On January 7, Nagaraju Maddirala, secretary of the Department of Financial Services (DFS), urged fintech companies to “consistently” provide creative solutions to the financial services sector while “strictly” adhering to rules. He said this while presiding over a conference in New Delhi with cofounders and senior executives from significant fintech companies. Kunal Shah, the founder of CRED; Bipin Preet Singh of MobiKwik; Sharath Bulusu of Google Pay; and officials from BillDesk, Infibeam Avenues, and Razorpay were among those present at the meeting. The gathering was also attended by industry organisations like the Digital Lenders Association of India, the Payments Council of India, and the Startup Policy Forum. According to a statement, “the goal of the engagement with partners from the startup and fintech ecosystem was to promote an open exchange of ideas aimed at elevating the fintech sector to a global standard.”
Sharing his views on the suggestion, Rajjat Gulati, Co-Founder, plutos ONE stated, “Fintechs use technology to deliver services to their customers cheaper, faster, and better than before or to offer innovative new solutions. With technology comes the potential to deliver these solutions and their positive impact at never-before-seen scales. At the same time, technology also means that any missteps or vulnerabilities can be multiplied many times over. An attacker now has access to not thousands, but millions of customer records if they are able to access your systems. Millions could be defrauded of billions because somewhere in the stack of technological services that come together to deliver a simple money transfer solution is a bug or vulnerability or a piece of malicious code.”
Digital Payment Systems Required Deeper Penetration
Maddirala praised the Indian fintech industry’s explosive expansion over the last ten years and emphasised the necessity of enhancing digital payment systems in rural and northeastern areas, especially with UPI. He also urged the stakeholders to support micro, small, and medium-sized businesses (MSMEs) through “lending based on digital footprints.” According to the official announcement, Maddirala outlined the several steps the Centre has made to foster an atmosphere that is supportive of the fintech industry. Officials from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), and the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) also attended the conference.
2024 Not a Promising Year for Fintech Startups
The gathering takes place while the domestic fintech sector continues to suffer from a lack of capital. Indian fintech firms raised $2.5 billion in 2024, a 19% decrease from $3.1 billion the year before, despite being the most funded industry last year. The fintech ecosystem had a drop in funding for the third year in a row in 2024. Nonetheless, the number of deals in the industry increased by 23% from 2023 to 2024, from 132 to 162. Last year, the fintech industry also achieved a $30 billion funding milestone (from 2014 to 2024) and welcomed two new unicorns to its portfolio: Moneyview and Perfios. Finova Capital, Drip Capital, and M2P were notable for securing some of the largest agreements in 2024, with each deal exceeding $100 million.
India’s Fintech Ecosystem Still Leading the Global Race
In spite of this downturn, the Indian fintech ecosystem is one of the top three globally financed fintech ecosystems in H1 2024, after the US and the UK. According to Tracxn’s Geo Semi Annual Fintech India Report for H1 2024, the ongoing funding winter and a number of other geopolitical challenges are to blame for the funding fall. Compared to one in H2 2023, two funding rounds totalling more than $100 million were observed during that time. These include the $120 million Series C funding round raised by lending platform Avanse and the $144 million Series D funding round raised by non-banking lender Credit Saison.
India’s financial technology industry has seen an explosive surge in financing over the last several years, with assets totaling more than $8 billion allegedly invested across various stages. India has the world’s highest FinTech rate of adoption. India has 10,200 registered fintech startups in 2024 and is one of the fastest-growing FinTech industries in the world. The Indian FinTech business is expected to be worth $150 billion by 2025.
While Payments and Alternative Finance accounted for more than 90% of investment flows in 2015, there has been a major change toward a more fair distribution of investment across sectors since then, with InsurTechs, WealthTechs, and other areas garnering considerable attention. In India, around 17 Fintechs have been designated as ‘Unicorns.’
Insurance companies throughout the world, particularly in India, have a lot of opportunities to use technology to optimize distribution costs and provide algorithms for personalized pricing. A believer of the same, Varun Dua, in the digital era, is commonly acclaimed for redesigning India’s insurance narrative.
“If you really want to change the plumbing, you will have to start manufacturing it,” is what he says. Varun Dua, the founder and CEO of Acko, is a renowned serial fintech entrepreneur. He co-founded and served as the CEO of one of India’s top online insurance aggregators, Coverfox, before launching Acko in 2016. Investors invested $30 million into Acko even before the formal debut, based on Varun’s proven records.
Varun Dua Biography
Name
Varun Dua
Birth
1981
Nationality
Indian
Occupation
Co-founder and CEO of Acko, Co-founder of Coverfox & Glitterbug Technologies
Acko’s Founder and Chief Executive Officer, Varun Dua, has over 10+ years of experience in the insurance market, with a wide spectrum of services and responsibilities. He was in charge of marketing analytics for direct business acquisition and technology for effective customer service. Coverfox Insurance Broking Pvt. Ltd. was his company, and he was its CEO and Co-founder.
He completed his Bachelor’s degree from the University of Mumbai. Later, he pursued a master’s at a prominent business school in India called MICA. Known for his extensive experience in product management and business development, Varun Dua’s educational background reflects a solid foundation for his professional journey.
Varun Dua – Family
Varun Dua’s father’s name is Chander Mohan Dua. His mother is Rashmi Dua and he is married to Sapna Rana.
Varun Dua – Career
Varun Dua, the founder of Coverfox, an online insurance aggregation platform, followed the road less traveled in a startup climate where the mantra is “act rapidly and damage things.”
Varun worked as a Trainee at Leo Burnett Advertising for less than a year after graduating. He subsequently went on to work for Tata AIG Life Insurance and Franklin Templeton Investments as a marketing manager. Varun launched two prior companies before founding Coverfox in 2013, Glitterbug Technologies and Enser Communications.
One of the key motivations for founding Acko, according to Dua, was the awareness that there had been an open chance to use the World Wide Web to bring interesting ways of selling insurance products.
Despite the fact that Dua had just come into contact with insurance by chance, he was rapidly pulled into its world and learned everything there was to know about the market’s intricate inner workings. It wasn’t long before he had the desire to start his own business.
In his own words, “I started off not really clear about what I wanted to do, but I definitely didn’t want to do what I was doing.”
The firm takes a D2C strategy, using its web platform to market traditional insurance services. This makes underwriting and risk selection substantially easier. Acko, his company, also offers unique and bite-sized insurance solutions, including rider insurance, ticket cancellation, mobile and appliance protection, and more, in addition to vehicle, bike, and health insurance. Acko also touts partnerships with more than 15 key digital ecosystem firms, including Ola, RedBus, OYO, Zomato, Urban Company, HDB Financial Services, and others.
Varun Dua on the Future of Insurance
Varun Dua – Acko
Varun Dua – Co-founder and CEO of Acko
Acko’s overall motto, according to its website, is “Insurance made easy: Zero commission. Zero paperwork.” Acko ran a campaign with the phrase “Full Paisa Wasool” to make people aware. The term “complete value for money” refers to insurance providing complete value.
Insurance schemes are how Acko makes money. Furthermore, Acko’s digital-only approach removes the retail costs of building physical storefronts as well as a parasitic reliance on a distribution network, both of which are factors that competing insurance firms rely on heavily.
Insurers, according to the owner of Acko Insurance, Dua, are obligated to hire salespeople to reach out to clients and market their goods because they all essentially provide the same or comparable products.
“Our focus on creating customised solutions will create the demand we are looking for, thus eliminating the need to hard-sell and invest a lot on a distributing network,” he adds.
Mumbai-based Acko, founded by Varun Dua, features a variety of customer-friendly programs. The organization has received several five-star ratings and over 4.5 crore satisfied customers as a result of its customer-centric initiatives.
Acko reported an operating revenue of INR 1,334 crore in FY22, which grew to INR 1,758 crore in FY23 and further increased to INR 2,106 crore in FY24. However, the company faced losses during these years. It recorded a loss of INR 482 crore in FY22, which widened to INR 738.5 crore in FY23 before improving slightly to INR 670 crore in FY24.
They deliver outstanding customer service, and as a result, Acko has gained their clients’ confidence. Narayan Murthy and Accel are also behind Acko’s amazing growth. Acko underwrote a premium of INR 41.56 crore in September 2019. In comparison to 2018, the firm had a 6x increase. The premium was previously valued at INR 6.53 crore.
Customers were unable to visit the showrooms because of the pandemic. Automobile purchases made through digital means, on the other side, have increased considerably. When compared with the year 2021, Acko, a digital insurance provider, saw a stunning 120 percent increase in sales of automotive insurance contracts in the first quarter of FY22.
Whether it’s for our vehicle, bike, or ourselves, pre-purchased insurance nearly always comes in useful, if not proving to be a lifesaver. Unfortunately, not all insurance service providers are glad to embrace a 0% fee and serve their customers online, but Acko is, which is why Acko is swiftly gaining steam.
Acko is here to provide premium insurance to the Indians. And moreover, the Mumbai-based Acko is now a unicorn. In the IPL 2022, Acko General Insurance signed on as an associate sponsor for three teams: Gujarat Titans, Kolkata Knight Riders, and Lucknow Supergiants. Two of these teams are new to IPL, having made their debut in the 15th edition.
Varun Dua has made 5 investments with the latest investment made in infinyte.club on August 12, 2024.
Date
Company
Round
Round Amount
Lead Investor
Aug 12, 2024
infinyte.club
Seed Round
INR 302 million
–
Jun 25, 2024
Plus Gold
Seed Round
$1.2 million
–
Sep 2, 2021
dezerv.
Seed Round
$7 million
–
May 23, 2017
Acko
Seed Round
$30 million
No
Feb 21, 2016
Charcoal Eats
Seed Round
$150K
No
Varun Dua – Challenges Faced
A basic challenge with his journey in the insurance sector, according to Dua, has been a lack of trust, which has created a big obstacle in his way in the beginning. Because of the complexities of the products on the market, the buying procedure, and the claiming process, the trust gap is exacerbated.
Customers have always found the insurance claims procedure to be a lengthy, time-consuming, and frequently iterative process. He wants to improve the consumer experience all the way through the value chain.
Varun Dua – Shark Tank India
Varun Dua – Shark Tank India
In more ways than one, the first season of the show, Shark Tank India has been a blessing to ambitious entrepreneurs in India. For watchers, it has been a huge hit! For openers, the show has brought those entrepreneurs a lot of attention, if not money.
The exposure, along with lucrative investments from the sharks, has paid off for some chosen ones. The Sharks’ banter, which is the most amusing segment for the desi population, helps to make the program what it is. It undoubtedly adds to the enthusiasm and provides some excellent items on Indian television. In the popular show’s third season, Varun Dua was one of the sharks at that time.
