App-Only Lending Startup CASHe Raises About $3 Mn In Debt Funding From IFMR Capital

Aeries Financial Technologies Pvt. Ltd, that owns the app-only lending platform CASHe, has raised about $3.07 Mn (INR 20 Cr) in debt funding from IFMR Capital in its NBFC company, Bhanix Finance and Investment. The debt funding will be used by the fintech startup to ramp up its loan book.

V Raman Kumar, Chairman, Aeris Financial Technologies stated, “CASHe is aggressively expanding its reach to meet the growing needs of millions of salaried millennials across the country. As we look to expand our already significant national footprint, we’ve found a great partner in IMFR Capital to support our growth strategy. This round of debt funding by IFMR Capital increases our capital pool which translates into higher loan disbursements, and more satisfied customers on a pan-India basis.”

CASHe claims to have disbursed loans worth $3.53 Mn (INR 23 Cr) in September this year, taking the total loan disbursal to $30.7 Mn (INR 200 Cr) since its launch in April 2016. The company is aiming to achieve an overall loan disbursal of $69.12 Mn (INR 450 Cr) by March 2018.

As per Kshama Fernandes, CEO IFMR, “CASHe is a pioneer in the fintech space with a sophisticated yet easy-to-access approach to lending through its technology platform. The partnership aligns with our approach of identifying and taking exposure to high-quality originators at an early stage with the intent of giving them access to capital markets investors through customised structured product solutions.”

A Quick Look At CASHE And The Indian Fintech Space

Launched in April 2016, Mumbai-based CASHe is an app-only lending company that provides immediate short-term personal loans to young professionals based on their social profile, merit and earning potential using its proprietary algorithm-based machine learning platform. The company is targeting young working professionals in the age group of 23-35 years and offers loans ranging from $76 (INR 5,000) to $1,536 (INR 1,00,000) payable over 15, 30 and 90 days.

Powered by its algorithm-driven, credit scoring platform, The Social Loan Quotient (SLQ), CASHe quickly determines a user’s creditworthiness by using multiple unique data points to arrive at a distinct credit profile of the customer. As per a company statement, CASHe is completely automated and requires no personal intervention and no physical documentation, and the average time is taken for a loan to be disbursed is about eight minutes, subject to proper submission of all documents.

In April this year, CASHe raised about $3.8 Mn (INR 25 Cr) Series A funding from an investor group led by Mathew Cyriac, Senior Managing Director at Blackstone Group. With this move, Cyriac joined the Board of CASHe as an Investor Director. Prior to that, in January 2017, CASHe entered into a strategic sales partnership with financial distributor Andromeda. They have also partnered with mobile payments and commerce firm Paytm to allow users to deposit cash transfers from CASHe to their Paytm wallets. Other startups in this segment include KrazyBee, Onemi, Finomena, Quicklo.

According to Inc42 Datalabs, fintech startups attracted the highest number of funding deals in H1 2017. Total investment made in this segment during the period stood at $2 Bn. For instance, only recently, Ahmedabad-based SME lending platform Lendingkart Technologies raised $10.9 Mn in a funding round, in pure equity from Sistema Asia Fund, others. The Indian fintech market is forecasted to touch $2.4 Bn by 2020, a two-fold increase from the market size currently standing at $1.2 Bn. Thus it presents a huge opportunity for startups like CASHe, which operate in the online lending segment.