India-based rural household-focused lending and distribution platform, SarvaGram closed its Series C round at USD 35 million. The company announced the closure on January 3, 2023. Venture capital fund Elevar Equity led the financing for the firm. Meanwhile, Elevation Capital, Temasek and TVS Capital Funds joined in the funding.
Purpose of financing for SarvaGram
With the latest proceeds from the Series C round, SarvaGram intends to expand its distribution network by adding 75 more outlets by the end of FY24.
Meanwhile, the startup has plans to expand its on-ground franchisees — known as ‘SarvaMitra’ – to three times the current strength across different states. It also aims to deploy funds towards strengthening the technology layer – both in terms of hiring tech talent and solidifying SarvaGram’s existing tech stack. Besides, the company intends to support and enhance business operations.
Earlier in February 2021, the company raised USD 10 million in its Series B round. Elevation Capital and Elevar Equity led the financing back then for the firm.
What the company’s official has to say
Utpal Isser, co-founder, MD and CEO, SarvaGram, said, “Having successfully executed our household-centric hypothesis across tens of thousands of rural households, we now understand our customers much better. The fundraise will boost our mission of putting more power in the hands of rural households by enhancing our technology platform, strengthening the data analytics layer apart from growing our distribution and adding on-ground human capacity.”
What the investors have to add
Jyotsna Krishnan, managing partner, Elevar Equity, further added, “SarvaGram is at the cusp of two critical trends. First, the inflexion point in rural markets as demonstrated by growing economic activity and aspirations seen across rural households and second, leveraging the entry point of financial services for a true data-led broader distribution strategy. This round provides aligned growth capital to help the company execute to their scale ambitions.”
Besides, Anuradha Ramachandran, managing partner, TVS Capital Funds, said, “We found the strong experience of the founders, the focus of SarvaGram on the underserved rural middle-class households and the increasing availability of data which makes for better underwriting, a differentiated story.”
Moreover, Mridul Arora, partner at Elevation Capital, said, “Their lending offering is unique and creates the foundation to offer a range of solutions – unlike the urban salaried individual with a payslip, assessing income for a rural borrower is tricky – given multiple income streams, variability in agricultural earnings, and limited paper trails. While collateral may be available, the documentation is non-standardised. “
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