Exclusive: PayU, IFC Invest $15 Mn In Supply Chain Finance Startup Vayana Network

Mumbai-based supply chain finance provider Vayana Network is raising funding from two global fintech solution providers – PayU, and International Finance Corporation. 

The $15 Mn ( INR 114 Cr) funding round seems to be part of the Series C round that Vayana Network had raised in November last year. 

Vayana Network is allotting 13,63,592 fully-paid up Series C CCPS to International Finance Corporation and PayU Fintech Investments as part of this infusion. 

Post this infusion, World Bank’s IFC will hold 5.37%, whereas PayU will hold 4.7% in Vayana Network.

Vayana Network intends funds for general corporate purposes, the company said in the filing.

In November, the startup raised $38 Mn in a Series C round from Chiratae Ventures, CDC Group, and Jungle Ventures. The round further saw participation from March Capital, Marshall Wace and some of the large family offices in the country and abroad. 

Prior to this, the startup had raised $4 Mn from IDG Ventures and Jungle Ventures. 

Founded in 2009 by Ramaswami Iyer, Vayana Network is a B2B trade financial intermediary, which connects SMEs and corporates with financial institutions for low-cost access to trade loans.

Vayana claims to have enabled $1 Bn+ financing through B2B card flows to 22K+ SMEs. Its base currently includes 1K+ supply chains in 25 different sectors across 20+ countries, including the US, Singapore.

Prosus, a global consumer Internet group that operates fintech giant PayU has been investing and acquiring Indian fintech startups for sometime now. The major acquisition of PayU in India was Billdesk which is still the biggest acquisition that the Indian startup ecosystem has ever seen to date. In August last year, PayU acquired BillDesk, a payment gateway company, for $4.7 Bn. 

PayU is one of the early investors in a soonicorn BNPL startup Zest Money. PayU has also invested in other fintech startups such as Fisdom, LazyPay, Wibmo, Indiagold, DotPe, among others. 

As per a Statista report, digital lending is one of the fastest growing sectors in the fintech industry. The report highlights that India’s digital lending market grew from $9 Bn in 2012 to $150 Bn in 2020, slated to reach $350 Bn by 2023.

As per the latest Inc42 Plus fintech market report, lendingtech is expected to hold a lionshare of 47.4% in the entire fintech space. In 2021 around $1.5 Bn or 19.5% of the total $7.9 Bn of investment received in the fintech sector was for lending tech startups.