Advent Invests $100 Mn In KreditBees Extended Series D Round

Last month, the company had raised $80 million in the ongoing Series D round from existing investors Azim Premji’s Premji Invest, Motilal Oswal Alternates, TPG-backed NewQuest Capital Partners, and Mirae Asset Ventures. The round also saw participation from MUFG Bank. Avendus Capital acted as the exclusive financial advisor to KreditBee on the transaction.

Mint reported about the deal first in June.

KreditBee plans to use the funds to scale the existing business and diversify its product offering by venturing into digitally enabled financial products, the Bengaluru-based company said in a statement.

“The latest round will help us to achieve our vision of serving over 400 million middle-income population in the country," said Madhusudan Ekambaram, cofounder and chief executive officer (CEO) of KreditBee.

KreditBee, which was founded in 2016, offers credit and other personal finance services through its registered non-banking financial company (NBFC), Krazybee Services Pvt Ltd.

The firm has also partnered with over 10 financial institutions to provide credit to borrowers. It claims that it is on track to clock assets under management (AUM) of $1 billion over the next six to nine months.

It offers multiple types of personal loans, online or offline checkout finance, and digital gold. Anyone can apply for a personal loan starting from ₹1,000 to up to ₹4 lakh with various repayment tenures. It claims that it has 6 million loan customers, out of which over 2 million are active loan customers.

“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," said Shweta Jalan, managing partner at Advent International.

KreditBee’s $200 million round comes at a time when it has become difficult for startups to raise capital amid tough market conditions. “The current round is a reflection that in any market conditions, companies with attractive margin profiles addressing a large market opportunity continue to create an exceptional outcome," said Pankaj Naik, executive director and co-head, of digital and technology investment banking at Avendus Capital.

Over the past few years, digital lending in India has presented vast opportunities for Indian startups. Gagan Joshi, director at Advent International, calls it a fast-growing under-penetrated space. “Only a handful of fintech (companies) like KreditBee have been able to crack profitably," he said.

In the lending tech space, the company competes against the likes of EarlySalary, PhonePe-owned Zest Money, Faircent, and LoanTap, among others.