[Funding alert] Online gold loan platform Rupeek raises $30M led by Bertelsmann India Investments

Rupeek, a Bengaluru-based fintech startup in the gold lending space, on Monday announced it has raised $30 million in funding led by Bertelsmann India Investments with participation from existing investors Accel and Sequoia India. 

The latest funding, which will be completed in two tranches, will be used towards product development and market expansion, the company said in a release. 

Sumit Maniyar, Founder and CEO, Rupeek, said, 

“We are really excited about the belief our investors have placed in Rupeek’s mission to monetise India’s gold efficiently. As a brand, we would like to bring transparency in the lending space and protect retail investor interest at all costs. We will be using our proprietary tech hardware to ensure standardisation, fairness, and scalability in gold purity assessment. The investment will also help us rapidly scale across new markets.” 

ALSO READ

[Funding alert] Fintech lender Aye Finance raises $10M debt capital from responAbility

Rupeek claims it is currently disbursing gold loans at an annual run rate of more than $150 million and is growing 20 percent month-on-month. 

Started in 2015 as an asset-backed lending marketplace, Rupeek leverages technology to operate with a branchless model and passes the benefit of lower operational costs to the end customer. 

The startup counts banks like Federal Bank and Karur Vysya Bank as its trusted lending partners. Offering a 30 minutes doorstep service for gold loans, Rupeek’s platform offers on-demand pickup and return of the valuables while promising industry best safety standards, it said in a statement.

Pankaj Makkar, Managing Director at Bertelsmann India Investments, said, 

“Powered by state-of-the-art technology and an automated asset-light supply chain, Rupeek is transforming the way gold loans are disbursed in India. We are confident about Sumit and the team’s vision to establish Rupeek as the most trusted gold-loan brand in the country.” 

The organised gold loan disbursal in India is estimated at $90 billion per annum. India currently holds 27000 tonnes of gold worth more than $1 trillion, out of which only six to seven percent is monetised through the organised market. The unorganised market is estimated to be three times the size of the organized gold loan market.

Currently, India imports 750 tonnes of gold annually without contributing to the GDP multiplier as most of the imported gold sits idle in the form of jewelry. Rupeek believes that gold loans can be an effective gold monetization mechanism.

In February 2018, the startup secured $6.8 million in Series A funding round led by Accel Partners.

(Edited by Megha Reddy)

ALSO READ

[Funding alert] Kunal Shah's Cred raises $4 million from Sequoia Capital