This is what he wrote on his X account:
To be a “shark” today for me is a strange feeling. I wasn’t born with a silver spoon. And with my average grades, I wasn’t what you’d call type A either. There was nothing in my resume, my repertoire or my background which should lead to the path of starting out a business, that should become large. And yet, here I am. My journey building @ACKOIndia has been anything but straightforward which is why being on Shar40k Tank is so meaningful. There is immense opportunity for young entrepreneurs in right now, as we are on the verge of a techtonic shift in India and India’s ambitions. I’m looking forward to contributing in this new ocean of opportunities with some awesome entrepreneurs.
Varun Dua is the founder and CEO of Acko Insurance.
What are Varun Dua education qualifications?
Varun Dua completed his Bachelor’s degree from the University of Mumbai. Later, he pursued a master’s at Mudra Institute of Communications (MICA), Ahmedabad.
Does Amazon own Acko?
Amazon is not Acko’s owner. While Amazon has been a major investor in Acko since 2018, contributing to its funding rounds, Acko remains an independent company with its own board of directors and management team.
What is Varun Dua net worth?
Varun Dua’s estimated net worth as of 2024 is INR 107 crore.
Who is Varun Dua wife?
Sapna Rana is the wife of Varun Dua.
What is Varun Dua age?
Varun Dua was born in 1981. He is 43 years old.
What is Acko net worth?
Acko’s valuation after its last funding round was $1.4 billion.
Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations.
The Indian digital payments industry stands at ₹2,153 Tn i.e., ~961% of GDP (source: RedSeer report) as of 2022. Cashfree has rapidly grown in the country’s competitive environment to the point where it is now dominating the payment disbursals with more than 30% market share among payment processors. Founded by Akash Sinha and Reeju Dutta, Cashfree is a full-stack payments solution that helps Indian businesses accept and send money.
Know more about Cashfree’s business model, how it started, its funding and investors, growth, and more, in this post ahead.
Cashfree offers businesses the fastest and most seamless way to collect and disburse payments at scale. The company’s products include a payment gateway, payout processing, marketplace settlements, Cashgram, Subscriptions, bank account verification, UPI Stack, Instant Refunds, Global Payouts, and auto-collection via virtual bank accounts.
Cashgram is Cashfree’s innovative web link that allows users to provide account details and receive payments instantly from businesses. Cashfree is leading the way in payments innovation with faster settlements, advanced fast-refund solutions, and higher success rates on online transactions.
The company has introduced solutions like Instant Settlements on its payment gateway; recurring payments via Subscriptions; and a UPI stack with 15+ ready-to-use integrations for all business payment needs including collections, disbursals, and verifications using UPI infrastructure. Furthermore, Cashfree also has specific solutions tailored for NBFCs – Lending, Insurance, E-commerce, and Education verticals.
Since Cashfree’s inception in 2015, the company has built a strong presence among enterprises by innovating for experience, scale, and security. The payment industry is still seen as an evolving industry with its own challenges.
Cashfree – Payments Industry Details
The market for payment processing is robust in India. Payment processors use gateways to authorize direct payments across networks of online retailers, storefronts, credit cards, and individuals. That’s why Cashfree has rapidly grown in the country’s competitive environment to the point where it is now dominating payment disbursals with more than 30% market share among payment processors.
According to Statista, the Indian digital payments industry stands at $ 1,624.00 billion in 2024 and will grow at 16.35% CAGR to reach $3,463.00 billion by 2029. This growth will be driven by:
Strong use case of merchant payments across user cohorts
Government policies such as Jan Dhan Yojana, personal data protection bill along with the growth of MSMEs
High smartphone penetration indicates strong headroom for growth through banking and financial services collaborations
Cashfree – Founders and Team
Akash Sinha (CEO) and Reeju Dutta are the founders of Cashfree.
(L-R) Reeju Dutta, Akash Sinha (CEO) – Founders of Cashfree
Both Akash and Reeju were engineering graduates. Akash and Reeju were introduced to each other by common friends, people with whom they went to college with.
Akash Sinha (CEO & Co-founder, Cashfree)
Akash was working at Amazon writing software and leading a tech team. He has a technical background and has also worked at BankBazaar, a fintech company. With Akash’s experience as a programmer and product owner, at Cashfree, he focuses on the intersection of technology and business opportunities. As a community builder in the startup and entrepreneur space, he is excited and enthusiastic about cutting-edge technologies that can help businesses experiment, scale, and innovate faster.
Reeju Dutta (Co-founder, Cashfree)
Before co-founding Cashfree, Reeju was heading marketing at FabFurnish, an e-commerce retailer. He has a background in digital marketing. He has also worked at ZS Associates, a consulting firm, advising pharmaceutical companies on managing data. At Cashfree, he focuses on customer experience, sales & marketing, finance, and hiring. He is passionate about the growth of the startup ecosystem and enjoys interacting with businesses that offer innovative solutions.
In 2020, Cashfree strengthened its workforce to over 225 employees with hiring accelerated by the growth of e-commerce and digital payments sectors. By the end of 2021, Cashfree plans to further double its workforce to 400 team members, filling up critical positions as they gear up for the next wave of transformation. As the company builds agile digital payments products, it also plans to grow its sales and support teams.
In mid-2015, Akash Sinha (CEO and Co-founder of Cashfree) and Reeju Datta (Co-founder of Cashfree) were bouncing ideas off each other and looking for a co-founder to build on their ideas. Akash had an idea around an AI-based chat while Reeju was thinking of something around route logistics. They were brainstorming on what could work and what wouldn’t be based on the market situation. Since hyperlocal commerce was thriving in 2015, Akash came up with the idea of finding a way to make their payments cashless – which until then was cash-intensive. That’s how Cashfree was born.
Akash and Reeju started Cashfree in 2015 and initially, they were digitizing offline COD payments. Then in April 2016, they got into the online space completely. When they started, it was only Reeju and Akash, along with another member who handled sales.
The idea worked well with night restaurants where it was difficult to make cash payments at odd hours. As a beta version, they launched a mobile web product were after the placement of an order. The customer receives a link to input their card details or uses their wallet to make the online payment. Soon after, the delivery person would get an SMS saying that the payment had been received.
A few such merchants approached them to process the payments for their businesses via their website as well and that is when Akash and Reeju started developing an online payment gateway.
Cashfree – Startup Launch
Initially, Akash and Reeju started out by working with small restaurants in Bangalore. They were focused on night delivery restaurants, as it was a segment that required alternate options for cash payments. So, night delivery restaurants are where they found their very first users.
Cashfree – Mission and Vision
Cashfree’s mission is unwavering, which is “to enable online businesses to deploy payment solutions to innovate and scale.”
The short-term vision is to invest in next-gen payments as well as banking tech to make payments processing easier and more reliable. The long-term vision is to grow Cashfree to be the leader in the payments space in India and internationally, backed by a solid foundation of in-house technologies, tech-driven processes, and in-depth industry knowledge.
Akash Sinha, CEO & Co-founder, Cashfree said, “At Cashfree, we are working towards boosting India’s fintech ecosystem, as it is the backbone of Digital India and is a key problem-solver of the economy.”
Cashfree – Name, Tagline and Logo
“Trusted by enterprises Loved by developers”, goes the tagline of Cashfree.
Cashfree Logo
Cashfree – Product/Service and USP
Cashfree has built a comprehensive payment toolkit for small to large businesses in India. It has launched various products and solutions with six first-of-its-kind fintech innovations including Payouts, Instant Refunds, Cashgram, Pre-Authorization, Subscriptions, and Instant Settlements. Their products and solutions are aimed at making online payments easier and elevating customer experience through innovation and higher transaction success rates. The company’s products include a payment gateway, payout processing, marketplace settlements, Cashgram, Subscriptions, bank account verification, UPI Stack, Instant Refunds, Global Payouts, and auto-collection via virtual bank accounts.
Payouts: The first gateway with a bulk disbursal solution for domestic and international payments. Payouts perform bank transfers to any unified payments interface, wallet, or debit card with more than 100 payment options and support for 30+ foreign currencies. It can also verify accounts in real time.
Instant Refunds: Launched on September 4, 2019, this was the first-time instant refunds were available on the Cashfree payment gateway. Merchants can initiate partial or full refunds from the dashboard or via an API. It seamlessly integrates with Shopify and Magento refund flows.
Cashgram: COD orders providing instant refunds for the first time. Customers can send a Cashgram link to a user, who can specify a destination for payments or instant refunds.
Pre-authorization: Provides the ability to block funds temporarily and debit the full or partial amount upon fulfillment. Customers can save payment gateway charges on canceled orders and integrate with their enterprise resource planning software. Users get real-time tracking of transaction progress.
Subscriptions: Cashfree was one of the first gateways to offer recurring payments via the e-mandate payment service initiated by the Reserve Bank of India and the National Payments Corporation of India.
Instant Settlements: Cashfree delivered the industry-first and fastest instant bank settlements for payment collections (within 15 minutes).
Co-lend: The first completely automated escrow management solution for co-lending in India, called “Co-lend,” was introduced by Cashfree on February 7, 2023. It allows for quick disbursal with automatic reconciliation and a dashboard for managing numerous partnerships.
BNPL Plus: To help companies give their clients more inexpensive and flexible payment choices, the fintech platform Cashfree Payments has introduced ‘BNPL Plus’ in July, 2023.
UPI Plug-in solution: The UPI Plug-in was introduced by Cashfree Payments, an API banking firm, on September 14, 2023. It enables mobile-first businesses to accept UPI payments from clients without requiring them to leave the application.
Pivot from the Initial product offering
When Akash and Reeju reached out to businesses to partner with for their online cash-on-delivery needs, around 5-6 months down the line, merchants approached them for an online payment gateway (PG) service. That’s why they went on to build the payment gateway for them because both the products were kind of similar, though not the same.
It was easy for the founders to transition to an online payment gateway. When they started rolling out the PG, they soon realized that there was still a need for a modern payment gateway that offered services like simple API integration, high transaction success rates, full collection on all the payment modes. That is how they transitioned into an online payment aggregator as businesses (customers) asked for it.
Cashfree is a full-stack payments solution that helps Indian businesses accept and send money and is used by 3,00,000+ businesses for vendor payouts, wage payouts, bulk refunds, etc. The company makes a fee of anywhere between 1.75% and 3% of the value of the transaction as of year 2020.
Cashfree – Customer Retention Strategies
Cashfree has focused on building exceptional payment products and developing innovations for merchants to minimize pain points associated with various payment use cases. This has led to a lot of organic growth for the company, driven by word of mouth and inbound traffic.
