Cellarim Labs Raises ₹6 Crore Seed Round Led by 3i Partners to Scale Cell-Free Biomanufacturing for High-Purity Beauty Ingredients

Cellarim Labs, a biotechnology startup pioneering cell-free biomanufacturing for beauty and personal care ingredients, today announced that it has raised ₹6 crore in Seed funding. The round was led by 3i Partners and Venture Catalysts, with participation from Momentum Capital, Jashan Bhumkar, Gayathri Kuppendra Reddy, and other strategic investors.

Founded in 2023 by Hitesh Rafalia and Nisa Mehreen, Cellarim Labs is redefining how high-value cosmetic ingredients are produced. Today, most of the bioactives used in the beauty industry are imported, often resulting in supply uncertainty, inconsistent purity, and higher costs for brands. These challenges have created a clear need for a more reliable, scalable, and transparent way to make premium ingredients, and Cellarim Labs’ platform is uniquely designed to meet that need. The company’s core innovation is a cell-free, enzyme-powered manufacturing platform that replaces slow fermentation and resource-heavy chemical synthesis with a cleaner, faster, and highly controlled process. By integrating AI-driven enzyme design with sustainable bioprocessing, Cellarim Labs converts renewable bio-waste into exceptionally pure and consistent beauty ingredients.

The newly secured capital will enable Cellarim Labs to establish its pilot-scale biomanufacturing facility, accelerate commercial production of NeuHyal™, and expand its B2B ingredient supply to beauty and cosmetic brands. The investment will also support the growth of Cellarim Labs’ AI-driven biofoundry, which allows partner brands to bring target molecules for rapid design, testing, and production—significantly shortening development timelines for novel bioactives.

Nisa Mehreen, Co-founder & CEO, Cellarim Labs; Cell-free biomanufacturing allows us to rethink how high-value ingredients are made, and this fundraise gives us the momentum to scale that vision. With the support of industry partners and investors who believe deeply in our technology, we are now ready to move from breakthrough innovation to commercial impact. Our focus is clear— build a sustainable platform that delivers high-purity bioactives like NeuHyal™ with unmatched precision, consistency, and transparency.

Dr. Apoorva Ranjan Sharma, Co-founder and Managing Director of Venture Catalysts, Cellarim Labs is bringing much-needed innovation to an industry that’s demanding higher purity, better consistency and sustainable production. Their cell-free platform directly solves these gaps, and the speed at which they’ve delivered NeuHyal™ shows real execution strength. We see them becoming a key disruptor in global ingredient manufacturing.

Built on this foundation, the platform has already delivered Cellarim Labs’ first breakthrough: NeuHyal™, a high-purity Hyaluronic Acid portfolio spanning 10 kDa to 5000 kDa, developed in just one year. NeuHyal™ offers superior hydration performance, improved moisture retention, and a highly traceable, responsible alternative to conventional HA sources. The company is initially targeting the USD 9 billion global Hyaluronic Acid market, which is seeing rapid growth across premium skincare, dermal fillers, and medical-grade applications.

With deep expertise across biotechnology, enzyme engineering, and scalable bioprocess development, the Cellarim Labs team aims to build high-performance biotech from India, set a new benchmark for responsible ingredient production, and shape the future of sustainable beauty innovation globally.