BharatPe Eyes Unicorn Status With $250Mn Fundraise From Tiger Global

Delhi-based B2B fintech platform BharatPe is in talks with venture capital firm Tiger Global to raise a fresh Series E round of $250Mn.

The talks are in an advanced stage which would give BharatPe a valuation boost to $2.5Bn, reported  TechCrunch. However, the terms of the deals haven’t been finalized yet.

In its previous funding round, BharatPe had raised $108 Mn in Series D funding round at a post-money valuation of $900 Mn. Out of this, around $90 Mn in funding came through a primary share sale, while the rest was through a secondary share to provide an exit to angel investors as well as ESOP holders.  

Overall, it has raised $268 Mn in equity and debt to date. The company’s list of marquee investors includes Ribbit Capital, Insight Partners, Steadview Capital, Beenext, Amplo, Sequoia Capital and Coatue Management

BharatPe had earlier claimed that its Series D round got oversubscribed within the last two weeks of December 2020, making it one of the fastest round closure for any startup in the Indian ecosystem.

CEO Ashneer Grover earlier told the press that the company has about $200 Mn in the bank, which will be used to deliver $30 Mn total payment volume (TPV) and build a loan book of $700 Mn with small merchants by 2023.

The company claims to have over 60 lakh merchants onboard across 100 cities and plans to get 10 Mn users on board by 2022. The company says it has already facilitated disbursement of loans totaling to over INR 1,600 Cr to its merchants since launch.

BharatPe was founded in 2018 by Grover and Shashvat Nakrani. It is primarily a merchant-focused payments platform that offers a single interface for all existing UPI apps and other payments systems, and has recently branched out into lending and other verticals.

The fintech startup had also raised $35 Mn (INR 249 Cr) debt funding from Alteria Capital, InnoVen Capital, Trifecta Capital and ICICI Bank on January 6. The company plans to raise debt funding up to $750 Mn in the next two years to facilitate its plans to go big on lending. As a part of this plan, BharatPe is taking over operations of Punjab and Maharashtra Cooperative (PMC) Bank. 

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) had recently provided in principle approval to the take over of cash-strapped Punjab & Maharashtra Co-Operative Bank by BharatPe and Centrum Financial Services Limited, the non-banking financial company run by the Centrum Group.