The high success rates of Cashfree’s flagship products such as Payouts and Cashgram have led to the company winning the trust of their customers. This led to these same customers also adopting some of the company’s other products to simplify payments.
Many of the payment products built by Cashfree were a result of direct feedback from existing customers on their payment challenges. The company saw these challenges as opportunities to develop products that would add value to their customers. One of the payment innovations that was a direct outcome of customer feedback is Cashfree’s Instant Settlements cycle – where Cashfree enables merchants to get access to their funds in 15 minutes. Merchants can make use of the settled funds for disbursals to vendors and other partners even on bank holidays.
Cashfree – Challenges faced
In early 2015 when Akash and Reeju first started out Cashfree, they were making prototypes in AI chat and logistics, but it didn’t work out, as a lot of hyperlocal commerce companies were using COD and there was no way to pay digitally.
That’s how they came up with their idea to use digital payment modes such as credit cards, debit cards, and netbanking. They were able to sign up 200-300 offline stores in Bangalore. They started at the right time, tried figuring out online payment pain points and ways to solve them.
Cashfree – Marketing Strategies
One of Cashfree’s most successful marketing campaigns was for the launch of the company’s e-commerce product suite. Cashfree’s e-commerce payments platform offers merchants the best payment experience for mobile and UPI payments and allows them to collect customer payments, process refunds, pay sellers and do a lot more. Along with the regular rollout of press releases, digital marketing, email marketing, and more.
Cashfree also hosted a series of fireside chats and webinars with thought leaders in the e-commerce space as a knowledge-sharing platform. This series of sessions not only helped Cashfree reach out to thousands of businesses but also helped many entrepreneurs understand the finer points of running a successful e-commerce venture.
Cashfree has been profitable since its first year of operations and counts more than 50,000 businesses amongst its merchants including leading internet companies such as Cred, BigBasket, Zomato, HDFC Ergo, Ixigo, Acko, Zoomcar, and Delhivery, among others.
Cashfree’s solutions are used by over 10,000 e-commerce platforms including Nykaa, Furlenco, EaseMyTrip, Wakefit, Vero Moda among others. In 2020, Cashfree processed more than over 100 million transactions from e-commerce orders and expects to onboard 5,000 e-commerce companies by the end of the year.
Cashfree claims to process transactions worth $80 bn annually as of 2024. Furthermore, it has an over 50% market share among the payment processors. Besides, Cashfree helps 3,00,000businesses with a wide range of activities including payment collections, vendor payouts, wage payouts, bulk refunds, expense reimbursements, loyalty, and rewards. The Bengaluru-based fintech startup also boasts of an international presence in countries including the USA, Canada, and the UAE.
At the end of 2024, here are some growth highlights of Cashfree:
Cashfree Payments boasted of a 50% market share in Payouts, thereby becoming the leading disbursals solution provider in India
Cashfree received funds from SBI Bank, India’s largest lender, which invested in the company, thereby boosting the company’s operations and growth
Cashfree saw a 95% rise in the number of merchants, which helped the company increase its merchant sign-ups by 268%
It managed to process $40 Bn transactions annually
Cashfree successfully served 200+ Million bank accounts has grown beyond the startup status and has emerged as a bigger and better firm now
Cashfree is currently serving 3,00,000 merchants
The company successfully launched ‘Accounts’, which is designed to be a BaaS solution, which will help the neo-banks and fintech platforms integrate banking services into their products
The company helped grow its employee count by 2X and is aiming to to double its employee count by 2022 end
Cashfree also noticed an increasing amount of trust and credibility among its stakeholders due to the partnering of Cashfree with some of the leading brands including Dvara Solutions, Deskers, Zybra, Shipway, Shyplite, Shoptimize, Hylobiz, Syrow, and more. This list also included some of the leading internet companies like Cred, BigBasket, Zomato, HDFC Ergo, Ixigo, Acko, Zoomcar, Delhivery, and more.
Cashfree has made it possible for users and businesses to transact with ease within software platforms with the release of its payment solution as per the news report of March 6, 2024. All parties benefit from efficiency and ease as transactions happen directly without the need for external interfaces or redirects to the availability of more than 120 payment types.
Cashfree Financials
Cashfree Financials
FY23
FY24
Operating Revenue
INR 614 crore
INR 642.7 crore
Total Expenses
INR 750 crore
INR 779.4 crore
Profit/Loss
Loss of INR 133 crore
Loss of INR 135 crore
Cashfree Financials
Cashfree – Funding and Investors
The funding details of Cashfree are as follows –
Date
Stage
Amount
Investors
May 18, 2023
Debt Financing
–
Trifecta Capital Advisors
June 7, 2021
Debt Financing
–
SBI
November 24, 2020
Series B
USD 35.3 Mn
Apis Growth Fund II, Y Combinator
April 9, 2019
Series A
USD 5.5 Mn
Y Combinator, George Osborne, Vellayan Subbiah
August 21,2017
Pre Seed Round
USD 120K
Y Combinator
January 1, 2017
Seed Round
–
–
Cashfree has raised a total of $40.9 Million to date. Cashfree’s investors are – Y Combinator, George Osborne (former Chancellor of Exchequer of the UK), Vellayan Subbiah (former MD of Cholamandalam Investment), and APIS Growth Fund II.
Cashfree plans to use the latest round of series B funding for research & development and for creating new product lines. The company will strengthen its team in India and expand into some of the emerging markets.
The investments have supported Cashfree’s ambitious growth plans including launching and rolling out new products. The company introduced Global Payouts which enables it to offer fintech, e-commerce marketplaces, logistics platforms, remote staffing platforms, etc. based outside India, instant, simple and cost-efficient rails for bulk cross-border money transfers to India.
International businesses can use Cashfree’s solution without having to set up a place of business in India. Cashfree also launched a payments toolkit for e-commerce stores and marketplaces in India. With a host of specific solutions, this product suite enables e-commerce businesses to collect payments on the website, mobile app, or any social media channel using Cashfree’s payment gateway, and to process partial or full refunds, facilitate seller payouts, split payments with multiple sellers and affiliate partners, and more.
Cashfree – Partnership
Cashfree has partnered with many companies some of the prominent partnerships are:
Multi-Partner Cross-Border Payment Launch
Swiggy, Nykaa, BookMyShow, Zepto, and others have partnered with Cashfree Payments to enable cross-border transactions. With RBI’s license for cross-border payments, Cashfree has launched a pilot program allowing international customers to pay for services in India.
Shopify
In order to offer onsite card payments to Shopify’s Indian merchants, Cashfree Payments has partnered with the Canadian e-commerce platform in September, 2023.
Yes Bank
Together with Yes Bank, Cashfree Payments is now able to provide exporters who have accounts there with “Global Collections,” an international collection service on May 3, 2023.
Mobikwik
In order to provide its consumers with the convenience of interest-free credit at their fingertips, MobiKwik announced its partnership with Cashfree Payments on August 31, 2023, a top provider of payments and API banking services. “ZIP Pay Later” will be integrated with Cashfree Payments’ Payment Gateway.
AutoPay on QR
‘AutoPay on QR’ has been launched by Cashfree Payments on September 12, 2023 a provider of payment and API banking solutions, in partnership with National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).
Cashfree – Acquistion
Cashfree acquired two companies. The most recent acquisition is of Zecpe on February 28, 2023.
Company Name
Date
Amount
Zecpe
Feb 28, 2023
–
Telr
Nov 30, 2021
$15M
The company has exited Telr as per various news reports.
Cashfree – Investments
Cashfree has made a strategic investment in Telr. The company invested 15 mn in the UAE-based payment gateway on November 30, 2021. This will further allow the company to expand its international footprints, which will start from the MENA region.
Cashfree – Competitors
Payu, Paytm, CCAvenue are some of the top competitors of Cashfree.
During a reorganization process, Cashfree has laid off up to 100 workers on January, 2023. In recent years, the SBI-backed company doesn’t appear to have conducted any layoffs until now.
Cashfree – Recognition and Achievements
Akash Sinha, CEO, and Co-Founder, Cashfree was listed in Forbes 30 under 30 2021
Cashfree secured as the 5th fastest growing technology company in Deloitte Technology Fast 50 India 2020
Cashfree – Future Plans
Cashfree estimates 45,000 to 50,000 merchant leads per month and is optimistic in its continued development trajectory. With the goal of becoming profitable again by the first quarter of FY25, the company intends to improve customer satisfaction and service offerings as per news report of January, 2024.
This entails broadening the range of services offered, making infrastructural investments in technology, breaking into untapped markets, putting the needs of the client first, and developing clever alliances. These calculated actions highlight Cashfree’s dedication to maintaining its position as the market leader in payment solutions and maximizing value for all parties involved.
Cashfree – FAQs
Who founded Cashfree?
Akash Sinha (CEO) and Reeju Dutta are the founders of Cashfree.
How does Cashfree make money?
Cashfree charges a fee of anywhere between 1.75% and 3% of the value of the transaction.
How much funding has Cashfree raised?
Cashfree has raised a total of $40.9 Mn to date. Its recent funding was led by Trifecta Capital Advisors as a Debt Financing round.
What is Cashfree?
Cashfree is a full-stack payments solution. It helps Indian businesses accept and send money. It offers businesses the fastest and most seamless way to collect and disburse payments at scale.
How much is Cashfree’s Operating Revenue?
Cashfree operating revenue is around INR 642.7 crores in FY24 and a Loss of INR 135 crore.
Is Cashfree free?
NO. Cashfree charges a fee of anywhere between 1.75% and 3% of the value of the transaction.
Ashneer Grover was the Managing Director and Co-founder of BharatPe, until February 28, 2022, when he had to resign and renounce his positions in the company. He co-founded the company along with Shashvat Nakrani in 2018. Within four years, they have turned BharatPe into one of the largest used payment apps in India. BharatPe founder Ashneer Grover was also seen on the judging panel of the Shark Tank India reality show. His net worth is around INR 700 crore.
Though Ashneer Grover had a good start in terms of education, career, and business, he also faced multiple challenges in his entrepreneurial journey. This article discusses the complete story of Ashneer Grover right from his early life, achievements, history, and career to the controversies and challenges faced by him recently.
Ashneer Grover was born in Delhi on June 14, 1982. His father was a Chartered Accountant and his mother was a teacher. As his parents were in good professions, the family was doing well. He got graduated from well-reputed institutes like IIT, and IIM.
Ashneer Grover was married to Madhuri Jain Grover. She’s an entrepreneur and owns a furnishing business named Mauve and Brown in Delhi. Ashneer Grover’s wife, Madhuri Grover had taken care of HR, finance, and other internal operations and headed the Controls at BharatPe before she was declared to be one of the employees who were involved in financial fraud and was eventually terminated by the Board. The couple has two children.
