Groww, a fintech startup has raised $6.2 million (Rs 44 crore) by Sequoia Capital India in a series A round. Other investors like Y Combinator, Propel Venture Partners, and Kauffman Fellows were also in the series round.
Groww is an Indian-based Y Combinator-backed online investment platform allows users to open an account electronically and transact in mutual funds online. The app services are free-of-charge with the direct mutual fund plans. Launched in April 2016 Groww is founded by former Flipkart employees Lalit Keshre, Harsh Jain, Ishan Bansal, and Neeraj Singh. The company had partnered with 34 mutual funds houses and around 5000 mutual funds.
The company, with the amount raised, is planning to build technology to scale and introduce new investment options like stocks. In July 2016, the fintech startup raised $1.6 million from Insignia Ventures Partners, Kairos, Lightbridge Partners, and existing investors Ankit Nagori and Mukesh Bansal.
“We want to create a platform that has all possible investment solutions within a tech-enabled, easy-to-use interface -and all this while providing the best-in-class user experience above all else. That is the fundamental premise of our offering,” said Lalit Keshre, co-founder and chief executive officer, Groww.
The company also plans to uses its data science to make investing simple, accessible and transparent. It professes that investors can notice more than 5,000 mutual funds on its platform and can invest without any paperwork.
Ashish Agrawal, Sequoia Capital India Advisor, said that
“We are seeing strong growth in the Indian investor base which is fuelling the market need for a better and inexpensive investment platform like Groww. With their strong product sensibilities and focus on the millennial investor, Groww aspires to be the preferred product for retail investors in India,” Ashish Agrawal, Principal, Sequoia Capital India Advisors.
Groww claims over one million registered users and most of them are aged under 40. The startup had $1M in revenue annually and raised a total of $7.8M with recent fundings included.
