BUILT is an Indian D2C performance brand making barefoot-inspired training and court shoes. It has now raised $2 Mn in pre-seed funding to push its natural movement footwear bet into the mainstream. Singapore-based Tanglin Venture Partners led the round, with participation from Lifelong Group founder Bharat Kalia. Most sneaker buyers still get sold on cushioning and looks first, while BUILT is trying to convince them that foot shape, ground feel, and movement mechanics should matter just as much. Founded in 2026 by Vedant Lamba and Vijayant Dhaka, the startup is trying to build a premium sportswear brand in a category that’s still tiny in India.
What is BUILT and how does its natural movement footwear work?
BUILT’s first product is a natural movement shoe designed around a 0 mm heel-to-toe drop, a wide toe box, firmer ground contact, and a flexible build that lets the foot move with less interference. The shoe is meant to get out of the body’s way rather than “correct” it. The current version also uses a collapsible heel pocket and pressure-mapped traction. It swaps stitching for bonded construction, and uses an engineered mesh upper with different weave densities for support and breathability. BUILT sells that flagship shoe at ₹4,999.
That’s not just branding copy. It’s a specific design philosophy. The wider forefoot is meant to allow toe splay. The zero-drop setup keeps the heel and forefoot on the same plane. The outsole places more rubber in high-load zones instead of spreading it evenly across the base. For users, the pitch is simple: better stability for gym work and more natural gait mechanics for walking. There’s also enough flexibility for yoga or calisthenics, plus a packable form factor for travel.
BUILT’s second silhouette is a court shoe. It’s aimed at sports that demand lateral movement and fast cuts — pickleball, tennis, badminton, and squash — rather than straight-line running. The storefront shows Court V1 in multiple colorways priced at ₹4,499, slightly below the flagship natural movement shoe. That price gap suggests BUILT isn’t trying to be an ultra-premium vanity label right now. It’s trying to make technical footwear feel reachable.
The bigger point is this. BUILT isn’t selling “barefoot” as a niche identity badge. It’s selling natural movement footwear as performance gear for regular fitness consumers.
Who founded BUILT and why are they betting on natural movement footwear?
From sneaker culture to building shoes
Vedant Lamba didn’t come out of nowhere. Long before BUILT, he built Mainstreet Marketplace, which started in 2017 from his sneaker-focused YouTube channel and grew into one of India’s better-known sneaker resale businesses. By 2022, Mainstreet had expanded from Pune into Mumbai and Delhi, and Lamba had already become a visible name in India’s sneaker culture. That background matters because he understands how footwear gets marketed and merchandised. He also knows how obsessively younger consumers discuss it.
BUILT’s founding thesis seems to come from that contrast. Lamba has spent years around sneakers that sell on hype, scarcity, and aesthetics. BUILT is his attempt to build around function first — but without making the product look like medical equipment or a hardcore minimalist-running experiment. His line from the funding announcement says it best: “We don’t want to become the number one preference of barefoot enthusiasts, we want to become the number one preference of fitness enthusiasts.”
What Vijayant Dhaka brings
Dhaka adds a different skill set. Before BUILT, he held senior roles in marketing technology and business growth. In 2020, ValueFirst brought him in as a senior vice president, and he had spent 14 years in the industry, including leadership roles at Cheetah Digital and Octane. More recently, his profile has been tied to High Jump Retail, the entity behind BUILT.
He’s not a legacy footwear operator. But he is relevant to a D2C brand that needs tight GTM discipline, brand positioning, and customer acquisition control. A lot of consumer brands fail because they have product taste but weak operating discipline. BUILT looks like it’s trying to avoid that trap early.
What BUILT has launched so far
The startup is live and selling through its own website only. It currently has 2 footwear silhouettes on the market — the flagship natural movement shoe and the court shoe — spread across 9 footwear SKUs. BUILT also said it was adding around 20 apparel and accessories SKUs as part of a broader activewear push.
For now, it isn’t using marketplaces, and it doesn’t plan to work with multi-brand retailers in the near term. That’s a deliberate choice. The founders want to own the customer experience end to end. They’re evaluating offline retail, including an experience store in Mumbai, but the near-term plan is lighter: pop-ups and brand installations in Mumbai first. Then expansion into Delhi, Bengaluru, and Hyderabad.
Why the round stands out
The funding itself is modest by sneaker-brand standards, but the setup stands out. BUILT raised $2 Mn, or about ₹17 Cr, in a pre-seed round led by Tanglin Venture Partners, with Bharat Kalia also participating. The company will use the money for R&D and product design. It’s also earmarked for proprietary tooling, manufacturing capability, custom footwear moulds, and inventory expansion.
That’s an expensive way to start a footwear brand. That’s the point.
A lot of new labels use standard factory moulds because it’s cheaper and faster. BUILT has invested in proprietary moulds instead, while sourcing technical materials from China and manufacturing in India. If that approach works, the upside is tighter control over fit, durability, and performance. If it doesn’t, the burn rate gets ugly fast.