Ashneer Grover – Education
Ashneer Grover completed his schooling in Delhi. He then graduated B.Tech from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT). During his time at IIT Delhi, he was selected for a student exchange program with the National Institute of Applied Sciences, also known as INSA Lyon, in France. It is one of the largest and finest engineering schools in Europe.
He moved to INSA Lyon in 2002 with a scholarship of €6,000 from the French Embassy. After graduating from IIT, Grover went to the Indian Institute of Management (IIM) Ahmedabad for his MBA in Finance. He graduated from the IIM in 2006.
Ashneer Grover – Initial Career
Kotak Finance Banking selected Ashneer Grover as the Vice President through campus placements from IIM. He has been a part of Kotak for almost 7 years since 2006.
In mid-2013, Ashneer joined American Express (AmEx), a payment card services company, and worked for two years. During his tenure, Grover also famously led some startup investments for the card network of India. The Series B investment in Mobikwik came on behalf of American Express when Grover was still there. He was designated as the Director of Corporate Development in AmEx.
After leaving American Express in 2015, Ashneer became the Chief Financial Officer at Grofers, a startup founded by his IIT Delhi classmate Albinder Dhindsa. However, Grover left the company in 2017 because he didn’t get the ESOP options there that were promised to him earlier. The company is now called Blinkit.
Later in 2017, PC Jeweller Ltd. took Ashneer as the Head of New Business, where he worked for exactly a year. Ashneer Grover established his own company BharatPe at a very young age.
After accumulating 12 years of experience from multiple jobs, Ashneer Grover decided to start his own business. His experience as the head of business development and payments at PC Jeweller sparked the idea of starting a payments company. Ashneer eventually joined hands with Shashvat Nakrani to establish BharatPe in 2018.
Together they built the fintech company from scratch and added several services to its core operation. Today, BharatPe offers UPI Payments, QR codes for transactions, POS machines for card payments, an investment and loan app called 12% Club, and digital gold transactions.
When BharatPe was a $30 million company, Ashneer claimed that he received an offer of $50 million from Google Pay, but he refused to materialize a deal with the latter, as per one of his statements on the show Shark Tank India. Grover later added that he knew that he was meant for something big, which all entrepreneurs, founders, and CEOs to be, should aim for, and BharatPe was last valued at around $3 billion.
They also got approval from the RBI for small business financing in collaboration with Centrum Financial Services Ltd. By offering diverse services, Ashneer Grover made BharatPe one of the most used payment apps in the country. However, he had to retire after numerous rounds of controversies thrown at him and allegations surrounding him due to the financial irregularities associated with him, which were noticed by the company’s board. Ashneer Grover tendered his resignation from BharatPe on February 28, 2022, and boasted of still being recognized as the single largest individual shareholder of the BharatPe company.
In a speech that Ashneer Grover gave at the Lovely Professional University on April 29, 2022, where he was invited as a guest speaker, Ashneer shared an insight into how businesses operate and all the things that need to be kept in mind while diving into a new venture. Speaking about the same, he disclosed one such incident, after starting BharatPe, when he sought to make it popular overnight. He had a total of Rs 100 crore in his bank account, but he wanted to sign up Salman Khan. The Bollywood actor charged close to Rs 7.5 crore. However, unsure of whether he could do that, Ashneer asked Salman to reconsider his fees. Salman’s manager also asked him “Aap bhindi kharidne aaye ho kya, kitni mandwali karoge?”. However, at last, Salman reconsidered the charge, and came down to Rs 4.5 crore, thereby becoming the brand ambassador of BharatPe in 2019.
Ashneer Grover – Shark Tank India
Ashneer Grover was a judge on the first season of Shark Tank India and became very popular. However, he was removed after a fallout with his former company, BharatPe, which he had helped start. Despite this, his popularity remained strong, with many fans still hoping he would return to the show in later seasons.
Ashneer Grover – Starting up again with the Unicorn Dreams
Ashneer Grover, as per the reports dated June 16, 2022, was looking to find another startup, for which he will likely be raising around $200-300 mn. The former Co-founder and MD of BharatPe is currently in the US and in talks with the US-based family offices and other private equity offshore players to raise the funding required. Sources said that Grover might also start the business with some of his own money and will eventually sell a part of his BharatPe stakes or raise funding by issuing a stake in the new company. People also added that Grover’s 8.5% stake is now valued at around $3 bn, and there are also buyers for the stake.
The company or the sector that Ashneer Grover will be inclined to start with his new venture was not confirmed, when last reported in June 2022. However, the former BharatPe founder stated on his 40th birthday that he will be re-entering the world of business and also has plans to build another “unicorn”.
Fast forward to July 9, 2022, the startup has already been formed by Ashneer and his wife Madhuri Jain Grover, and is called Third Unicorn Pvt Ltd., according to the Tofler data. The startup, which has reportedly launched on July 6, 2022, will have both Ashneer Grover and his wife as Directors. The total paid-up capital and the authorized share capital have been revealed as Rs 10 lakh and Rs 20 lakh respectively.
Ashneer Grover – Controversies and Challenges Faced
BharatPe, as a company, got into a controversy when it labeled itself as nationalistic and its competitors as Non-Indian companies. The company issued pamphlets citing such details to the public. So the competitors filed a lawsuit against BharatPe and reported the same to the RBI.
Another controversy arose when PhonePe and BharatPe fought for the word ‘Pe’ in their respective names. PhonePe has filed a case against the latter in the Delhi High Court. It was later disposed of by the same.
A major controversy faced by Ashneer Grover was about an audio clip leaked on Twitter. It is claimed that Grover used inappropriate language and threatened a Kotak employee over an issue of not securing Nykaa’s IPO shares. Before this issue could be settled, the company’s board raised accusations against Ashneer and his wife. The board accused them of initiating fraudulent transactions against non-existing vendors. They also reported irregularities in invoices. The audio issue forced him to stay away from the company and take a temporary leave for three months. After the discovery of the financial irregularities, the board demanded the permanent exit of Ashneer Grover from the company. Grover then responded that he was happy to leave his role in BharathPe but would always stay as a shareholder and a founder. With pressure mounting up on Ashneer Grover to leave BharatPe, he had strongly criticized the CEO Suhail Sameer. He said that Sameer manipulated and arm-twisted him to exit the company. Grover had also demanded a huge compensation worth around Rs. 4000 crores for his withdrawal from BharatPe. He said that he has 9.5% stakes, which would be worth around the same amount, but it’s been reported that the board is unlikely to agree with it.
Ashneer Grover had made an emergency arbitration plea to the SIAC but that was tossed off by the Singapore International Arbitration Centre. He made everyone believe that the probe by the board was unethical, but he failed. Grover also demanded his buyback before exiting the company, but the BharatPe investors declined the same. According to the BharatPe Board, Grover received the agenda of the company’s board meeting on February 28, 2022, which will also include the PWC report on the conduct of Grover where the actions were taken against him, will also be discussed, and it was on the same day that Ashneer Grover resigned. Grover resigned with immediate effect on 28th February but claimed that he would still be standing as the single largest shareholder of the company after mentioning that he and his family were “vilified” and forced to resign. On 30th September 2024, BharatPe and Ashneer Grover settled ending their long legal battle and public disputes. As per the settlement, Grover will no longer be associated with the company, and the legal case against him has been dropped. As part of the deal, Grover will also give up his shareholding in the company.
Ashneer Grover and Salman Khan
Ashneer Grover recently appeared on Bigg Boss 18 on 18 November 2024, where host Bollywood actor Salman Khan called him out for his past comments and accused him of “doglapan.” Salman also mentioned not remembering any previous meetings with Ashneer. In response, Ashneer praised Salman as a “great host” and said he was sure the episode got great TRP.
Conclusion
The story of Ashneer Grover enunciates that however successful you are, problems and challenges are part and parcel of life. The way you overcome them has the power to define who you are.
Despite the accusations made against him by the board, one can never disagree with the effort and time Ashneer Grover invested in the growth of BharatPe. The Ashneer Grover controversy undoubtedly kept the startup ecosystem, BharatPe Board, the media, entrepreneurs, business professionals, and others engaged for over 2 months, but what hooks all of us right in is what Grover next plans to do. A man of his caliber would certainly have some plans in mind for the startup ecosystem too along with his own personal gains.
FAQs
Who is Ashneer Grover?
Ashneer Grover is the former co-founder, MD, and CEO of BharatPe.
Who is the CEO of BharatPe?
Suhail Sameer has been the CEO of the company since August 2020.
Is Asheer Grover from IIT?
Ashneer Grover is from IIT Delhi.
How Ashneer Grover became rich?
Ashneer Grover became rich by co-founding BharatPe, a fintech company that helps small businesses accept digital payments. The company grew quickly and became valuable, making Grover a wealthy entrepreneur. He also earned money through investments and his role on Shark Tank India.
Which state is Ashneer Grover from?
If you are wondering Ashneer Grover is from which state, then you should know that the Former Founder and MD of BharatPe was born in Delhi.
What is Ashneer Grover education?
He graduated B.Tech from IIT Delhi and MBA in Finance from IIM Ahmedabad.
What is Ashneer Grover age?
Ashneer Grover was born on 14 June 1982. He is 42 years old.
What is the issue with BharatPe’s board and Ashneer Grover?
The board accused Grover and his wife of making fraudulent transactions and irregular maintenance of invoices.
Which was Ashneer Grover first startup?
Ashneer Grover’s first startup was BharatPe, a fintech company that he co-founded in 2018.
What is Ashneer Grover net worth?
BharatPe founder Ashneer Grover’s net worth is around INR 900 crore as of 2024.
What are Ashneer Grover companies funded by him?
Some of the major investments that Ashneer Grover made were in:
In a world where the internet connects people, places, and devices, data is the pulse of modern life. In this age of automation, where speed and accuracy are paramount, the ability to handle massive data flows efficiently is no longer a luxury—it’s a necessity. The demand for real-time analysis, risk management, and pricing solutions has skyrocketed, pushing tech companies to develop smarter, more agile platforms. That’s where Perfios comes into play, offering a suite of solutions simplifying this complexity for global financial institutions. With fresh investment, Perfios has become the second unicorn of 2024, crossing the $1 billion valuation mark.
Founded in 2008, Perfios is a platform that excels in extracting, categorizing, and analyzing thousands of data types in real time. This platform is built to adapt, learn, and grow the businesses they support. Whether it’s decoding encrypted traffic or handling data from various entities across geographies, Perfios brings clarity to complexity.
