Phab makes high-protein snack bars, milkshakes, and wafers for Indian consumers who want healthier convenience food without getting stuck with bland “diet” products. The Mumbai-based brand has now raised $4 million in a pre-Series A round led by OTP Ventures and Chona Family Office, a fresh Phab protein bars milestone as it tries to scale online and offline at the same time. Healthy snacking in India still has a basic problem: people want better macros, but most everyday options still force a trade-off between taste, price, and availability. Founded in 2018 by husband-wife duo Ankit Chona and Gayatri Chona, Phab is using the new capital for brand building and geographic expansion. It also plans wider distribution and a stronger leadership bench.
What are Phab protein bars and milkshakes?
Phab isn’t a supplements company pretending to be a snack brand. It sells ready-to-eat and ready-to-drink protein-led products across cheat bars, protein bars, protein milkshakes, and protein millet wafers. On its storefront, the range includes 15g cheat bars and 11g protein bars. It also sells 18g protein milkshakes and millet wafer protein bars in flavors like Cookies & Cream, Strawberry Cake, Mocha Latte, and Choco Truffle.
The pitch is simple, and honestly, that’s part of why it works. Phab positions its bars around calorie efficiency and a high protein-to-calorie ratio instead of selling a hardcore bodybuilding image. The brand also frames its products as something you can use post-workout or as a morning protein boost. It also works as an evening snack when you don’t want another sugary biscuit pack.
For a customer, the experience is pretty low-friction. You pick a format based on habit — bar, milkshake, or wafer. Then you order online or grab it from retail and eat it without mixing powders or planning a mini meal around protein intake. That cuts a lot of the manual work people usually associate with “eating healthy.” Especially for office workers, gym-goers, and commuters.
There’s a second layer here. Phab has been expanding beyond sweet bars into formats that feel more local and snackable, including savoury Bhel Bars and millet wafers. That’s smart because Indian snack behavior isn’t built only around chocolate-flavored protein products. It’s built around texture, savory cravings, and repeatability.
Who founded Phab and how has the brand grown?
The founding story
Phab was founded in 2018 by Ankit Chona and Gayatri Chona. The origin idea was straightforward: build healthier snacks that don’t taste like punishment. The brand’s protein-first identity wasn’t accidental either. Later brand material tied the name and the product design back to protein as the core nutritional hook.
Why the founders fit this category
Gayatri Chona brings the nutrition lens. She’s described as a nutritionist, certified nutritionist, wellness coach, and health coach across the company’s own presence and industry coverage. That makes her a credible builder for a food brand that sells itself on macros rather than just trendy packaging.
Ankit Chona brings the food-business muscle. He runs House of Chonas Collaborative and represents the third generation of a family long tied to Indian food and hospitality. He studied business at Purdue University and worked at Panera Bread in the US. Later, he helped build brands including HOCCO and Huber & Holly. That matters because scaling a consumer food brand in India is less about a single viral product. It’s more about manufacturing, retail relationships, and channel discipline.
Traction, channel mix, and the latest raise
Phab now sells through Amazon, Flipkart, Blinkit, and Zepto, alongside modern trade and general trade outlets. Nearly half of its business comes from offline channels. That’s an important signal: this isn’t just another D2C brand living on performance marketing. By May 2026, the brand was being described as offering about 40 SKUs across 3,000+ retail touchpoints.
The new round takes Phab into pre-Series A territory a little over a year after its $2 million seed raise, which OTP Ventures led and Capri Global, Sim & San Law Firm, and angel investors joined. This time, OTP Ventures returned, and Chona Family Office joined as co-lead. The company will use the new money for brand building, deeper geographic reach, distribution expansion, and leadership hiring.
How does Phab compare with rivals?
Phab is entering a crowded aisle. The Whole Truth has built a clean-label nutrition brand across protein powders, bars, chocolates, nut butters, and muesli — and raised $51 million in a Series D round in 2026. That shows how much investor appetite still exists for nutrition-led packaged foods at scale. Yoga Bar took a different route, building a strong digital-first health food brand before coming under ITC’s control effective April 1, 2026. Beyond Snack sits in a different product niche with flavored banana chips, but it still competes for the same healthier packaged-snack wallet and retail shelf.
