Hesa

Hesa is an Indian rural commerce and distribution company that operates a "phygital" platform combining a mobile-first digital marketplace with an on-the-ground network of village-level entrepreneurs called Hesaathis. The Hesaathi acts as a local aggregator, transacting on behalf of villagers for banking and financial services, bill payments, insurance, agricultural inputs and output sales, online education and a catalogue of retail products.

The company positions itself at the intersection of fintech and agritech, offering enterprise clients five categories of engagement: reach (brand visibility in selected rural markets), demonstrate (doorstep delivery of products and services), transact (direct buying and selling with farmers and villagers), interact (surveys and behavioural, demographic and financial mapping) and impact (rural livelihood creation). Its stated mission is to provide rural households with affordable access, income opportunities and financial inclusion while giving brands a gateway to rural markets; its stated vision is to become the operating system of rural commerce in India by 2028 and to expand to Africa and Southeast Asia by 2035. Hesa also markets a consumer packaged-goods line, SUHAS, comprising pulses, ground spices and readymade masalas.

Founding story

Hesa was founded by Vamsi Udayagiri and Hema Nandiraju. In a founder's note, Udayagiri frames the company around the gap between urban Indians' click-and-swipe access to services and the daily friction faced by residents of over 650,000 Indian villages in banking, selling agricultural produce or recharging mobile phones, and describes adding a digital layer to trust-based rural commerce to create business solutions and livelihoods at scale.

Business model

Hesa runs a B2B2C model: it sells access to rural consumers to enterprise clients — banks and insurers, agro-based businesses, consumer brands, and NGO/CSR programmes — while a network of commission-earning village-level entrepreneurs (Hesaathis) executes transactions on the ground. The proposition to business clients is described as an aggregator and last-mile connection with low total cost of ownership and no capital expenditure. Revenue streams reported include commission on transactions and e-commerce services.

Reported revenue streams are commissions on transactions conducted through the platform and e-commerce service fees, alongside paid engagements for brands, financial institutions and NGOs seeking rural reach and distribution.

Traction

At the June 2022 pre-Series A, the company claimed over 65 brands connected to 600,000 rural customers through 8,000 partners across roughly 5,000 villages in three states, and separately reported more than 17 lakh (1.7 million) customers. Company materials report ₹1,717 Cr revenue and over 100,000 villages connected for 2024. A third-party profile lists 61-100 employees.

Latest developments

Company materials cite recognition in Forbes India for its rural work, the retail availability of its SUHAS kitchen-essentials range, ₹1,717 Cr in revenue and more than 100,000 villages connected for 2024, and preparation for international market entry in 2025.