Perfios is proud to say that they’ve been a trusted partner to over a million users, offering them secure, agile, and scalable solutions that transform their digital journeys. A track record of zero security incidents speaks volumes about Perfios’ commitment to privacy and data security.
Perfios – Industry
The fintech industry is booming, and India is leading the charge as one of the fastest-growing markets globally. Valued at $584 billion in 2022, the Indian fintech market is expected to soar to $1.5 trillion by 2025. Within that, the digital lending sector alone was worth $270 billion in 2022 and is projected to hit INR 4.5-5 trillion by 2028.
Meanwhile, the SaaS market has seen explosive growth over the past decade, with no signs of slowing down. Globally, it’s expected to reach $307.3 billion by 2026 and an astounding $908.21 billion by 2030. The surge is fueled by the need for remote work solutions, the rise of cloud-based technologies, and the demand for scalable, cost-efficient software.
What’s more, SaaS has now evolved to offer a strong line of defense against security threats like data breaches, thanks to its enterprise-level security measures and built-in disaster recovery protocols.
Coming a long way since their early days in the financial sector, Perfios now proudly serves over 1000 lenders in India—including all of the top 10 banks, along with a majority of NBFCs and Fintechs. Their success in India has set the stage for global expansion, where their customizable ML algorithms seamlessly adapt to any country’s statement formats, making data decisions a breeze. They’ve tailored their processes to fit the specific needs of each region and client, ensuring accuracy and efficiency. As India’s digital landscape continues to boom, with projections of the digital signature market growing at an impressive CAGR of 27.5% by 2026, they’re excited about the future and ready to ride this wave of growth.
Perfios – Founders and Team
V.R. Govindarajan and Debashish Chakraborty founded the company in 2008.
V.R. Govindarajan (GOVI)
V.R. Govindarajan – Co-founder and Executive Chairman of Perfios
Govi, Perfios’ co-founder and Executive Chairman, is the driving force behind the vision of making them the most trusted name in personal finance software in India. With over 32 years of experience in the IT industry across the US and India, he’s no stranger to innovation. Before Perfios, Govi co-founded Aztecsoft, a pioneer in Offshore Product Development, and has had stints at tech giants like Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) and IBM, specializing in database technology. Armed with an M.S. in Computer Science from Massachusetts University and a B.E. in Electrical and Electronics from IISc Bangalore, Govi stays actively involved in the tech community, frequently speaking at both Indian and international conferences.
Debashish Chakraborty is the Co-Founder and Board Member of Perfios. Chakraborty brings great experience to his role, having spent 22 years in the software industry. After completing his B.Tech at IIT Kharagpur and M.Tech at IIT Kanpur, he dove into a career that took him from optimizing compilers at Wipro to pioneering software frameworks and application servers at Aztec.
In the early days at Wipro, he worked on optimizing compilers, a market boosted by limited foreign competition due to government policies. Later, he joined IBM India, where he rotated between the IBM T.J. Watson and Almaden Research Labs, focusing on device drivers and database technologies. By 1997, he joined Govi as one of the founding members at Aztec, where he thrived as an architect, creating frameworks for developers.
At Perfios, Mr. Chakraborty leads the team in building the company’s innovative product line.
Sabyasachi Goswami
Sabyasachi Goswami – CEO of Perfios
Sabyasachi Goswami is the CEO of Perfios. With over 20 years in financial services, fintech, and product technology, Mr. Sabyasachi Goswami brings expertise in P&L management, business development, business strategy, and product development. He is an alumnus of Symbiosis Institute of Management Studies and an executive professional LEAD graduate from Stanford Graduate School of Business. Sabyasachi has led strategic roles in Retail and SME Banking, overseeing major business acquisitions and private equity investments.
His strengths in enterprise sales, consultative selling, and relationship-building have driven significant business growth. Known for launching new products, assessing risks, and executing marketing strategies, he has consistently met market targets. Dedicated to leadership development, he nurtures future leaders, emphasizes an entrepreneurial mindset, and excels in collaboration, earning multiple awards for his achievements.
Rajesh Kini
Rajesh Kini – CFO of Perfios
Perfios has appointed Rajesh Kini as its Chief Financial Officer! He served as CFO of Infosys’ product subsidiary and led their Corporate Accounting Group. With over 25 years of financial leadership experience, Rajesh is well-equipped to align with Perfios’ vision of sustainable growth. He has a strong track record in optimizing financial performance, improving margins, and enhancing operational efficiency.
A Chartered Accountant, Rajesh holds a bachelor’s degree in commerce from St. Joseph College of Commerce, Bangalore. His expertise will be key in guiding Perfios through its global expansion.
Perfios – Startup Story
Perfios is the brainchild of Mr. VR Govindarajan and Mr. Debasish Chakraborty, who launched the company back in 2008 with a shared vision for simplifying financial management. Govindarajan initially served as CEO, while Chakraborty, a computer science graduate from IIT Kanpur, brought his tech expertise, and Santosh contributed his industry insights. They envisioned Perfios as a “Personal Finance One Stop,” helping individuals track and manage their finances—hence the name Perfios.
As they dug deeper into the market, the co-founders recognized a greater opportunity within the B2B space. Pivoting in 2013, they channeled their expertise into developing solutions for banks and financial institutions, transitioning Perfios into a sophisticated B2B software provider. By keeping the team lean and relying solely on angel investors, they prioritized impactful, innovative tools over rapid scaling.
Perfios saw some key leadership changes over the years. In August 2022, Govindarajan was made executive chairman, and a senior leader within Perfios, Goswami, stepped in as CEO. By 2023, Chakraborty stepped back from his role as CTO, making room for Sumit Nigam from Tata Digital. While Govindarajan and Chakraborty continue as board members, Santosh is no longer a part of Perfios.
By 2014, Perfios had developed technology to process various document formats like PDFs, turning them into structured data for companies to use efficiently. This innovation paved the way for Perfios Insights, a comprehensive suite that enables banks and lenders to verify applicants’ income and employment details—a critical step for loan and credit approvals. The strategic shift cemented Perfios as a trusted partner for financial institutions, providing smart, reliable solutions tailored to the industry’s needs.
Perfios – Mission and Vision
At Perfios Software Solutions, theirmission is to create an ecosystem where every financial decision is powered by real-time data. They are dedicated to building an exceptional suite of products tailored to their expertise and geographic focus. From improving security and legal compliance to reducing errors and promoting sustainability, they ensure seamless integration of financial services into their customers’ everyday lives. Perfios is not just reshaping how money is managed; they’re simplifying it—making transactions easier, more secure, and incredibly convenient. Understanding and meeting customer preferences is at the heart of everything Perfios does, helping them thrive in the highly competitive financial landscape.
Perfios – Name, Tagline and Logo
Perfios Tagline – Lead/Leap
Perfios’ logo, under the “Lead/Leap” positioning, symbolizes its evolution into a global tech platform, supporting the entire customer lifecycle from onboarding to underwriting. The flame arrow reflects progress, innovation, and focused energy, highlighting Perfios’ mission to drive financial inclusion for billions. This identity underscores their commitment to building institutions and spreading expertise and impact.
Perfios’ new brand identity, “Lead/Leap,” reflects bold steps and trailblazing innovation. It’s all about a forward-thinking attitude, summed up as “leading with brilliance, pushing beyond boundaries.”
Perfios – Business Model
Perfios kicked off its journey by launching the first cloud-hosted, fully automated Personal Finance Management solutions. They then went on to build the Perfios data platform, which remains unmatched in its scope and capability. Additionally, their platform leverages cutting-edge machine learning techniques to provide deep data analysis tailored to each customer’s needs, delivering reports that are uniquely customized. Privacy and security are core to their design philosophy; where they ensure that no Personally Identifiable Information or account details are stored, keeping their customers’ data safe and secure. Perfios’ lead generation taps into data from around 4 crore MCA and non-MCA registered entities, allowing for large-scale lead generation and effective lead qualification for B2B businesses. How?
Relying only on inbound leads and existing connections can slow down how well your new products catch on in the market. Whereas, outbound lead generation means reaching out to potential customers who may not know about your product yet. It involves making calls or sending messages to spark interest and build a strong sales pipeline.
Here, you might end up pitching to people who aren’t that interested, no matter how long you spend on it. That’s where focused outbound lead generation with Perfios comes in handy. It’s a great way to get higher conversions faster.
Perfios – Revenue Model
Consumer Lending Solutions: Customizable, plug-and-play solutions for income and employment verification. Automates credit assessment and decision-making for financial institutions and lenders.
SME Lending: Tools to evaluate the financial health of SMEs and corporates seeking credit. Assesses creditworthiness, and payment capacity and identifies potential lending risks.
Wealth Management: A leading personal finance management app that consolidates financial information into a single dashboard. Enables financial institutions to offer targeted advice and cross/upsell products, and helps customers achieve their financial goals.
Account Aggregator: Solutions that aggregate and analyze both structured and unstructured data, providing deep analytics and insights.
Specified Solutions: Specialized tools for digital transformation in lending processes. Includes InDigize, an intelligent solution that speeds up the processing of unstructured data and eliminates slow, error-prone manual tasks. Additionally, Perfios generates revenue through multiple streams, including software coding and maintenance services, as well as license and subscription fees.
Perfios Financials
Perfios Financials
FY22
FY23
FY24
Operating Revenue
INR 136 crore
INR 407 crore
INR 557.8 crore
Total Expenses
INR 156 crore
INR 386 crore
INR 495.5 crore
Profit/Loss
Loss of INR 16.8 crore
Profit of INR 7.8 crore
Profit of INR 71.67 crore
Perfios Financials FY24
Perfios’ operating revenue grew by 199% from INR 136 crore in FY22 to INR 407 crore in FY23. Total expenses increased by 147%, rising from INR 156 crore to INR 386 crore. The company moved from a loss of INR 16.8 crore in FY22 to a profit of INR 7.8 crore in FY23, marking a significant financial turnaround.
In FY24, Perfios’ operating revenue increased to INR 557.8 crore, up 37% from INR 407 crore in FY23. Total expenses also saw an increase of about 28.3%, reaching INR 495.5 crore in FY24 from INR 386.4 crore in FY23. Perfios’ profit after tax (PAT) saw an 820% increase to INR 71.67 crore in FY24 from INR 7.8 crore in FY23.
Perfios – Challenges Faced
At Perfios, a few big challenges have to be dealt with as they work to stay ahead in the financial tech game. One of their main hurdles is figuring out whether to team up with just one lender or go for multiple partnerships. Sticking with a single lender might limit their growth because it narrows their potential borrower pool. But if they partner with several lenders, they get more chances for business, although it comes with its own set of problems.
