrapped.

The company will be utilizing the newly-acquired capital towards improving its existing offline and online services, developing a new product range consisting games and toolkits, enhancing marketing and brand visibility, optimizing technology and the app for boosting accessibility across multiple types of devices, attracting and acquiring talent, among other strategic areas.

Speaking on the fundraise, Shivli Shrivastava & Abhilash Shrivastava, Co-Founder & Director, BetterSpace, said: “We are elated to announce our pre-seed round powered by PedalStart – an exciting milestone in the journey of growing BetterSpace”. 

Meeting the company’s short-term working capital needs and ensuring its stable, sustainable growth

Existing market conditions, especially in healthcare, make it difficult to succeed or move forward for many start-ups, so funding is extremely important for the desired development. Recently, 

Change Healthcare has filed a prospectus with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) for a $100 million initial public offering (IPO), hoping to cover over $5billion worth of debts.

Founded in 2005, the Nashville-based company offers data and analytics-driven solutions to insure better clinical, financial and patient engagement outcomes. This is accomplished through its comprehensive suite of software, analytics, technology-enabled services, and network solutions.

Change Healthcare operates in key areas of the healthcare delivery and payments system, including, according to its filing, patient/member access; treatment/documentation; reimbursement; and, post-payment/communication.

The funds BetterSpace raised through this recent round are supposed to not only meet the company’s short-term working capital needs, but also ensure its stable, sustainable growth, by enabling BetterSpace to move forward in a cash-positive yet socially impactful manner over the long term.

“We are immensely grateful to the investors who have placed their faith in us, to help realize our mission and vision of promoting improved mental wellness, emotional resilience and happiness amongst communities, and thus creating a world where everyone has access to quality mental healthcare, regardless of their background or location,” Shrivastava  added.

Manas Pal & Aditya Darolia, PedalStart co-founders, said: “In a country like ours where the growing burden of mental health disorders poses a serious concern, it has become imperative to use technology in solving pressing, real-life mental health related challenges. BetterSpace is committed to doing just, while ensuring quality mental health services delivery in a regional, accessible, and affordable manner to various stakeholders across the society.”

PedalStart leading the funding round for BetterSpace ensured a positive result

Personalized healthcare solutions for the mind and body are the future we are already living and efforts to further research to empower patients in making their own health related decisions are constant and significant throughout the industry. Viome Life Sciences, a longevity company committed to translating scientific advancements into actionable and individualized health solutions,recently announced the acquisition of Naring Health, a digital health and wellness company providing access to individualized clinical and molecular data to empower informed decisions. 

PedalStart leading the funding round for BetterSpace ensured an equally positive result. 

“We at PedalStart have been impressed by BetterSpace founders’ innovative and solution-oriented approach, their commitment to embracing technology, and most importantly, could resonate with their vision of creating and nurturing safe-inclusive spaces through a mix of online and offline initiatives focused on mental health, sexuality and disability awareness. We look forward to extending our continued support to BetterSpace to enable them to create positive social impact at scale,” they added.

Notably, BetterSpace was a part of PedalStart’s ‘Zero-to-One’ cohort (a community-based, outcome-driven programme for supporting early-stage startups) in 2022.

Speaking about the association with PedalStart, Shivli Shrivastava shared, “Ever since our participation in their Cohort, PedalStart has been a constant source of valuable support and mentorship, and even a part of crucial decision-making for the business at BetterSpace.” 

“They have guided us in so many ways – from helping us in validating our idea to measuring our impact, organizing sessions and workshops for addressing mental health problems of startup founders and employees, and of course now vis-à-vis fundraising. Looking ahead, we would definitely continue collaborating and being associated with PedalStart and its awesome community,” Shrivastava said.

BetterSpace offers psychologist led counseling aiming mental health challenges

BetterSpace provides its psychologist-led counseling, workshops, and community engagement programs, and other initiatives aimed at solving numerous existing mental health challenges in the society. The startup’s standout value proposition lies in their ability to deliver content, therapy and other strategic interventions in multiple vernacular languages, allowing them to resonate with local audiences.

Since its inception, the startup has till date facilitated 5000+ offline sessions across schools, hospitals, community centers, corporate offices, et al, positively impacting the lives of more than 2 lakh people (including both children and adults) pan-India.

In addition to that, BetterSpace has already developed its own mobile app, and other self-paced products and toolkits for enabling betterment of mental health and fueling personal growth.

In the near future, they are gearing up to launch few more innovative tech-enabled mental wellness solutions, such Imagi box (a therapy box for children having learning and cognitive difficulties), Therapy Pods (dedicated rooms in hospitals to solve the privacy issues for individuals when availing therapy), and a first-of-its-kind mental wellness game for families.

They have ambitious plans to grow rapidly and expand operational footprints to at least 10+ Indian states and internationally in the next year.