Aye Finance,small business loans provider is planning to raise ₹ 250-300 crore ($33.9-40.7 million) in the Series D funding round from the new overseas investors, said company executive. The Gurugram-based non-banking financial company has even initiated the talks with two foreign investors for raising the fresh capital at the valuation of rs 500 crores said Sanjay Sharma the Managing Director of Aye Finance. Added to that the existing investors are also expecting for participating in the proposed round.
In June, the company also reported that Aye Finance had raised its ₹ 145.2 crore Series C round from Capital G, the venture capital fund owned by Alphabet Inc. Till date, it has raised about ₹ 242 crore in external funding.
“We thought we would look at raising money again in the next 18 months, but we are finding there is a lot of interest in the SME market still. The industry is beginning to realise that a pure fin-tech play without being on the field will not help,” said Sharma. “There is beginning of interest in the brick-and-mortar model, which uses a lot of data science techniques like Aye Finance does.”
Wooplr Technologies Pvt. Ltd, which enables social commerce via an eponymous online fashion portal, is in talks to raise up to $20 million (Rs 137.89 crore at current exchange rates) in a Series C round of funding, two persons directly in the know said. The fresh capital will be raised from a mix of Indian and China-based investors, said one of the above-mentioned persons on the condition of anonymity. The identity of these investors could not be ascertained. Wooplr is likely to seal the transaction within the next few months, said the second person.
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Global human resources consulting major Mercer, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Marsh & McLennan Companies, Inc., on Monday acquired Mettl, a Gurugram-based online talent assessment firm. The acquisition of the Cloud technology and data sciences-driven Mettl platform for an undisclosed amount marks Mercer’s entry into the rapidly growing global talent assessment market.
“Online talent assessment is a powerful tool that helps companies unlock the potential of their people. Mettl is a disruptive HR tech start-up that has pioneered a robust assessments platform,” Anish Sarkar, CEO, India, Mercer, said in a statement.
“The combination of Mercer’s pedigree and talent industry experience in India and Mettl’s leading-edge and scalable proprietary technology platform will enable companies in India to improve their workforce as they prepare for the future of work amidst rapid digitisation,” he added.
Salesforce Ventures, the corporate venture investment arm of US-based technology company Salesforce Inc., is keen to evaluate investment opportunities in India, said a senior executive of the venture firm.
“We have been having conversations with other VCs that have a presence in India and San Francisco. We are present in Japan and Australia, currently, in the Asia Pacific region. But Asia Pacific is growing fast and so we are looking at other places, too. We follow the Salesforce infrastructure and as Salesforce builds out its presence in a market, we follow,” said Matt Garratt, managing partner, Salesforce Ventures, on the sidelines of Dreamforce 2018, an annual tech conference organized by the San Francisco-based Salesforce, which was held in the last week of September.
“We are seeing that motion build-up in India and we are having more conversations,” said Garratt, adding that the firm is evaluating the right investment strategy. “India is a place where we will be making more trips going ahead.” Salesforce Ventures has invested in over 275 companies across 17 countries and has been investing since 2009.
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