Decode Age Raises ₹14.48 Cr Pre-Series A Round
28 Jul 2026
Decode Age, a Bengaluru-based startup focused on gut microbiome and ageing biology, has raised ₹14.48 crore in a pre-Series A round announced in December 2025. The round was led by Dr Krishna Prasad Chigurupati.
The Deal
The funding follows a modest bootstrapped start. Founders Parth Amin, Darshit Patel and Rakesh Somani registered the company in Bengaluru in August 2021 and launched its first products by November 2021. The founders initially put in roughly ₹1 crore of their own capital, followed by an early funding round of about $150,000. The ₹14.48 crore pre-Series A marks a significant step up from those early figures.
Growth Signals
Decode Age's revenue grew from Rs 3.07 crores in FY23 to Rs 11.9 crores in FY24 — a jump that may indicate the company is finding early product-market fit in the ageing and microbiome supplement category. Supplements currently account for about 93% of revenue, with margins reported near 70%, a combination that could point to a scalable and profitable core product line if volumes continue to rise.
The company also appeared on Shark Tank India in 2024, though the report contains no detail on whether that appearance resulted in an actual investment deal. In April 2024, Decode Age announced a partnership with the Longevity India Initiative at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), a collaboration that may lend scientific credibility to its ageing-related offerings.
Why Founders Should Care
This raise offers a few probabilistic signals worth noting for early-stage founders, particularly in consumer health and biotech-adjacent spaces:
- The path from a ~₹1 crore founder investment and a $150,000 early round to a ₹14.48 crore pre-Series A suggests that modest bootstrapping combined with targeted institutional backing may be a viable trajectory for health-focused startups, though this is one data point rather than a proven playbook.
- A revenue concentration of 93% in a single product category (supplements) could signal a need for founders in adjacent spaces to think early about diversification, even as high margins (~70%) show that a narrow focus can still be profitable.
- Academic partnerships, like the one with IISc, may help startups working in complex biological domains build legitimacy with both customers and investors — though the report does not detail the scientific validation methodology behind Decode Age's tests.
- Investor interest from Dr Krishna Prasad Chigurupati could indicate growing confidence in the longevity and microbiome health category more broadly, though it remains too early to generalize from a single funding round.
Risks and Open Questions
Several caveats temper the optimism. Decode Age's overall revenue scale — Rs 11.9 crores in FY24 — remains relatively small, which could reflect early-stage market traction rather than proven scale. Heavy reliance on supplements for 93% of revenue may also limit diversification if consumer preferences shift or competition intensifies. Additionally, dependence on a single pre-Series A round suggests the company will likely need further funding rounds to scale operations meaningfully.
The report also leaves several gaps: there's no FY25 revenue data or growth figures since the pre-Series A round, no breakdown of how the new funds will be deployed, no data on customer base size or retention, and no mention of competitors or market positioning within the ageing/longevity space. These missing details make it difficult to fully assess Decode Age's trajectory beyond the headline funding number.
For founders watching the consumer health and longevity space, Decode Age's raise is a useful data point — but one that comes with open questions about scale, diversification, and competitive positioning that only future rounds and disclosures will answer.