The integration process with multiple lenders can be tricky. They tackle tech issues like security, data management, and making sure their systems work well together. Ensuring data safety is a big deal, so they have to use strong encryption and set up solid network security. Plus, the whole integration process takes a lot of time and requires them to handle regulatory requirements and manage resources carefully.
Perfios – Funding and Investors
Perfios Software Solutions has raised a total of $441.2 million in funding over 7 rounds. Their latest funding was raised on Mar 13, 2024, from a Series D round. Perfios has caught the attention of five key investors: Warburg Pincus is Perfios’ largest shareholder with a 41% stake, while Bessemer holds 32.1%, showing strong investor confidence. Teachers’ Venture Growth (Darius Vakil, Deepak Dara, and Kelvin Yu) and Kedaara Capital are the latest to back them.
Their latest funding boost of $229 million came from a Series D round in March 2024, which is keeping them well-equipped to keep growing!
Announced Date
Funding Round
Amount
Investors
March 13, 2024
Series D
$78.84 million
Teachers’ Venture Growth
September 11, 2023
Series D
$229 million
Kedaara Capital
September 11, 2023
Secondary Market
–
Kedaara Capital
October 18, 2022
Debt Financing
$5.98 million
Stride Ventures
February 25, 2022
Series C
$70 million
Bessemer Venture Partners, Warburg Pincus
November 19, 2019
Series B
$50 million
Bessemer Venture Partners, Warburg Pincus
April 4, 2017
Series A
$6.1 million
Bessemer Venture Partners
Perfios – Mergers and Acquisitions
Perfios acquired Chennai-based Fego.ai, bringing in their 30-member team. Co-founders S. Kumar Srivatsan and S. Kumar Srikanthan joined Perfios to lead product and strategy, respectively.
They also snapped up Karza Technologies, a banking and financial intelligence solution provider.
Perfios – Growth
Perfios is on a serious growth journey! Today, Perfios has grown to become the largest SaaS-based B2B fintech software company in India, serving over 800 financial institutions with a product suite of more than 75 solutions across 18 countries, including Southeast Asia, the Middle East, APAC, and MENA regions.
In FY22, the company reported $17.5 million in revenue and has maintained profitability for the past five years. According to Goswami, Perfios is actively exploring inorganic growth opportunities to expand into new verticals and geographies and is open to raising future VC funding to support acquisitions. To date, it has secured $452 million in funding from top investors like Warburg Pincus and Bessemer Venture Partners.
With plans to supercharge their tech stack, they’re ready to transform the entire customer experience across banking, insurance, and embedded commerce. Backed by TVG’s investment, Perfios is gearing up for even bigger things ahead, taking their international growth to the next level.
Powers 90% of India’s financial institutions, handling 8.2 billion data points and 1.7 billion transactions yearly. Strong data capabilities helped major Indian banks offer same-day loans and instant approvals.
Expanding into insurance (fraud detection) and HR tech (background verification) sectors with AI-powered solutions.
Named “Best Fintech in Value Added Services” by the BT-KPMG jury.Disruptive Innovation Award for their Health Claims Analysis Solution and PerSieve at Elets Insurance Innovation in Mumbai.
Deloitte Fast 50 Award winner in the FinTech category.
Named Best Lending Tech Initiative of the Year at the ETBSFI Excellence Awards.
Perfios – Competitors
Some of Perfios’ key competitors with their market share are as below:
QuickBooks with 45.24%
NetSuite with 10.53%
Cognos with 6.98% market share
Perfios – Future Plans
Perfios is constantly upgrading its smart Document Processing platform with fresh machine learning models to handle all kinds of financial documents and spot fraud. As a B2B SaaS company in the BFSI sector, their cutting-edge decision-making solutions help make real-time decisions for everything from small transactions to major financial moves.
They’ve been growing steadily and plan to use this investment to boost digital transformation for their partners.
Focused on financial inclusion, Perfios aims to provide access to financial services for billions globally.
Perfios processes 1.7 billion transactions annually and handles $36 billion in assets under management, delivering 8.2 billion data points to banks and financial institutions every year!
FAQs
What is Perfios?
Perfios is a platform that excels in extracting, categorizing, and analyzing thousands of data types in real-time. This platform is built to adapt, learn, and grow the businesses they support.
Who is the founder of Perfios?
V.R. Govindarajan and Debashish Chakraborty founded the company in 2008.
Is Perfios a Unicorn company?
Yes, Perfios is the second unicorn of 2024 with a $1 billion valuation.
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A new restaurant at the corner of the lane, online offers, sale season, and food applications make life easy by delivering in your footsteps; all of these are so tempting. With over a hundred reasons to spend, one might get concerned about the monthly expenditure. It is cumbersome to keep an account of our expenses in this life of hustle and bustle, but an application like Moneyview, which helps in monitoring day-to-day finances, is the answer to all our money-related issues.
Moneyview was launched in 2014 by two IIT friends, Sanjay Aggarwal and Puneet Agarwal. Moneyview caters to the user with personal finance management, to keep a check on everyday finances. Be it; electricity bills, or travel expenditures, it has a record of cash expenses and regularly reminds the users of payments that are due. Not only this, but Moneyview also provides loans. What more do we need from an application?
Moneyview has joined the unicorn club with a valuation exceeding $1 billion on 12 September 2024. After the latest allotment, its valuation has surged to INR 10,086 crore ($1.2 billion), marking a notable increase from its $900 million valuation in December 2022.
This article is all about this interesting startup that is helping millions of users manage their expenses and live a life of financial discipline.
Struggling with your monthly budget? Look no further. Moneyview is here to keep you sorted about your expenses. Moneyview is a personal money manager and expense manager app that focuses on making financial management simple, smart, and secure; thereby, enabling end-consumers to manage their day-to-day expenses and finances in a better way.
Founded in 2014, Moneyview is a versatile personal money manager app, which offers a snapshot of all your finances. It scans texts related to your bank accounts and spending on your mobile phones and gives you a well-organized view of your expenses. It also has a bill tracker, which ensures that you never miss a payment deadline. Recently they have also moved on to giving personal loans to the users.
According to the co-founders, Moneyview is an application designed to give you a single view of what’s happening with your money. It tracks all the daily expenses by sifting through the debit/credit card messages received from the bank on your phone. Thus, letting you know your expenditure on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis. Moreover, it tries to understand your spending pattern and reminds you to pay your bills on time. Unlike other apps, Moneyview organizes all the data through SMSs, without one having to manually segregate them.
Since 2016, Moneyview comes in 6 local languages, namely Hindi, Gujarati, Bengali, Tamil, Telugu, and Kannada. The main reason to have local languages is to be able to fully solve the users’ problems. Currently serving more than 10 million users, Moneyview assures to have a security system like the best banks in the country. The company uses personal client information only to provide a better experience. The information is encrypted which helps in avoiding any data loss or misuse.
The Moneyview App Has Three Big Features
The first feature gives the consumers a single view of where their money is. It lists out all the financial accounts that one has like bank accounts, credit card accounts, loan accounts, etc. Get a graphical view of your ‘Available to spend’ before you hit your budget.
The second features tell you where your money is going. How you are spending your money? It also auto-categorizes your spending; it assembles facts like out of 50,000 bucks you have spent so much on food, rent, and shopping.
The third feature is the app is integrated with tools for users to start making better financial decisions. The first tool is a budget management tool. It enables real-time budget management. You can set up your budget for a particular month and at any given point in time the app will tell you how much more you can spend in the remainder of the month.
Also, the company assures that the Moneyview app is safe. It uses 256-bit data encryption for data management, to keep the customer data safe and secure. Besides, it is important to know that the app decodes only the transaction-related messages on your phone, and not your OTP or other personal information.
Technological Tools
Technology is the backbone and the key facilitator in the app’s offerings. Moneyview makes use of sophisticated natural language processing and information retrieval techniques to create intelligent norms. These are then utilized by the app to produce a very accurate picture of the users’ financial data in a way that they can simply and effortlessly understand. Therefore, it uses its patent technology that systematizes the data from these messages to deliver a simple and smooth view of the users’ finances through the app.
All You Need to Know about Moneyview Personal Loan
Moneyview, a fintech startup, is a loan financer, which also helps in planning overall finances. It can provide loans ranging from INR.10,000 to INR. 5,00,000 within a day or less. The application pulls data about banking, bills, and expenses from the client’s SMS box. It provides the user with a view of their bank balance, income spent, and income dues. The application is designed for all smartphones and is also a lightweight application, which can run and be updated even without internet connectivity.
Moneyview offers personal loans of up to INR 5 lakh for a period of 3 to 60 months. You can simply download the Moneyview Loan app and apply for a Personal loan. You just need to fill in the required details and upload the documents required through the Moneyview Loan app. After your profile is verified, you receive the NACH (National Automated Clearing House) form and loan agreement on the app. After submitting a signed copy of the NACH mandate, and loan agreement, Moneyview disburses the amount to your bank account normally just within a few hours.
Eligibility criteria for receiving Moneyview Loans are:
Your age should be between 21-57 years
Your salary should come by bank transfer
Income criteria vary based on whether an applicant is salaried or self-employed, the applicant’s CIBIL score ( minimum 300 required), credit history, and the applicant’s location
Documents required for Moneyview Loans
ID proof (Aadhar card or PAN card)
Address Proof
Bank Statement of Salary Account
Income Tax Return Verification Form for the last 2 years, in case of self-employed persons
The best part about Moneyview Loans is that the entire process from documentation to verification is paperless and digital.
Moneyview Loan’s interest rates vary from 16% pa to 24% pa. EMI payment can be done manually through the app or one can also opt for the auto-debit option. Besides, users can go for foreclosure of Moneyview Loans anytime after payment of 3 EMIs.
Moneyview Loan Status Check
Moneyview offers its users the facility of loans ranging from INR 5,000 to INR 5,00,000. You can easily check the loan status in Moneyview. If you’re wondering about easy ways to Moneyview loan status check, then:
You first need to visit the website of Moneyview and then click on the Sign in option
You then need to log in to your loan account with the help of your registered email address
After that, you need to check out the Dashboard and then scroll down to the Application Status tab, where you will be able to check your loan application status.
Moneyview – Founders and Team
Moneyview was founded in 2014 by two IIT friends, Sanjay Aggarwal and Puneet Agarwal.
Moneyview Founders – Puneet Agarwal and Sanjay Aggarwal
Puneet Agarwal
Puneet Agarwal graduated from IIT-Delhi in 1995 and moved to the US to complete his MBA from Purdue University – Krannert School of Management. He was there for the next 17 years, working at different companies including McKinsey, Capital One, and Google, where he was a product management director. Puneet started his career working as a consultant for McKinsey for about three years. He then worked with Capital One, Bling Nation, and as a Product Management Director for Google. Puneet has been an entrepreneur for 7+ years now and also advises and invests in start-ups.
