Jai Kisan, a Mumbai-based rural fintech start-up, has raised ₹217 crore ($30 million), through a combination of equity and debt through a Series-A round led by Mirae Asset, to fund its expansion plans.
Syngenta Ventures, and existing investors Blume, Arkam Ventures, Nabventures, Prophetic Ventures, Better and other global investors and high networth individuals participated in the funding round. Blacksoil, Stride Ventures and Trifecta Capital contributed to the debt portion.
“With the latest infusion we look forward to investing heavily in enhancing our engineering capabilities and building our own book to be able to better serve the need of our partners and customers and create further impact in deeper parts of the country,” Arjun Ahluwalia, Co-founder at Jai Kisan said.
“Despite the pandemic, we have successfully scaled business by over 50 per cent in three months, with an annualised Gross Transaction Value of ₹2,790 crore recorded on Bharat Khata and annualised loan disbursal run-rate of ₹432 crore as of March 21,” he added.
Jai Kisan had launched Bharat Khata in April 2020, a digital ledger and smart business solution for rural businesses.
The company will use the proceeds for talent acquisition, enhance engineering and data science capabilities, expand into new geographies and build an on-book portfolio. With its own capital, Jai Kisan will also create new credit products.
Jai Kisan, founded by entrepreneurs Arjun Ahluwalia and Adriel Maniego, provides digital financial services such as starting with credit for online and offline businesses. “We believe that access to credit is one of the key enablers for farmers to adopt quality practices. The low penetration of traditional financing institutions in the sector creates significant financial stress for smallholder farmers,” said Shubhang Shankar, Managing Director, Syngenta Group Ventures.
“We hope Jai Kisan will be able to extend its credit offerings to the millions of under-served smallholder farmers in India and beyond,” he added.
Veda Corporate Advisors was the financial adviser to Jai Kisan for the fund-raise.