India’s Varaha Bags $20M to Scale Carbon Removal From the Global South

Varaha, a climate technology startup based in India, has raised $20 million in new funding to expand carbon removal projects across the Global South and establish itself as a lower-cost supplier of verified emissions reductions.

The funding represents the first tranche of a planned $45 million Series B round, led by WestBridge Capital. The investment marks WestBridge’s first bet in climate technology. Existing investors, including RTP Global and Omnivore, also participated in the round.

Founded in 2022, Varaha has raised approximately $33 million in equity funding, along with $35 million in project financing and $500,000 in grants, as it develops carbon removal initiatives across Asia and Africa.

India is increasingly emerging as a key hub for carbon removal projects, offering relatively low operating costs, strong agricultural supply chains, and a deep pool of technical talent. At the same time, global demand for verified carbon removals is rising, particularly from corporations that face higher energy consumption from data centres and artificial intelligence workloads.

Varaha aims to leverage these advantages, positioning itself as a cost-efficient provider of carbon removal while adhering to the same international verification standards used by higher-priced competitors in Europe and North America. The company argues that its execution-driven approach enables it to deliver removals more affordably without compromising credibility.

Varaha’s strength lies less in proprietary technology and more in execution, according to co-founder and chief executive Madhur Jain, who said rising operating costs could become a significant challenge for carbon removal developers in wealthier regions as pricing pressure increases.

“If carbon credit is a cost to the businesses that are buying these carbon credits … it’s a cost on their balance sheet. It’s not a CSR item,” Jain told TechCrunch. “And hence, if the cost of a certain geography is going to be so high by an order of magnitude of like, 1.5x to 3x credit production, it is going to be extremely hard for those companies to survive.”

Varaha develops carbon removal projects through four primary pathways: regenerative agriculture, agroforestry, biochar, and enhanced rock weathering. The company works mainly with smallholder farmers and industrial partners in emerging markets. It generates and sells verified carbon removal credits through international registries, including Puro. earth, Isometric, Verra, Gold Standard, and Switzerland-based Carbon Standards International, serving global corporations seeking durable and independently verified emissions reductions.

To date, Varaha has removed more than 2 million metric tons of carbon dioxide across 14 active projects, producing approximately 150,000 carbon removal credits, according to Jain. He added that Varaha was the first company in India to issue carbon credits from biochar projects and the first in Asia to issue credits from enhanced rock weathering through an international registry.

The company reported revenue of ₹430 million (around $4.76 million) in the last financial year from delivered credits and expects revenue to grow to nearly ₹1 billion (about $11.06 million) this year, while remaining profitable after tax.

Varaha has signed long-term offtake agreements with global buyers,s including Google and Microsoft, as well as corporations such as Lufthansa, Swiss Re, and Capgemini.

The startup currently operates in India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan, and the Ivory Coast, working with approximately 170,000 to 175,000 farmers across roughly 1.7 million acres, Jain said. The newly raised capital will be used to expand into additional markets in South and Southeast Asia, including Vietnam and Indonesia, while also strengthening operations in existing regions.

Varaha is also launching an Industrial Partners Program, enabling industrial operators with access to sustainable biomass and gasification capacity to generate verified biochar-based carbon removal credits using Varaha’s measurement, reporting, and verification systems. The program is already active with partners in West Africa and India, including agribusiness firms and a steel producer, as the company looks to scale carbon removal through partnerships rather than owning all infrastructure itself.

“The problem is so big that tech, etc., will become open source over a period of time,” Jain said. “So what matters the most is the execution.”

Varaha employs between 225 and 230 people, including around 55 staff across technology, science, product, and data functions. More than 80% of its workforce is based in India. While the company does not operate overseas offices, it maintains team members in countries including Nepal, Germany, the United States, and Australia, reflecting its growing global customer base.

“We believe Varaha is uniquely positioned to build a global carbon-removal platform from India, combining integrity, scale, and impact,” said Sandeep Singhal, co-founder and managing partner at WestBridge Capital. “This investment reflects our conviction in the team and their potential to shape the next phase of climate infrastructure worldwide.”