Sanjay Aggarwal
Sanjay Aggarwal, the co-founder of Moneyview, is an IITian who completed his BTech degree in 1993, from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi. Later, he continued working as an engineer at Ciena Corporation, and Yahoo, among others. Sanjay Aggarwalhas vast tech experience working with companies like Appian Communications Inc., Ciena Corporation, and Yahoo! After this, Sanjay founded minglebox.com, an education portal providing content on colleges, courses, exams, and admissions, in the year 2006.
Moneyview has a team that is of around 201-500 employees, which helps in securing the data of the clients. The company’s core value is to bring simple solutions and have control of your money at the same time.
Moneyview – Startup Story
It was a dream of both the co-founders, which started one day while sipping coffee at Starbucks. The dream was to make India financially fit through a mobile app. After Puneet came back to India in the year 2013, he moved to Bengaluru, to gauge the start-up scene and start something of his own. While looking for a place to stay in the city, he reunited with his IIT senior, Sanjay. It was the same time when Sanjay was exiting his venture, Minglebox. He along with Sanjay started Moneyview in the year 2014. They then realized at an early stage, in the year 2016, that providing the application in local languages would help solve the problems of users better. Their target is to provide young India with an application that helps to keep a check on their expenses.
In the beginning, Moneyview only provided the users with guidance to save, this helped in gaining data. In the year 2016, Moneyview became a complete fintech product. ‘We believe that access to financial services is a basic right to all individuals’ is the core belief of the start-up founders. Moneyview is now a paperless application, allowing users to set budgets, view their bank account details, manage bills, and record cash expenses.
Moneyview – Logo
Moneyview Logo
The logo design of Moneyview communicates trust and innovation, aligning with Moneyview’s mission of empowering users with financial control.
Moneyview – Business Model & Revenue Model
With Moneyview, Sanjay and Puneet are focusing on establishing a trusted brand in the personal finance management application segment. They are also looking at moving from just notifying users of their savings, to notifying them about potential investments that can be made.
“Our aim is to help our users stay on top of their finances with zero effort. With our focus continuously on adding features and offerings that help our users stay financially fit. For instance, one of the things the app helps the user with is to start saving more by managing his expenditure. The users will soon be able to find smart ways to invest their savings from within the app,” quotesMoneyview co-founders Sanajy and Puneet Agarwal.
Since Moneyview is a free application, the company does not have a fixed revenue model. It follows month-on-month metrics, and as claimed by the founders in a 2015 interview, the company was growing at almost 100 percent.
In 2016, Moneyview tied up with ICICI Prudential Mutual Fund and launched Green Account, a feature that lets the users of Moneyview App, invest through the app. Moneyview earns a commission on every investment made through the app.
Moneyview Financials
Moneyview Financials
FY22
FY23
FY24
Operating Revenue
INR 222 crore
INR 577 crore
INR 1,012 crore
Total Expenses
INR 240 crore
INR 515 crore
INR 1,190 crore
Profit/Loss
INR 17.7 crore
INR 163 crore
INR 171 crore
Moneyview Financials for FY22, FY23, and FY24
In FY23, Moneyview’s revenue increased by 160%, growing from INR 222 crore in FY22 to INR 577 crore in FY23. Expenses increased by 114%, from INR 240 crore to INR 515 crore. Even with higher costs, Moneyview made a strong profit of INR 163 crore in FY23, compared to just INR17.7 crore in FY22.
The company recorded a 20% growth in its revenue from operations, which became INR 98.45 crore in FY21 from INR 81.45 crore in FY20. The losses of Moneyview were also restricted by 31%, thereby making it stand at INR 46.81 crore (FY21) from INR 68.30 crore in FY20
In FY24, Moneyview reported a revenue of INR 1,012 crore, a notable increase of 75% from INR 577 crore in FY23. Total income also improved considerably, increasing from INR 677 crore in FY23 to INR 1,389 crore in FY24, representing a growth of approximately 105.6%.
Moneyview’s profit rose slightly from INR 163 crore in FY23 to INR 171 crore in FY24, an increase of about 4.9%. However, total expenses more than doubled, growing from INR 515 crore in FY23 to INR 1,190 crore in FY24, an increase of about 130.5%.
Moneyview – Funding and Investors
Moneyview has raised a total of $190.4 million so far. Its most recent funding came from a Series E-II round on September 12, 2024, where $4.6 million was invested by Accel India and Nexus Venture Partners. This new funding pushed Moneyview’s valuation up to $1.2 billion, making it a unicorn. Earlier, in a Series E round, the company raised $75 million, led by Tiger Global Management, at a valuation of $900 million.
Date
Stage
Amount
Investors
September 12, 2024
Series E- II
$4.6 Million
Accel India and Nexus Venture Partners
December 26, 2022
Series E
$75 Million
Apis Partners, Tiger Global Management
March 9, 2022
Series D Round
$75 Million
Tiger Global, Winter Capital, Evolvence India, Accel and more
December 14, 2018
Series C Round
$13 Million
Accel
January 31, 2016
Venture Round
$8.61 Million
–
April 1, 2015
Venture Round
$6.90 Million
Tiger Global, Accel India, Ribbit Capital
October 1, 2014
Series A
$1.32 Million
Accel
Moneyview is also looking at investing a part of this funding in consumer acquisition activities and building the brand. Moreover, looking at expanding their team size while looking at hiring, the co-founders aim to double their technical team strength by the end of this year. Starting with just the two of them, currently, the company can now boast of an active functioning team of 55+ individuals. Their primary spending remains to be on the technology they’re using to power the product.
Moneyview – Acquisitions
Moneyview acquired Jify on September 12, 2024. Jify is a platform offering on-demand earnings access, through a share swap. Jify’s investors, Accel and Nexus, received Moneyview shares in the deal. This acquisition will enhance Moneyview’s financial services and expand Jify’s reach, marking a significant step in Moneyview’s growth into various financial products.
Moneyview – Growth
Currently, Moneyview has a user base of over 10 million. The Moneyview app currently has customers across 400 Indian cities. Besides, Moneyview loan has also received positive reviews from customers. The Moneyview Loan app is rated 4.2 in the Google Play Store.
Moneyview currently boasts over 1 million app downloads per month and it takes pride in catering to more than 200 mn underserved customers. Currently, as per Moneyview, the business has grown 4X in the previous year and is presently disbursing loans at an annualized run rate of $700 million.
With the steady rise in the number of Indians opting for digital payments, Sanjay and Puneet are planning to take Moneyview to new heights.
Moneyview – ESOPs
Moneyview has expanded its ESOP pool, where it has added INR 72 crore worth of stock options, as of May 28, 2022. The earlier 1,33,338 stock options of Moneyview were increased to INR 1,75,390 options. Its new ESOP pool is now worth INR 300 crore ($40 million) including the recent expansion worth INR 72 crore.
Moneyview – Awards & Recognitions
To list, some of the major awards and recognitions that Moneyview witnessed in recent times are:
Moneyview has been ranked as the Best App in the year 2015 by Google, India.
It was also a runner-up in the IBM start-up challenge.
It was listed in the ‘Top 100 Startups in India 2018‘ by SutraHR.
Moneyview – Partnerships
Moneyview partners are many including the ICICI Prudential Mutual Fund, with which the company has collaborated to launch an app-based solution – the Green Account platform.
Through the Green platform, it will offer two exclusive products—Savings+ and Tax Saver+—allowing users to take a step ahead towards financial fitness by saving money and growing it faster.
Savings+ is designed as a suitable alternative to traditional saving options. It allows users to park them in Liquid Funds offered by ICICI Prudential Mutual Fund. Meanwhile, the Tax Saver+, the second product offered through this partnership, helps users save on their taxes by investing in Equity Linked Savings Scheme (ELSS) option provided by ICICI Prudential Mutual Fund.
Moneyview has tied up with more than 3 banks as lending partners. Moneyview is also inviting individuals to join them as loan partners. Interested individuals can visit the Moneyview website, register as a loan partner, and start earning by referring anyone who is looking for a Moneyview personal loan. The online credit platform has partnered with over 15 financial institutions to date to expand and better its credit offerings.
Moneyview – Competitors
As far as the financial management space is concerned, Moneyview is not the only personal assistant available. There are others such as ‘Walnut’ to track expenses, get bank balances, and split bills with friends; Times Internet-backed money management app, ‘Smartspends’; expense manager ‘Gullak’, which claims to have registered over 1 million downloads; and Aditya Birla’s ‘MyUniverse’.
As bigger and more applications are building at a high speed, the market is getting tougher. Moneyview believes to be competing with applications like:
In the coming months, it will be interesting to see how this company will bring the necessary differentiation to rise above its competition and generate a value proposition in the minds of its customers.
Moneyview – Future Plans
The company is currently looking to have $1 billion in assets under management (AUM) over the next 12 months. Moneyview is also eyeing to be more profitable in the upcoming fiscal.
Moneyview is a fintech company founded in 2014, which has an app that is user-friendly via which the users can track and organize expenses, bills, and account balances. Furthermore, with the Moneyview app, they can also avail of personal loans.
Who is the owner of the Moneyview company?
The Moneyview has been founded by Puneet Agarwal and Sanjay Aggarwal, who are among the Moneyview owners.
Does Moneyview provide loans?
Yes, in addition to helping you keep track of your daily finances, Moneyview also provides loans ranging from INR 10,000 to INR 5,00,000 within a day or less.
Who are some competitors of Moneyview?
Some Moneyview competitors are Faircent, Lendingkart, and Capital Float.
Does Moneyview provide loans?
Yes, in addition to helping you keep track of your daily finances, Moneyview also provides loans ranging from INR 5,000 to INR 5,00,000 within a day or less. Its instant loan can also be approved within 2 minutes.
Who are some competitors of Moneyview?
Some Moneyview competitors are Faircent, Lendingkart, and Capital Float.
This article has been contributed by Mr Jitin Bhasin – CEO and Co-founder of SaveIN.
As we move forward, the intersection of healthcare and financial technology (fintech) is poised to play a pivotal role in shaping the future. “If timely and quality healthcare can be made accessible to everyone, our country will have truly evolved.” This belief underscores the crucial role of healthcare in India’s path to becoming a developed economy by 2047, marking 100 years of independence.
India’s Growth and the Healthcare Sector
Currently, India is the fifth-largest economy globally, boasting a GDP of over $3.5 trillion. The nation is on a robust growth trajectory, setting benchmarks across various sectors. However, to achieve developed nation status, the healthcare sector must undergo a significant transformation.
