Kunal Shah has stepped down as CEO of CRED to run WhatsApp globally, days after closing the platform's largest funding round of the year: $900 million led by Meta, valuing CRED at $4.5 billion.
Newly released H1 2026 data shows three other founders also headlined the funding race. Madhusudan Ekambaram's KreditBee raised $280 million, minting India's newest lending unicorn. Aravind Sanka's Rapido raised $240 million, pushing its mobility valuation to $3 billion. Sarvam AI, led by Dr. Vivek Raghavan and Dr. Pratyush Kumar, raised $234 million at a $1.5 billion valuation.
The narrative of a two-year 'funding winter' thawing into recovery misses a key detail: capital is concentrating in a small set of category-defining leaders rather than spreading across the startup ecosystem.
Early-to-mid stage startups still hunting for product-market fit face a market that remains cold, while founders with established category dominance are seeing near-unlimited access to large, single-cheque allocations.
