{"id":441859,"date":"2026-02-10T17:31:43","date_gmt":"2026-02-10T12:01:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/?p=441859"},"modified":"2026-02-10T18:07:20","modified_gmt":"2026-02-10T12:37:20","slug":"introducing-padcare","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/rainmatter\/introducing-padcare","title":{"rendered":"Follow-on investment &#8211; PadCare"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sanitary waste is a large, invisible problem.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Over 12 crore women in India use sanitary pads. This results in billions of pads being generated every year, most of which end up in landfills or are burned. The bulk of used sanitary waste is disposed of in an unsafe and unscientific manner. This has an impact on both health and the climate, with waste often leaching into the soil. There is a disproportionate impact on waste workers as well.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image1.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">PadCare is trying to fix this by building systems to collect and recycle used sanitary pads at scale. Their approach focuses on recovering plastic and cellulose from pads instead of incineration or dumping.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image2.png\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We invested in PadCare in 2022 with a small cheque. Since then, the team has steadily built the business\u2014growing substantially, expanding across cities, and operating profitably in a space that is operationally intensive.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We\u2019ve chosen to reinvest because the broader problem remains unsolved and because PadCare has shown both intent and execution over the last three years that we\u2019ve been privileged to be part of.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is long-term work. It needs patience, capital, and long-term intent. We\u2019re glad to continue supporting PadCare as they do that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Here\u2019s Ajinkya from Padcare talking about his journey:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/image3.jpg\" \/><\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cI<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">n 2018, during a landfill visit in Pune, I saw a sanitation worker manually separating sanitary waste with no safety gear. That moment made me uncomfortable in a way I could not ignore. I realised that when we say \u201cdispose,\u201d we are not solving anything; we are just transferring the problem to someone else.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Over time, we built our own decentralised collection system and a patented recycling process that actually works at scale, with a 1000 MT processing capacity. Today, PadCare processes sanitary waste across 24 cities, recovers usable material for industrial application, and prevents it from ending up in landfills or water bodies.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What keeps me going is knowing that the technology that is designed is protecting women\u2019s health, creating safer livelihoods for sanitation workers, and reducing long-term environmental damage.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As long as sanitary waste is treated as invisible, I feel a responsibility to keep building.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sanitary waste is a large, invisible problem. Over 12 crore women in India use sanitary pads. This results in billions of pads being generated every year, most of which end up in landfills or are burned. The bulk of used sanitary waste is disposed of in an unsafe and unscientific manner. This has an impact [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":242549,"featured_media":441861,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[478],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-441859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-rainmatter"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v23.5 (Yoast SEO v26.6) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Follow-on investment - PadCare &#8211; Z-Connect by Zerodha<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Sanitary waste is a large, invisible problem. Over 12 crore women in India use sanitary pads. This results in billions of pads being generated every year,\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/rainmatter\/introducing-padcare\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Follow-on investment - PadCare\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Sanitary waste is a large, invisible problem. Over 12 crore women in India use sanitary pads. This results in billions of pads being generated every year,\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/rainmatter\/introducing-padcare\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Z-Connect by Zerodha\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/zerodha.social\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-02-10T12:01:43+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-02-10T12:37:20+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Rainmatter-investments.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"700\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"401\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Vignesh Pai\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@zerodhaonline\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@zerodhaonline\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Viraj Joshi\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/rainmatter\/introducing-padcare\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/rainmatter\/introducing-padcare\",\"name\":\"Follow-on investment - PadCare &#8211; Z-Connect by Zerodha\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/rainmatter\/introducing-padcare#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/rainmatter\/introducing-padcare#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Rainmatter-investments.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-02-10T12:01:43+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-02-10T12:37:20+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/zerodha.com\/z-connect\/#\/schema\/person\/9b332024e2c3a7ff49e401fdcb16ead7\"},\"description\":\"Sanitary waste is a large, invisible problem. 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