Job referral platform Happy2Refer nabs $250K angel funding from Equity Crest, Vinners & Others

Mumbai based Job referral platform, Happy2Refer has raised $250,000 in angel funding from Equity Crest, Vinners and Sparknext along with a host of individual investors. The funding will be used in ramping up the product, algorithms, enhancing user experience and marketing.

happy2refer-cofoundersThis referral hiring start-up was founded by Nimit Bavishi, Harshit Bavisi and Mitesh Jain in September 2015. The start-up is being mentored by HR industry veterans including Ashutosh Sinha, Global Head – Talent Acquisition & Strategy at Reliance Industries. Happy2Refer app aims to turn the hiring process on its head by rewarding users who refer talent to any company on the platform and earn incentives.

“Our vision is to turn everyone into a referrer/ recruiter on-the-go”, said Mitesh, who leads tech at Happy2Refer adding that the idea came to founders after they noticed the painful hiring processes in India.

He also said that in India, where the staffing industry is sized at $4.2 billion and has a growth rate of 27 per cent annually, less than one in 10 people are hired through referrals despite it being 10x more effective.

Equity Crest’s Cofounder, Deepak Gupta said, “Equity Crest is delighted to back the Happy2Refer team which has displayed a high level of execution and business traction across various customer types in a largely unexplored arena in the hiring space.”

Nimit Bavishi, Founder, Happy2Refer said, “We have built a disruptive model that creates a viral win-win experience. If you work in pharma sales, you are best suited to understand a pharma sales job requirement. Ideally, you should be empowered to discover and refer 5 great-fit people from your network in 30 seconds and get rewarded if your referral makes it. People can earn 20-30 per cent of their annual salary more from making the right referrals, which gives HR a pool of high-quality curated profiles to look at.”

Ahmed Naqvi, Founder, Sparknext said, “The hiring industry has not seen a major disruption. By enabling multi-level reward chains, Happy2Refer opens up a relevant talent pool at a scale and speed unlike ever before.”