Gift card technology firm Qwikcilver raises funding led by Sistema Asia Fund Advisory

Bengaluru-based Qwikcilver, a gift card technology company, has raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Sistema Asia Fund Advisory, a proprietary fund floated by Sistema JSFC, and existing investors. Reportedly, the amount raised in this round is $10 million.

The raised funds will be used for R&D, expanding into newer geographies like the Middle East and South East Asia, and scaling its growth.

Qwikcilver, which has grown by 300 percent year-on-year for the last four years and currently processes over 50 million transactions across physical cards, digital cards and mobile-based engagements across card transactions annually, is a cloud hosted SaaS technology platform. It has partnered with more than 500 brands.

Kumar Sudarsan, Director and Founder, Qwikcilver, said, “We are pleased to have Sistema as our new investor, along with all our existing investors participating in this fund raiser. We see this as testimony and validation of our pioneering presence and leadership in the gift card category with our SaaS technology product business in India. Qwikcilver will continue to work towards scaling the gift card category with its cutting edge product platform, which is of high global standards.”

Qwikcilver Solutions is a single-stop provider for all kinds of stored value card-based solutions for retailers, service providers and corporates, and has also obtained the RBI licence for semi-closed loop PPIs (Prepaid Product Instruments).

The company, which is present in both the B2B and B2C segments, engages consumers through its e-commerce platform Woohoo and also its app. The website was initially launched in 2013 as GiftBig InstaGifts and was later renamed.

Kirill Kozhevnikov, MD of Insitel/Sistema Asia Fund Advisory, said, “We are very pleased to come on board and lead this investment round in Qwikcilver. The commitment and pioneering role of Qwikcilver in establishing its strong leadership of the prepaid and gift card industry in India has been truly unique. The strong credentials and passionate team has helped build and grow a robust SaaS product company based from India.”

The gift cards and vouchers category in India currently stands at more than Rs 2,000 crore and is expected to reach Rs 8,000 crore by 2017-18. The space has seen a steady growth over the years but no player has emerged as a dominant force. Broadly, these startups also compete with the e-commerce players. Among the other players from this segment is GiftsCardsIndia, which had earlier acquired Giftery.