Nivaan Care, India’s multidisciplinary chronic pain management clinic chain, on Wednesday said it has raised $4.25 million in seed funding led by Endiya Partners. The round also saw participation from existing investor W Health Ventures.
Chronic pain remains a significant yet overlooked health issue in India, with approximately 270 million people suffering from it and over 25 million new patients added each year, according to Nivaan Care.
Most current treatments adopt a unimodal approach, focusing on a single modality of care. This often leads to a patient journey marked by uncertainty, frustration, and persistent pain. To address these challenges, Nivaan Care offers multidisciplinary treatment using a biopsychosocial approach, which the company claims is over nine times more effective than traditional methods.
In a response to DealStreetAsia, Nivesh Khandelwal, founder of Nivaan Care, shared that the company aims to expand to 100 clinics across the top 25 cities in India within the next seven years.
Endiya Partners, whose portfolio includes companies such as Darwinbox, Kissht, SigTuple, Scrut Automation, and Eyestem, expressed confidence in Nivaan Care’s growth trajectory. Vedha Sampath, a partner at Endiya, highlighted Nivaan’s asset-light model and the vast, unmet demand for chronic pain management in India as key drivers for expected growth.
“Given Nivaan’s healthcare services model and the strong demand, we do not anticipate a long gestation period before profitability,” Sampath added.
Sampath also pointed out the challenges faced by healthcare investors in India. In healthcare services, hurdles include a shortage of quality talent, limited awareness, and historically low willingness or ability to pay for healthcare — although these factors are improving. In life sciences, the sector faces longer gestation periods, complex regulatory requirements, costly clinical trials, and difficulties in securing follow-up funding.
Nivaan Care’s funding comes amid a surge in PE and VC investments in India’s healthcare sector. Factors such as increasing insurance penetration and higher health spending have made the sector attractive to investors.
Last year, Indian healthcare firms — from traditional hospitals to medical robotics startups and healthcare financing companies — received a cumulative $5.67 billion in funding. Although this marked a 9.7% decline from the $6.29 billion raised in 2022, the volume of PE-VC deals in the sector remained steady, according to data from research firm Venture Intelligence.
