Advent joins Series D for India's KreditBee
Advent International has committed USD 100m to Indian lending start-up KreditBee as an extension to a Series D round announced last month.
The company has now raised USD 200m in Series D funding, according to a statement. This includes a first tranche of USD 80m from Premji Invest, NewQuest Capital Partners, Mirae Asset Ventures, MUFG Bank, and Motilal Oswal Alternates (MO Alts). Indian media reported that KreditBee is now valued at approximately USD 680m.
Prior to Advent’s investment, the company had raised nearly USD 380m in private funding, AVCJ Research’s records show – more than one-third of it through a USD 145m Series C that closed in 2021. Other backers include Alpine Capital, Arkam Ventures, IndiaSME Investments, and ICICI Bank.
Founded in 2018, KreditBee aims to close a demographics financial inclusion gap in India by providing instant personal loans of up to INR 400,000 (USD 4,900) to young professionals. It is a subsidiary of Finnov, which also controls non-bank financial company (NBFC) Krazybee. There is said to be a strong focus on technology, including data-driven know-your-customer functions.
On closing the first tranche of the Series D, the company had 6m loan customers, about 2m of whom are active loan customers, and a network of more than 10 financial institutions in addition to Krazybee. The plan was to expand its coverage to encompass 400m “middle India” users.
The new capital will help scale the existing business and support diversification into digitally enabled financial products. The platform is on track to surpass USD 1bn in assets under management over the next 6-9 months.
“We believe KreditBee’s proprietary underwriting tech stack is one of the best in the industry and helps in its ability to identify and underwrite future prime customers at an early stage. We are thrilled about this partnership and to assist KreditBee to drive further value creation in its next phase of sustainable growth,” said Shweta Jalan, a managing partner at Advent, in a statement.
Access to credit is a major pain point in the concept of Bharat, which has underpinned consistent private equity interest in supporting the NBFC segment, even as market shocks have shaken up business models. This has included a strong shift toward retail-focused lending programmes and flexible credit, as well as areas such as gold finance and home loans.
Avendus Capital served as exclusive financial advisor to KreditBee on the latest transaction.
More on South Asia
Latest News
Asian GPs slow implementation of ESG policies - survey
Asia-based private equity firms are assigning more dedicated resources to environment, social, and governance (ESG) programmes, but policy changes have slowed in the past 12 months, in part due to concerns raised internally and by LPs, according to a...
Singapore fintech start-up LXA gets $10m seed round
New Enterprise Associates (NEA) has led a USD 10m seed round for Singapore’s LXA, a financial technology start-up launched by a former Asia senior executive at The Blackstone Group.
India's InCred announces $60m round, claims unicorn status
Indian non-bank lender InCred Financial Services said it has received INR 5bn (USD 60m) at a valuation of at least USD 1bn from unnamed investors including “a global private equity fund.”
Insight leads $50m round for Australia's Roller
Insight Partners has led a USD 50m round for Australia’s Roller, a venue management software provider specializing in family fun parks.