Deal Street: Xiaomi Leads $13.4-Million Funding In Lending Startup ZestMoney
Your weekly dose of startup deals.
Five Indian startups raised nearly Rs 2,000 crore, or about $339 million, in angel, seed or venture capital funding last week, across sectors such as lending, content, digital payments among others.
Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi made its second bet in an Indian digital lending startup last week as it looks to replicate its success in China of building digital credit products in the country. It had previously backed KrazyBee.
Servify Raises $15 Million From Tech Investor Iron Pillar
After-sales service and management for devices startup Servify bagged Rs 106 crore ($15 million) in growth round led by Iron Pillar, an India-focused venture fund.
Existing investors Blume Ventures and Beenext also participated in the round, the company said in a statement, adding that the funds will be used to make senior hires and also build new technology solutions for its clients.
Founded in 2015, Mumbai-based Servify, provides protection against accidental damage as well as solutions for recycling and buyback for smartphones. It says it works with a number of top device brands, retailers, distributors, insurers, service providers and carriers such as Amazon, Apple, Croma, Godrej, and Huawei.
Servify has 600 partners on its platform and close to 1 lakh customers, the statement said. The company recently launched operations in the U.S. and is setting up operations in Europe.
Xiaomi Backs Lending Startup ZestMoney
Digital lending startup ZestMoney raised Rs 93.6 crore (around $13.4 million) in an extended Series A funding led by mobile handset maker Xiaomi.
Existing investors PayU, Ribbit Capital and Omidyar Network also participated in the round, the company said in a statement.
The latest funding takes the total amount raised by the startup to $22 million, the statement added. The company said it aims to use to use proceeds of the round to strengthen its technology and data science capabilities.
ZestMoney allows users to get online credit and pay back in equated monthly instalments to make purchases without having to use a credit card.
ZestMoney and Xiaomi co-launched Mi Finance last year, enabling Mi customers in India to afford Xiaomi products via a cardless EMI, the company statement added.
It also works with e-commerce players such as Amazon, Flipkart, Zefo, among others as well as ed-tech firm UpGrad. The company said it receives three lakh applications per month.
myUpchar Raises $5 Million From Nexus, Omidyar And Shunwei
Medical content startup myUpchar raised Rs 35 crore ($5 million) in fresh funding round from Nexus Venture Partners, Omidyar Network and Shunwei Capital.
The startup, which provides medical and wellness content in Hindi and other Indian languages, said in a statement that it will use the investment to strengthen its product and technology offerings in the area of voice, video and virtual reality interfaces.
Founded in 2016, myUpchar said to have partnered with doctors to create health content in 13 Indian languages across various disciplines such as allopathy, Ayurveda and homeopathy.
It says that employs a proprietary voice search as well as text-to-speech technology for all health content.
Others
Berkshire Hathaway Inc. bought a stake in Paytm’s parent company One 97 Communication Ltd., India’s biggest digital-payments brand, in the conglomerate’s first foray into the country’s startups, Paytm said in a statement. Berkshire is set to acquire 3-4 percent of One97 for about $300 million in a deal that values the target at more than $10 billion, people privy to the development told BloombergQuint.
Warren Buffett, Berkshire’s chairman and chief executive officer, wasn’t directly involved in the investment in One97, the statement added.
Lending platform, Shubh Loans raised $4.2 million (Rs 30 crore) in a new funding round led by venture capital firm Saama Capital, VCCircle reported.
Lifestyle and entertainment content website, MissMalini raised Rs 10.4 crore (around $1.4 million) in a pre-series A round of funding from venture capital firms Orios Venture Partners and New Enterpise Associates, it said in a statement.