Chai Bisket, the Hyderabad-based digital content company, has raised $5 million in a seed funding round led by InfoEdge Ventures and General Catalyst.
The round also saw participation from a stellar list of angel investors, including Rana Daggubati (Actor and Entrepreneur), Sriharsha Majety and Nandan Reddy (co-founders of Swiggy), Phanindra Sama (founder of redBus), Rohit Chennamaneni (Co-Founder of Darwinbox), Alakh Pandey and Prateek (co-founders of Ph,sicsWallah), Aravind Sanka, Rishikesh SR, and Pavan Guntupalli (co-founders of Rapido), Amar Nagaram (founder of Virgio), TiE Nizamabad and others.
The funds raised will be used to launch and growth of Chai Shots, a mobile-first, short-form OTT platform designed to deliver premium fiction in ultra-short formats to India’s next billion entertainment consumers.
Founded in 2015 by Sharath Chandra and Anurag Reddy, Chai Bisket has spent the last decade shaping the regional content ecosystem. Its YouTube channels and digital content platforms have clocked over 2 billion views, attract more than 50 million monthly video views, and have produced a massive library of thousands of videos.
With a 100+ member team based in Hyderabad, Chai Bisket brings full-stack capabilities across content creation, digital strategy, and audience building, now extending that expertise into technology and product.
Led by Sharath Chandra, Anurag Reddy, and Krishna Mohan Varma, Chai Shots is a regional-first, mobile-only OTT platform delivering premium microdramas in 2-minute episodes. Unlike traditional OTTs built for drawing rooms and family viewing, Chai Shots is built for individuals on the move – personal, portable, and deeply cultural.
Chai Shots will launch in early access soon and aims to release over 100 original shows in the first six months.
Designed for Gen Z as well as the rapidly growing Tier 2 and Tier 3 audiences, the app will launch with original content in Telugu and scale across multiple languages in the coming months.
Sharath Chandra, Co-Founder, said, “Chai Shots was born out of a clear shift in consumer behavior. While platforms like YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels have proven the massive demand for short-form video, the space is still dominated by user-generated content. We believe it’s time to elevate the format – to blend the emotional power of fiction with the speed and convenience of short-form, and to do it at scale, in our languages, and on our terms.”
Anurag Reddy, Co-Founder, said, “We believe content is culture – and culture is what people scroll, skip, and binge every day. We’ve spent ten years building a storytelling engine rooted in emotional truth and regional identity. With Chai Shots, we’re taking that to the next level – by creating a scalable entertainment brand made for mobile, powered by creators, and built for the future of India’s digital generation.”
Krishna Mohan Varma, Co-Founder, said, “I’m excited to be building Chai Shots at the intersection of technology and storytelling. There’s an immense opportunity to deliver a seamless, intuitive, and emotionally resonant product experience. Our goal is to create not just a video app, but a long-lasting relationship between story, screen, and user.”
Kitty Agarwal, partner at Info Edge Ventures, said, “We’re extremely bullish on microdramas as a format, especially in regional markets like Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam, and Kannada, where there’s both strong demand and high willingness to pay for original content. In this space, content is the product and the Chai Shots team are veterans of the craft, with over a decade of experience in consistently delivering high-quality storytelling. We’re excited to back their vision.”
Rahul Garg, partner at General Catalyst, said, “In today’s world, storytelling lives in the palm of your hand, that’s fast, emotional, and unmistakably local. Chai Shots has built a short-video streaming platform that taps into how India consumes content. This team isn’t just reacting to culture, they’re creating it. We look forward to partnering with Sharath, Anurag & Krishna as they grow.”
Rana Daggubati, Actor and Entrepreneur, said, “The future of stories is fast, local, and emotional. Chai Shots gets that. I’m excited to be part of the new short culture revolution.”
