<div>Mountain Trail Foods Pvt Ltd, that owns Chai Point network of tea stores, has raised $10 million from Fidelity’s proprietary investment arm Eight Roads Ventures – that was earlier known as Fidelity Growth Partners India. This is the second round of funding for the Bangalore-based company.</div><div> </div><div>Existing investors Saama Capital and DSG Consumer Partners have also participated in this round, as per a press statement. Investment bank o3 Capital acted as the exclusive advisor on the transaction.</div><div> </div><div>Established in 2010 by Amuleek Singh Bijral, Chai Point is a tea retail chain operating in Delhi-NCR, Bengaluru, Pune and Mumbai. It works through a network of service stores, delivery-only hubs and also has 'Chai on Call' and 'Chai at Work' businesses. As per the company, it receives orders for 1.5 lakh glasses of chai per day, including 40 per cent of delivery orders from the mobile app.</div><div> </div><div>The money raised will be used to expand its geographic reach to 7 cities, to grow the delivery component of business - Chai on Call as well as Chai at Work that caters to the corporate clientele, as per a release issued by the investment bank.</div><div> </div><div>Chai Point is focused on serving the tea market in India that consumes roughly 20 per cent of the world's tea. The market in India is estimated to be worth Rs 33,000 crore and has been growing at 15 per cent annually. Tea consumption in India is 8-9 times that of coffee.</div><div> </div><div>As more Indians with higher disposable income take to dining out, the hitherto-fragmented food and beverages market is becoming an attractive investment area for risk capital investors, say analysts. “With the culture of dining out picking up in India with changing lifestyle and increased disposable income, this is one space which is definitely garnering a lot of investor attention,” says Raja Lahiri, partner at advisory services firm Grant Thornton.</div><div> </div><div>According to consultancy firm Technopak Advisors, the Indian food-service industry is estimated to grow to $78 billion by 2018 from its current level of $48 billion, registering a compounded annual growth rate of 11 per cent.</div><div> </div><div>The latest data available from research firm Venture Intelligence probably explains the rush of investor money into restaurant chains. In the last seven and a half months (Jan-August) in the current calendar year, as many as 13 investments have been sealed in the sector, more than double of what was in the corresponding period last year. In the Jan-August period in 2014, there were a mere 5 deals worth $45 million. In terms of deal size, the total amount that private equity and venture capital funds have invested so far in 2015 amounts up to $123 million, as per research firm Venture Intelligence.</div>
