Elevar leads $32m round for India start-up credit provider

StrideOne offers short-term credit products to B2B technology start-ups with a view to improving their interactions with small-business clients. This includes unsecured personal and business loans to vendors, buyers or other stakeholders in the start-up ecosystem. The aim is to provide comprehensive financial services to the start-up ecosystem across sectors and life cycles.

“Delving deeper into the growth capital needs of start-up aligned ecosystems that often struggle with access to capital, StrideOne leverages technology and data to build customised, risk efficient and scalable credit structures catering to their dynamic needs,” StrideOne said in a social media post confirming the investment.

The company claims to have maintained profitability, scaled assets under management to INR 2bn, onboarded 20 start-ups on its platform, and acquired lending start-up EzCred - all in its first six months of operations. EzCred previously received seed funding from angel investors associated with Citibank, ANZ Bank, and US VC firm Costanoa Ventures.

StrideOne’s founders are Ishpreet Singh Gandhi, who founded Stride Ventures in late 2018, and Abhinav Suri, who joined Stride as a managing director the following year. Both previously filled roles at IDFC Bank and Citibank, among other financial institutions. Stride has made more than 60 investments to date and hit a first close of INR 5.5bn on its second venture debt fund last year.

Elevar was established in 2006 by Sandeep Farias, who previously set up Indian operations for global microfinancier Unitus, and Johanna Posada, a former economist for the Central Bank of Mexico who heads Latin American investments. Elevar has made more than 40 investments to date. In India’s credit space, these include non-bank lenders InCred Financial Services and Samunnati.

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• Topics
• South Asia
• Financials
• Early-stage
• India
• Impact investment
• venture debt
• Financial Services
• Stride Ventures
• Elevar Equity