How BUILT compares with rivals
BUILT has direct competition inside India’s still-small barefoot and natural footwear category from names like Rara Barefoot, Zen Barefoot, and State of Joy. Those brands have largely spoken to users already sold on zero-drop shoes, wide toe boxes, and foot-health language. BUILT is chasing a broader buyer than that.
Then there’s the adjacent D2C footwear crowd. Comet built a mainstream sneaker brand in the ₹4,000 to ₹4,500 band and raised a Series A round in 2024. Gully Labs, which leans into culturally themed premium sneakers, raised ₹30 Cr in Series A funding in January 2026 and is already pushing offline expansion and international visibility. CHK has entered with a different angle again — one daily retro-style shoe, made in its own Ranipet factory, priced at ₹4,999 instead of imported alternatives that can cost ₹10,000 to ₹14,000.
And above all of them sit Adidas, Nike, Puma, and Asics.
BUILT’s real differentiator isn’t just “Indian brand.” It’s trying to create demand for a new use case inside Indian premium footwear — performance shoes built around natural foot mechanics, not just sneaker styling.
Why does BUILT’s $2 Mn round matter for natural movement footwear?
This round matters because BUILT isn’t using the capital for splashy distribution first. It’s using it to build the hard stuff.
Custom moulds, tooling, and product development don’t give you instant hype on Instagram. They do matter if you’re trying to create a footwear category instead of just copying existing silhouettes with a sharper logo. That’s a tougher path. It’s also the only path that gives BUILT a real chance at defensibility.
The capital also gives BUILT room to test whether natural movement footwear can sell beyond the already-converted crowd. Lamba’s target isn’t the barefoot forum user who already owns 4 pairs of minimalist shoes. It’s the gym-goer, casual runner, or racquet-sport player who’s never really thought about toe shape or heel drop before.
Tanglin’s bet says something about investor appetite right now. There’s still money chasing focused D2C brands in India — but only when the product category feels distinct enough to justify customer education and premium pricing.
How big is India’s natural movement footwear opportunity?
India’s broader footwear market is already huge. IMARC pegged it at $20.67 Bn in 2025 and projects it to reach $47.53 Bn by 2034, which implies a 9.7% CAGR. The same market breakdown includes both athletic and non-athletic footwear and explicitly separates premium from mass pricing. That matters because BUILT is clearly playing in the premium athletic lane, not the mass-volume one.
The timing also lines up with a shift in how Indian consumers buy shoes. Online-first retail has made product education easier. Buyers are more willing to try niche formats if the storytelling is strong. Homegrown brands no longer need to imitate global giants on day 1 to get attention.
The court-sports angle helps too. India’s pickleball scene is suddenly moving fast. The Indian Pickleball Association said that as of early 2025 the country had about 200,000 active players, more than 1,200 courts, and 3 to 4 new courts being added every week, with the player base projected to approach 1 million within 2 to 3 years. That doesn’t guarantee BUILT wins. But it does mean there’s a fresh consumer wedge for a court-specific shoe that doesn’t have to fight only in the running aisle.
Can natural movement footwear really go mainstream in India?
That’s the bet.
BUILT has enough money to refine product, add inventory, and test whether natural movement footwear can become a real consumer category instead of a subculture. The next thing to watch isn’t just sales. It’s whether mainstream Indian fitness buyers come back for version 2, bring friends, and stop treating foot-shaped shoes like a weird internet hobby.
Read how Dhruva Space raised ₹60 Cr from IN-SPACe's Antariksh Venture Capital Fund to scale satellite manufacturing, expand space infrastructure, and build an end-to-end commercial space technology stack for India.
FAQ
- What is BUILT’s latest funding round?
BUILT has raised $2 Mn in a pre-seed round. Tanglin Venture Partners led the investment, and Lifelong Group founder Bharat Kalia also participated. The company is putting that capital into R&D, tooling, design, manufacturing capability, and inventory rather than a fast marketplace blitz. - How does BUILT’s footwear work?
BUILT’s core idea is simple: make shoes that interfere less with natural foot movement. Its first training shoe uses a 0 mm drop, a wide toe box, targeted outsole grip, and a flexible structure, while its court model is built for sports like pickleball, badminton, squash, and tennis. - Who are the founders of BUILT?
BUILT was founded in 2026 by Vedant Lamba and Vijayant Dhaka. Lamba is best known for building Mainstreet Marketplace in India’s sneaker resale market, while Dhaka brings senior commercial and growth experience from roles that included ValueFirst, Cheetah Digital, and Octane. - Why is natural movement footwear getting attention in India?
The category sits at the intersection of premium fitness spending, D2C brand discovery, and rising interest in foot health and movement quality. It’s also getting a push from court-sport adoption — especially pickleball — at a time when India’s overall footwear market is still growing quickly.
