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Kriti Sanon joins GIVA as strategic investor following ₹530 Cr Series C

What's the deal? Indian jewellery brand GIVA has brought on Bollywood actor Kriti Sanon as both a strategic investor and brand ambassador. The move follows GIVA's ₹530 crore (~$63M) Series C round led by CreaegisDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, which valued the Bengaluru-based company at roughly $462M.

Sanon's capital infusion adds to the approximately $133M GIVA has raised across 14 equity rounds since its 2019 founding. Her role will go beyond endorsements to include collection design input and consumer engagement, the company said.

Why now? GIVA is in the middle of aggressive expansion. Founded by Ishendra Agarwal and Nikita Prasad, the brand started with everyday silver jewellery and has since branched into gold and lab-grown diamonds. It now operates over 300 stores across India and Sri Lanka, with roughly 2,344 employees — a 59% year-on-year increase.

The financial trajectory is hard to ignore. Revenue from operations rose 66% in FY 2023-24 to ₹273.6 crore, then nearly doubled to ₹523.3 crore in FY 2024-25. Over five years, GIVA has posted a revenue CAGR of roughly 200%.

Series C capital — backed by Premji Invest, Epiq CapitalDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, and Edelweiss Discovery Fund, among others — is being deployed across retail expansion, technology, and supply chain improvements. A more recent ₹100.5 crore tranche in February 2026, backed by IQ-EQ, Kenro CapitalDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, Premji Invest, Titan CapitalDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, and Alteria CapitalDealroom has a profile for this one. Try Dealroom →, pushed the post-money valuation to ₹4,193 crore.

What could go wrong? GIVA posted a net loss of ₹72.3 crore in FY 2024-25, a reminder that rapid growth comes at a cost. The brand is investing heavily across multiple fronts — retail, tech, new categories — while competing with established names like CaratLane and Melorra. Celebrity partnerships also carry reputational risk; tying a brand's identity closely to a single public figure can backfire if sentiment shifts.

The signal: GIVA's Series C syndicate — spanning Creaegis, Premji Invest, and Epiq Capital — reflects growing institutional conviction that India's largely unorganised jewellery market is ripe for a venture-backed consolidator. Despite still being classified as "early growth" on Dealroom, the brand's revenue nearly doubled to ₹523.3 crore in FY 2024-25, suggesting it is outpacing the stage label. Adding a celebrity with actual equity stakes — rather than a flat endorsement fee — signals a DTC playbook increasingly borrowed from the US, where founder-aligned ambassadors are used to compress customer acquisition costs during aggressive retail rollouts.

Read more: startuptalky.com

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