MUMBAI: Wizcounsel, an online market network that helps people hire & manage freelance Legal, tax & accounting experts, has raised Rs 10 million in an angel round led by Kapil Dev, former Indian cricket team captain, Sunil Kumar Gupta, founder & chairman, SARC Associates, and Manas Fuloria, founder & CEO, Nagarro.
The funds will be used for marketing, sales and to strengthen current operations.
Talking about starting WizCounsel, Ranu Gupta, founder & CEO, said: “People still look for professional services the way they used to 15 years back and professionals still develop a business the same way. This is a perfect “that’s how it has always been an opportunity”. It is a big industry that is outdated and badly in need of improvement for speed, convenience, affordability, and quality”.
Kapil Dev commented: “It is going to be all about the Internet. People are already using it to order food, to book doctors, etc. and I am sure they will start looking for services from CAs and lawyers or even accountants online. Many directories exist, but the thing is there must be a platform to give them much more confidence about how they deal with experts for their work.”
Commenting on the investment, Fuloria noted: “Individuals or small companies seeking legal, tax or accounting help are automatically on the back foot because of “information asymmetry”. They typically do not know what exact services to ask for, how much to pay, how to monitor timelines and effort, and how to evaluate the quality of decisions. WizCounsel aims to even this asymmetry by giving the client more control over the search, service and payment journey.”
WizCounsel was launched in March this year and is currently running in Beta. Till now, the platform has more than 100 verified professionals across different cities out of 600 total applications and has generated a total transaction value of approximately Rs 300,000.
