Start-up firm Squadrun to expand global footprint

The company makes sure that its users earn Rs.150 an hour on an average.

March 05, 2016 01:26 am | Updated 01:26 am IST - NEW DELHI:

Squadrun, a Delhi-based crowd-sourcing start-up that helps users get additional income by performing back office tasks on their mobiles, is planning to raise between $3 million and $5 million to upgrade technology and fund its expansion to markets such as the U.S. and Canada.

The company, which outsources work such as data curation and catalogue quality check to freelancers through its mobile application on behalf of consumer-focused Internet and technology firms, is currently backed by investors including Slide Share, Zomato, Topper and Google’s Rajan Anandan.

Once a user downloads the application, they get a few ‘qualifier missions’ to identify the type of task they are capable of performing. “There is a matching algorithm that understands what the task is and gives it to the right user. Once the task is done, there are certain quality checks. Our output is usually over 98 per cent accurate,” Apurv Agarwal, founder, Squadrun, told The Hindu. The user-base comprises mainly housewives, college students and employees earning up to Rs.22,000 a month. Some tasks are also performed by young professionals who have free time.

Squadrun has a 45,000-strong mobile workforce of which 4,200 are active users performing at least one task a day. These users take up around 4,00,000 units of work, wherein one picture being categorised or a call being made makes for a unit.

The company makes sure that its users earn Rs.150 an hour on an average, Mr. Agarwal said. The exact remuneration depends on the complexity of the task being performed.

“For example, at Snapdeal, the sellers upload about a million products in a day. Each product needs to go through 12 different data operations before it goes live, and many more even after it goes live such as correct image, correct description, open tags that helps in search, correct categories, etc. These are the kind of tasks Squadrun users can help the company with. The users, in turn, can get additional income,” he said.

Squadrun, which generates about Rs 10 lakh monthly revenue, helping it break even, is looking at expanding business to other markets such as Canada and the U.S. and is looking to raise $3-5 million in the next month or so,” he said.

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