Phab’s angle is a bit more hybrid. It’s trying to be protein-forward without looking like a pure sports-nutrition company. It’s also trying to win in offline retail faster than a lot of digitally native brands do. Its mix of milkshakes and sweet bars points one way. Savoury bars and millet wafers point another.
Why does this Phab funding round matter?
For a food startup like this, pre-Series A money isn’t glamorous. It’s operational.
Phab is putting the cash into brand building, distribution, geography, and leadership. That tells you the company is now trying to solve the boring hard stuff that actually decides whether a consumer brand lasts. Investors aren’t just backing a decent product line here. They’re backing the next layer of execution that turns a promising snack brand into a scaled retail business.
There’s also a channel story underneath this. Because nearly half of the business already comes from offline, more capital should help Phab push harder into the places where food brands are really made or broken. Store visibility matters. So do regional expansion, modern trade negotiations, and better distribution reliability. Online traction gets attention. Offline repeat purchase gets durable revenue.
OTP Ventures returning after the seed round matters too. Repeat participation usually means early investors liked what they saw after the first cheque. It doesn’t guarantee breakout success. But it does suggest Phab has shown enough product-market and channel progress to justify a second round of backing.
Why are Phab protein bars riding India’s healthy snacking wave?
The macro tailwind is real. Grand View Research pegs India’s healthy snacks market at $4.42 billion in 2025 and projects it will reach about $8.18 billion by 2033, growing at an 8.1% CAGR. That lines up pretty neatly with the market-opportunity figure in your source article and helps explain why investors keep funding brands that can make healthier packaged food feel mainstream rather than niche.
Zoom out a bit more and the overall snacks category is huge. IMARC says India’s snacks market reached INR 46,571.3 crore in 2024 and is being pushed by urbanization, convenience buying, and shifting preferences toward natural, vegan, low-calorie, and gluten-free variants. Healthy snacks don’t grow in isolation. They grow by taking share from the much bigger everyday snacking habit.
There’s also a protein angle that keeps getting sharper. Mint, citing UN Food and Agriculture Organization data, reported that India’s daily per capita protein supply was 70.5g in 2021, versus 124.6g in China and 124.3g in the US. That doesn’t automatically turn every protein bar into a winner. But it does explain why protein messaging now lands with a much wider audience than just lifters and athletes.
What happens next for Phab protein bars?
The hard part starts now. Phab protein bars have moved past the “interesting startup” stage and into the much less forgiving phase where growth has to show up in retail depth, repeat purchase, and city-by-city distribution quality.
That’s why this round feels more meaningful than flashy. Phab already has a broader product bench than many single-format snack brands, and it already has offline momentum. The next thing to watch is whether it can turn that into a stronger national presence without losing the nutrition-first credibility that made the brand stand out in the first place.
Read how Fraganote raised a $3M Series A led by V3 Ventures to expand its story-led fragrance brand into body care, using discovery kits, omnichannel distribution, and affordable luxury positioning to capture India's growing premium scent market.
FAQ
- What funding did Phab raise? Phab raised $4 million in a pre-Series A round led by OTP Ventures and Chona Family Office. The company plans to use the capital for brand building, geographic expansion, distribution growth, and leadership hiring, following a $2 million seed round a little over a year earlier.
- How do Phab protein bars work as an everyday snack? They’re designed as ready-to-eat, protein-led snacks that fit normal routines rather than strict fitness programs. The brand sells multiple formats — including 11g and 15g bars, 18g milkshakes, and millet wafers — so consumers can pick something that works at work, after a workout, or during a commute.
- Who are the founders of Phab? Phab was founded in 2018 by Gayatri Chona and Ankit Chona. Gayatri brings the nutrition background, while Ankit brings deep food and restaurant operating experience through HOCCO, Huber & Holly, and the broader Chona family’s F&B legacy.
- Is Phab a healthy snacks brand or a sports nutrition brand? It’s better described as a healthy snacking brand with a strong protein focus. Phab sits between mainstream packaged snacks and hardcore sports nutrition, which is why its range spans bars, milkshakes, and wafers and why it competes for retail shelf space alongside broader consumer snack brands.
