Pronto raises $25 million as daily bookings climb 18x in seven months

Bengaluru: On-demand household services startup Pronto has raised $25 million in a Series B round led by Epiq Capital after daily bookings on its platform grew from roughly 1,000 to over 18,000 over the last seven months.

Existing investors Glade Brook Capital, General Catalyst and Bain Capital Ventures also participated in the round. Pronto said it is currently growing at over 20% week on week.

“The way Indian households find and manage domestic help hasn’t really evolved. It’s still referrals, uncertainty and a lot of frustration on both sides,” Anjali Sardana, founder and CEO of Pronto, said. “We are very early in solving this problem and under no illusion about how much work lies ahead. But we know exactly where we are headed.”

In an interview with TOI, Sardana said Pronto’s recent growth has been “supply led rather than incentive led.” She said daily bookings were around 1,000 six months ago, reached about 3,000 in November and have since scaled to 18,000. Pronto’s month-on-month growth over the last three months has been around 80%, she told TOI.

The new capital will be used to hire and train more professionals, and deepen operations across existing markets and service categories over the next 12 to 18 months, the company said.

Pronto said it now works with nearly 3,000 professionals and has a core team of around 60. The company’s three-month retention rate for professionals is over 70%, it said, adding that higher retention also helps customers because the same professional can return to the same household over time.

Sardana told TOI that repeat usage is already meaningful. She said 35% of bookings last month were from first-time users, implying the majority of bookings came from repeat customers. While she did not disclose overall frequency, she said the median frequency for returning users is above three a month. Pronto’s top 1% of users place about 23 bookings a month, while the top 10% place nine or more, she told TOI.

Full prices are typically in the Rs 200 to Rs 300 per hour range, though discounting varies by micromarket and user profile, Sardana told TOI. Demand is higher on weekends, with bookings per day about 15% higher than weekdays, she said.

Rishi Navani, founder and managing partner of Epiq Capital, said customers the firm spoke to described Pronto as becoming “part of their routine,” citing trust in professionals and service quality.