India, October 6, 2023: Aquaconnect, a full-stack aquaculture platform with embedded fintech that uses Satellite remote sensing and Artificial Intelligence to enable market linkage for stakeholders in the fish and shrimp farming industry, today announced its strategic expansion into West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh as part of strengthening its domestic presence. Aquaconnect also expanded its AquaPartner network by 4X in the last 15 months.
AquaPartners are rural entrepreneurs who provide last-mile assistance to the farmers such as farm advisory, access to feed and other farm inputs in the farm vicinity. One Aquapartner can assist around 100 aqua farmers.
Aquaconnect’s foray into two new markets – West Bengal and Uttar Pradesh, fortifies its presence across six major aquaculture production states including Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Odisha and Gujarat. This move is in line with Aquaconnect’s goal of optimizing its service offerings to enable market access for farmers to purchase innovative farm input brands and growing stronger in the pre-harvest aquaculture value chain by tripling its AquaPartners network by the end of this year. Through this expansion, Aquaconnect aims to amplify its impact across India with a strong ground network.
In West Bengal, Aquaconnect’s sphere now extends to nine districts and spans eight districts across Uttar Pradesh.
“West Bengal is the second-largest fish-producing state, contributing approximately 14% to India’s total production and Uttar Pradesh follows closely as the third-largest with a 7% contribution. Despite India being a leading seafood exporter, the domestic market is ripe for disruption. Expanding into these states is a strategic move to address this untapped potential. It aligns with our vision of establishing the largest aquaculture platform through our robust phygital distribution network. Combining satellite remote sensing technologies with Artificial Intelligence and amplifying our AquaPartners network, we are committed to bring transparency in the aquaculture value chain and enabling market linkage between stakeholders. By pioneering this transformative approach in these states, we are making a significant stride towards creating a more interconnected and streamlined ecosystem. We aim to promote sustainability and catalyze progress, gradually contributing to the broader growth of aquaculture in India,” said Karthivelan Selvaraj, Chief Operating Officer, Aquaconnect.
About Aquaconnect:
Aquaconnect is a full-stack aquaculture technology platform, pioneering the use of AI and satellite remote sensing to bring transparency and efficiency to the aquaculture value chain. Aquaconnect also enables market linkage for aquaculture farmers, retailers, and seafood buyers to increase access to farm inputs, and post-harvest markets. Aquaconnect provides formal credit to its retail partners and seafood buyers to ease their working capital needs and upscale their businesses.
The start-up has been recognized by ‘Forbes Asia 100 to Watch’ and ‘World-Changing Ideas 2020’ by Fast Company. The startup showcased its solutions at the Paris Peace Forum – 2022 and is a part of the Innovator cohort at Seafood Innovation Project and Hatch Accelerator and the Norwegian Seafood Innovation Cluster. Aquaconnect is one of the winners of the ‘Agriculture insure tech award’ by the World Bank Group. The startup was selected for the fifth edition of Google for Startups Accelerator (GFS) India. It is also the first Indian aquaculture startup to earn an ISO 27001 certification for information security management. Aquaconnect has also been recognized as the ‘Best Agri Startup in Application of Digital Technologies 2021’ & the ‘Most Innovative AgTech Start-up (Mature Stage) 2022’ by FICCI and recently, they were honored with the prestigious Fisheries Startup Grand Challenge Award by the Department of Fisheries, Government of India.
Aquaconnect is supported by investments from Omnivore Partners, Hatch Accelerator, Flourish Ventures, Rebright Partners, Agfunder, Lok Capital, LDC, Sunlight Investments, and 6G Capital.
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