With a healthcare market valued at around $372 billion, the government has initiated numerous programs to bolster this sector. Initiatives like the Pradhan Mantri Swasthya Suraksha Yojana, National Health Mission, and the Ayushman Bharat Health Infrastructure Mission are key in fostering sustainable partnerships between the public and private sectors. These efforts aim to make healthcare both affordable and accessible.
India’s recent strides in digitalization have propelled it ahead of other emerging economies. The country’s efficient handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, built on a solid digital infrastructure, exemplifies its ability to execute at scale. The next wave of healthcare disruption must also be rooted in the principles of transparency, efficiency, and accessibility through digital means.
Challenges and Opportunities in Healthcare
Indian Digital Health Market
Today, India’s healthcare sector faces three primary challenges: accessibility, quality, and affordability. While many salaried workers benefit from government schemes such as the Employee State Insurance (ESI) and Central Government Health Scheme (CGHS), the public healthcare infrastructure struggles to meet rising demand. This gap presents an opportunity for increased public-private collaboration.
Despite the presence of over two million healthcare providers across the country, affordability remains a critical hurdle. While insurance penetration is expected to rise over the next decade, many medical procedures, especially elective and outpatient treatments—which account for nearly 50% of medical expenses—are not covered by insurance. These treatments remain outside the scope of insurance due to a lack of data and standardization, making it difficult to price insurance products effectively.
For inpatient procedures where insurance is more common, patients often face insufficient coverage, delays in approval, or are required to pay out of pocket before receiving reimbursement, which can take months. To increase insurance penetration and improve healthcare affordability, these issues need to be addressed.
The Role of Fintech in Bridging the Healthcare Gap
This is where fintech, particularly embedded finance, can play a transformative role. By providing on-demand credit at the point of care, embedded finance can bridge the affordability gap in private healthcare. Similar to how the consumer electronics and smartphone sectors have evolved, offering financing options for healthcare can create a revolution in the industry.
Embedded finance (EmFi) allows healthcare providers to partner with lenders, enabling patients to pay for medical services using pre-approved credit lines. These credit lines can be repaid through easy, interest-free installments. This model benefits both providers, who can serve more patients, and recipients, who can access timely medical care without financial strain.
As more healthcare facilities adopt these simplified payment solutions, the demand for such services will likely increase, encouraging people to prioritize their health. A healthier population can lead to improved productivity, contributing to national GDP growth and creating a positive economic cycle.
Over time, data from Electronic Medical Records (EMRs), treatment patterns, and demographic information will help standardize and streamline healthcare services, leading to greater efficiency across the board.
Financing Health: The Role of Fintech Companies
Fintech companies, along with the private sector, are uniquely positioned to address the affordability issues in Indian healthcare. By leveraging cutting-edge digital technologies, risk-based underwriting, and innovative product structures, they can offer solutions that cater to both patients and providers.
The fusion of healthcare and finance holds immense potential, and the process of consumerizing healthcare has already begun. The timing is perfect, as the importance of health has never been more paramount to society. With clear roles for providers, patients, and financial facilitators, the coming decade promises to bring about significant advancements in personal healthcare.
In this insightful interview, Tanul Mishra, founder and CEO of Afthonia Lab, shares her journey from being an entrepreneur to leading India’s only independent fintech-focused incubator. She discusses the lab’s rolling cohort model, personalized startup blueprints, and its mission to bridge gaps in India’s fintech ecosystem. Mishra highlights emerging trends such as InsureTech, cybersecurity, and AgriFinance, emphasizing the importance of product-market fit for fintech startups. Through a robust network of mentors, partners, and investors, Afthonia Lab provides critical support, guiding startups in fund optimization and strategic growth.
StartupTalky: Please give us an overview of what Afthonia Lab does and what its mission is in the fintech industry.
Ms. Mishra: Afthonia Lab is India’s only independent fintech-focused incubator, distinguished by our rolling cohort model that allows year-round onboarding, as opposed to batch-oriented programs. Each startup we engage with receives a personalized blueprint designed to propel them to their next inflection point. Our program offers a global perspective, providing access to worldwide knowledge, funds, and networks, crucial for market access and expansion. We utilize a proprietary tool to shortlist startups and craft their development blueprints, supported by a global panel of mentors and a strong network of investors from micro VCs to venture capitalists.
StartupTalky: What motivated you to transition from being an entrepreneur to leading an incubator focused on fintech startups?
Ms Mishra: Having built and co-founded my own food business, I realized the critical importance of a robust network and sufficient funding for business growth. After exiting, I observed a significant gap in India’s startup ecosystem, particularly a lack of structured support compared to countries like the US and China. This insight led me to establish Afthonia Lab, a fintech-focused incubator designed to offer structured growth environments and allow startups to learn from their mistakes effectively.
StartyupTalky: What are the key latest trends you foresee for the future of the fintech industry in India?
Ms. Mishra: Looking ahead, sectors like InsureTech and cybersecurity show significant growth potential due to increasing digital transactions. Another promising area is AgriFinance, particularly for innovations targeting tier two and three cities, which are currently underserved.
StartupTalky: How do you support fintech startups in achieving a sound product-market fit?
Ms. Mishra: Achieving a strong product-market fit involves multiple stages, from sketching out business models to developing a minimum viable product, and devising customer acquisition strategies. At Afthonia Lab, we address these stages by leveraging a vast network of ecosystem partners and growth mentors who provide the necessary support for startups to navigate these phases efficiently. Our approach ensures founders spend less time seeking partners and more on strategic growth.
StartupTalky: How does Afthonia Lab facilitate connections between startups and venture capitalists?
Ms. Mishra: Over time, we have cultivated a strong network of 100 + partners and investors that play a pivotal role in the startup ecosystem. This network allows us to provide startups with early feedback on their business strategies, enhancing their viability and scalability. Our connections also facilitate a deeper understanding of investor expectations, which helps in aligning startup offerings accordingly.
StartupTalky: What strategies does Afthonia Lab use to guide startups in optimizing their use of funds?
Ms. Mishra:Financial management is crucial, and at Afthonia Lab, we emphasize optimizing fund flow, which involves careful planning of future financial sources and uses. We assist startups in maintaining financial stability without compromising growth, ensuring efficient working capital management, and exploring viable revenue streams.
StartupTalky: What advice would you give to aspiring entrepreneurs looking to enter the fintech space?
Ms. Mishra: I advise fintech founders to focus on the core problems their technology is solving for customers rather than the technology itself. It’s crucial to address real customer needs effectively and remain adaptable to feedback to ensure long-term success.
According to a media agency, several prominent fintech companies have decided to participate in the digital currency pilot program run by the Indian central bank. These companies include Google Pay, PhonePe, Cred, Mobikwik, and AmazonPay.
According to sources who spoke with the news agency, the corporations will accomplish this by providing e-rupee transactions.
Notably, the digital currency pilot program was launched by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in December 2022.
At first, the only financial institutions authorized to sell e-rupee through their mobile apps were the central bank. However, fintechs were also permitted to offer e-rupee transactions after RBI’s permission in April of this year.
Then, rumor has it that fintech companies are requesting the central bank clarify the norms of interaction with banks so they can implement use cases for central bank digital currency (CBDC).
Fintech companies are reportedly collaborating with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), and the domestic payment authorities in preparation for the e-rupee’s launch in the coming three to four months, according to a prominent news agency’s report.
According to the research, the number of digital currency transactions has dropped significantly from over 1 million per day last year to about 1-2 lakh each day.
Use Cases for Retail CBDCs
This news arrives as reports surface that banks are collaborating with fintech entrepreneurs on a range of fronts to launch retail use cases for Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDCs).
The first round of the CBDC retail trial for NBPSOs is testing two significant use cases. One involves corporate cost management and the other involves subsidy payments for agricultural supplies.
Banks are presently focussing on deploying these use cases, and they will now also collaborate closely with fintech firms to support the CBDC trial.
Following the beginning of the Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) experiment in December 2022, RBI deputy governor T Rabi Sankar announced in April that 2.2 crore transactions had been handled.
What is CBDC?
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has created CBDCs, a digital token equivalent to the Rupee. Using distributed ledger technology (DLT), it could one day replace physical currency with digital transactions.
The CBDC pilot has been serving both the wholesale and retail sectors since its start in 2022, and an increasing number of institutions are rushing to become a part of it.
The country’s Central Bank unveiled new features, like the ability to make CBDC retail payments offline and using user-defined algorithms, in February of this year to boost CBDC sales.
On Thursday, the financial management platform CRED introduced CRED Money, which provides a unified view of a user’s balances, transactions, and patterns across bank accounts.
According to a statement from the fintech business CRED Money, directed by Kunal Shah, “CRED Money is built on the account aggregator (AA) framework that allows users to securely share their bank account information with authorised vendors. “
Users will receive updates and reminders through the platform, and it will offer to make regular payments directly using CRED UPI, making it easy to manage things like SIPs, EMIs, rent, staff wages, and insurance premiums.
How CRED Money Can Benefit Its Users?
Users can gain insight into their financial habits by searching as a merchant or category and analyzing spending patterns across their bank accounts. Customers may conveniently monitor all of their transactions, including dividends from investments that were forgotten, payment reversals, tax refunds, and more. The new product from CRED makes use of cutting-edge data science to transform raw data into useful insights, letting customers make better financial plans and use their funds more wisely.
Prioritise Customers With High Incomes
Midway through 2022, CRED sought out users with worse credit scores, but these users did not engage with the platform. Beginning in the middle of 2023, the business once again started prioritizing the acquisition of consumers with higher credit scores.
With the launch of their luxury rewards program “Only Fridays,” CRED is putting an emphasis on engaging with premium consumers. This program is open to users who have earned over one million CRED Coins from paying credit card bills.
Customers who have spent a total of one million rupees on CRED have earned one coin for every rupee worth of credit card bills.
Recognizing UPI’s success among wealthy clients, the business is actively pursuing this demographic. CRED has been successful in expanding its UPI share, even though credit cards remain its primary business emphasis.
Players Providing Similar Services
Apps like this one are available from ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, and Fi Money, and they all offer a centralized hub for managing all of their clients’ bank accounts and transactions. Customers do get a consolidated picture when they use a FinTech payment app to pay for subscriptions, insurance, and utility bills.
Despite CRED’s expansion beyond credit card payments to offer wealth management, eCommerce, travel, and automobile products and services in the recent few quarters, a media agency claimed last month that the company’s user growth has stopped at 13 million subscribers over the last 18 months.
Nitin Konde
