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Sequoia invests $3.9m in Indian recharge portal

  • Alvina Yuen
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Indian E-commerce portal Freecharge.in has raised INR200million ($3.9million) in its series A round of funding from venture capital firm Sequoia Capital.

Launched in 2010 and backed by Accelyst Solutions, Freecharge provides mobile-recharge services. For every recharge done, the site offers discount coupons equivalent to the recharge amount redeemable at restaurants and other retailers. Freecharge claims to have a customer base of 1.5 million and records 10,000 transactions a day. McDonald's, Barista, Puma, Pizza Hut and Jet Airways are tied to the site as retail partners.

Freecharge earlier received seed funding from Sequoia Capital and Tandon Group, members of the Mumbai Angels in 2010, DealCurry reported. The recent fundraise will be used as expansion capital.

"Freecharge has created a new online model, enabled by couponing, "said Shailendra Singh, managing director of Sequoia Capital. "We were attracted because it isn't another daily deals site, but one that leverages a localized phenomenon of pre-paid mobile and DTH services to generate demand for large merchants."

Earlier this month, Sequoia Capital reportedly invested INR270 million in online health store Healthkart.com. It has also invested in several Indian e-commerce companies, including Freecultr and Fashionandyou.com.

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