Amid rising hopes that the year will see a break in the funding winter, two startups announced fresh fundraises on Wednesday.

Pocket FM raises $103 million: Audio entertainment startup Pocket FM has bagged a $103 million funding (about Rs 857 crore) in a Series D round led by Lightspeed. The round also saw participation from US-based Stepstone Group.

Pocket FM will use the fresh funds to expand its operations globally, enhancing its generative artificial intelligence efforts and bolstering the content library. This late-stage funding round is noteworthy as it comes amid the current funding winter and is one of the largest fundraises so far this year by an Indian startup. The company is reportedly also in talks with Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund ADIA for its next funding round.

Pocket FM co-founder Rohan Nayak told Moneycontrol that the latest fundraise pegs the company’s post-money valuation at $750 million. The company has raised a total of about $196 million to date. He added that the company is targeting expansion into European and Latin America markets.

On the generative AI front, the company is developing AI-powered tools to streamline content creation—one such tool for writers is using AI voices to make an audio series out of their writings.

Founded in 2018 by Nayak, Nishanth Srinivas and Prateek Dixit, Pocket FM offers long-form audio content across genres. Much of it, however, leans towards salacious and erotic. We have written about this in an earlier story: Pocket FM and the rise of steamy audio. The platform runs on a “freemium” model—users have access to a basic version of the platform for free, but have to pay for premium content or certain features.

In 2022, the company entered the US market. This along with its pay-as-you-go approach has been largely successful. Last month, the startup also launched an online novel reading platform, Pocket Novel, and announced an investment of $40 million (over Rs 300 crore) for the product.

In the 2022-23 fiscal, Pocket FM’s revenue from operations surged nearly eight-fold to Rs 131 crore compared to the previous year. Its losses narrowed to Rs 75.7 crore from Rs 171.6 crore in FY22.

Ultrahuman bags $35 million: Healthtech startup Ultrahuman, which makes wearable devices and services to track metabolic health, has bagged $35 million in a mix of equity and debt.

The round was co-led by existing investors Blume Ventures, Steadview Capital and Nexus Venture Partners, the firm’s founder and CEO Mohit Kumar told The Economic Times. The round also saw participation from existing backers Alpha Wave Global and Zomato CEO Deepinder Goyal.

$25 million of the total amount raised was in equity, the rest in debt. With the latest round, Ultrahuman has raised $65 million to date.

The company plans to use the funds to expand its manufacturing capacity and bolster research in health-tracking technologies. Founded by Kumar and Vatsal Singhal, Ultrahuman offers products like smart rings,—which track vitals like sleep, movement, heart rate and body temperature—glucose monitoring wearables and blood testing products. Kumar told ET that the company plans to ramp up production of its flagship product, the 'Ultrahuman ring,' from about 15,000 units to around 100,000 units by the end of the 2025-2026 fiscal year.

Ultrahuman, which competes with the global smart ring market leader Oura, wants to claim the top position in the smart ring market within the next 12 to 15 months, Kumar told TechCrunch.

A quick look at Ultrahuman’s financials show that the company’s revenue surged fourfold to Rs 30 crore in FY23, but its losses also increased 20.3% to Rs 71 crore, compared to the previous year.