Mumbai, India-based Care24 has closed a $4 million Series A to help users find qualified caregivers for their aging family members. SAIF Partners provided the funds, which will be used for caretaker training and to beef-up the company’s technology platform.
Care24 was founded in December 2014 by Vipin Pathak (CEO), Abhishek Tiwari, Garima Tripathi, and Pranshu Sharma, after they realized how difficult it is to find qualified caregivers for their aging family members.
“We all come from small towns from different parts of the country. Our parents live far away from us and we were struggling to get the right care at their place,” Pathak said to TechCrunch.
Care24 conducts background checks on certified nurses, physiotherapists, and attendants before adding them to its platform. At the moment, the company is focused on geriatric care, with plans to expand its offering and include services from routine, like blood pressure monitoring, to illnesses that require hospitalization or around-the-clock care. Also, Care24 will build more educational features into its platform so providers can get instructions about how to care for people with specific conditions, like knee fracture or paralysis. The company serves about 4,000 patients a day.
Already there are more than 100 million Indians aged over 60, and that number is expected to triple by 2050. With multiple generations living separately — as opposed to under the same roof — there’s plenty of room for growth for companies like Care24. And these would include the likes of Portea, Healthcare at Home India, India Home Healthcare, and Nightingale’s.