Keychain Raises $30M to Scale India Engineering Team

Keychain doubles down on India engineering to scale CPG platform

Keychain, a New York–headquartered startup that helps consumer brands find manufacturing partners, has closed a $30 million funding round to accelerate product development and grow its India engineering hub in Gurugram.

Although Keychain only serves Western markets today, it runs core engineering, product, and analytics from India. The company plans to expand its Gurugram team from 35 to 70 in the coming months and to roughly 100 within a year, making India the center of its product roadmap and AI development.

Keychain’s platform already serves more than 20,000 brands and retailers, works with eight of the top 10 retailers including 7‑Eleven and Whole Foods, and lists over 30,000 manufacturers. About half of its 70-person workforce is in India, with the rest split between New York and Austin handling partnerships and go‑to‑market.

Founders cite talent depth, hiring velocity, and prior experience building resilient engineering teams at Handy and Angi as reasons for the India-first engineering strategy. Gurugram’s time zone also enables near-continuous development that complements U.S. commercial hours.

KeychainOS and the AI push

A major focus for the expanded India team is KeychainOS, an AI-powered suite for manufacturers. The first live module helps manufacturers convert quantitative food-safety data into auditor-ready qualitative reports and lets users pull insights through natural-language queries.

Future modules will target purchasing and procurement, inventory, and production planning — positioning KeychainOS to compete with legacy ERPs that need multiple add-ons to serve food and beverage manufacturers effectively.

Business model and traction

Keychain gives its discovery software free to brands and retailers while charging manufacturers for access and discoverability. The startup reports hundreds of paying manufacturers, with contract values ranging from $10,000 to over $100,000 and an average annual revenue per manufacturer of about $20,000.

The Series B was led by Wellington Management and BoxGroup among others. With this round Keychain has raised $68 million to date and reportedly holds more than $50 million in cash runway.

Why this matters for CPGs and manufacturers

If Keychain scales its engineering machine and rolls out KeychainOS successfully, CPG brands and retailers gain faster access to vetted manufacturing capacity, richer compliance reporting, and AI-driven planning tools. For manufacturers, the platform offers discovery revenue and software to tighten operations and audit readiness.

There are strategic trade-offs: relying on an offshore engineering hub lowers hiring time and cost but requires disciplined product management, IP controls, and cross-border collaboration practices to keep product-market fit and speed intact.

Quick takeaways

• Funding: $30M Series B to scale product and India engineering.
• Team growth: Gurugram headcount to double to ~70, aiming for ~100 in a year.
• Product: KeychainOS with AI modules for food safety, procurement, inventory, production.
• Market: Focused on North America now, with Europe expansion planned.

Keychain’s bet on Indian engineering mirrors a growing pattern: building product and R&D where deep technical talent and fast scaling are most accessible, even when the market served lives elsewhere. The next 12 months will test whether that bet turns into a differentiated AI-native OS for manufacturers and a faster route to reliable supplier networks for brands.