WillJini Raises First Round at $3.5M Valuation Without Pitching a Single VC

WillJini has closed its first external funding round at a $3.5 million post-money valuation, and not one venture capital firm heard the pitch. The investors were SPJIMR MBA batchmates, close friends and some of the company's own channel partners — mutual fund distributors who already sell WillJini's services to end clients and chose to put money into the business as well.

"They approached us. They believed in the category before the market did," says Jugal Popat, co-founder of WillJini.

The estate-planning startup spent 12 years building the business on its own cash. Over three years, it grew monthly revenue from Rs 3 lakh to Rs 50 lakh without a rupee of outside capital. Every new idea was deferred to the next quarter because the cash to fund it was not there yet.

"Every rupee came from clients who needed what we were building. That gave us the confidence to raise on our terms," Jugal says.

Investors cite the market, not momentum

The round drew investors who point to the size of the opportunity and their direct familiarity with the founders.

"In my career spanning almost three and a half decades, I have seen more wealth destroyed by the absence of a will or a trust. Bharat has 1.4 billion people and crores of new crorepatis popping up, but almost no one has a succession plan," says Priyesh Sampat, a Mumbai-based wealth advisor who invested in the round.

"WillJini is making will-making as easy as ordering food online, legal, secure and affordable. This isn't just a fintech, it's a family tech," he adds.

Sapan Gandhi, an SPJIMR batchmate and investor, backed the company for three reasons: the massive market opportunity, a problem worth solving, and his personal knowledge of both founders. "Living in the US, I've seen how established this industry is there. It made me realize how much room there is for adoption and awareness in India," he says.

Pranav Byatnal, another batchmate and WillJini's first investor, has known Jugal and his co-founder, Rahul Popat, for a decade. "I have seen how they leverage their complementary strengths while working towards a singular vision. This investment was a natural next step," he says.

A lawyer's side project turned category builder

Jatin Popat, a practising lawyer, founded WillJini in 2013 after CEOs and business families kept asking him to draft their wills. What began as a professional favour became, according to the company, India's first organized attempt at estate planning as a business.

For seven years, the category grew quietly. The pandemic changed that, pushing conversations about mortality and family security into the mainstream almost overnight.

In 2022, Jugal Popat — Jatin's son, an SPJIMR MBA and former Swiggy strategy executive — left his job to join the company full time. He brought operational systems to a business his father had built by hand. Co-founder Rahul Popat, who invested in WillJini before formally joining, rounds out the founding team.

The inheritance math

The stakes are large. India is entering a decade of significant intergenerational wealth transfer, with $1.3 trillion expected to change hands over the next decade, according to a EY-Julius Baer report. Less than 1% of Indians have a will, and most families have no plan for how property, bank accounts, investments and businesses will pass to the next generation.

Jugal argues estate planning today sits where insurance sat 20 to 30 years ago: low penetration, stigmatized, but inevitable.

"In the US, companies doing exactly what we do have raised $80 to $100 million each. The Indian market is just getting started," he says.

WillJini has worked with more than 20,000 families and operates across 480 cities and 32 countries. The company is the official succession planning partner of India's leading financial institutions, including HDFC Group, Tata Group, Yes Group, IIFL and Incred Wealth.

The fresh capital will fund awareness efforts, an expanded advisory team and technology infrastructure, and will take the company deeper into markets it already serves.

"Apart from capital, this round brought permission to think bigger," Jugal says. "We created this category in India. Just as Flipkart had to build the culture of online shopping before it could scale, we have to build awareness around estate planning. That is both our challenge and our opportunity."

With $1.3 trillion in wealth set to move between generations and fewer than 1% of Indians holding a will, WillJini's bet is that awareness, not competition, remains the binding constraint on India's estate-planning market.