Trade financing platform, Vayana Network, on Thursday said it has raised ₹283 crore in Series C funding round from new and existing investors, including Chiratae Ventures, CDC group, Jungle Ventures, March Capital, and Marshall Wace.
Large family offices from India and abroad also participated in the round.
Vayana Network is a supply chain finance platform in India that provides digital access to low-cost financing to enterprises. It also facilitates goods and services tax (GST) services, e-way bill and e-invoice for numerous corporates and lakhs of small and medium enterprises (SMEs).
“Over the last 4 years, we have grown 20-times on quarterly financing volumes. We have strongly believed that every segment of the supply chain and for every type of trade, there needs to be a relevant product that allows the business to grow sustainably. Given our strong presence in credit enabling infrastructure such as GST and e-invoicing coupled with the launch of our Good Business Score (GBS), we have managed to reach the smallest of businesses, connecting them to the largest lender,” said Ram Iyer, founder and chief executive officer (CEO), Vayana Network.
The company claims to have enabled finance of over $8 billion, till date, including over a billion-dollar of finance through business-to-business (B2B) card flows to over 22,000 SMEs for over 1000 supply chains in 25 different sectors.
“Vayana has been committed to making trade finance easier, accessible and affordable for all businesses in a supply chain, irrespective of size. This single-minded focus has helped them to grow at a rapid pace and become the market leader. Across the globe and especially in India, SMEs play the crucial role of being growth engines of an economy; despite which they suffer from delayed payments and lack of access to low-cost formal sources of finance,” said TC Meenakshi Sundaram, managing director and co-founder, Chiratae Ventures.
At present, Vayana connects over 1000 corporates and their trade ecosystems to provide digital and affordable access to credit for their payables and receivables, the company said in a statement.
“The supply chain industry in India is at a place that requires new-age startups, like Vayana, that build key financial infrastructure for all stakeholders to easily operate with transparency and fluidity,” said Amit Rajpal, CEO Asia and portfolio manager of Marshall Wace.
With its proprietary technology, Vayana has processed over 1.7 million transactions. Its network today spans across 600 cities and over 1150 pin codes in India and extends to 20 countries across the globe.
Source: Mint