Funding
Fintech startup Vegapay raises $1.1M pre-seed funding
Digital lending and card management platform Vegapay has secured $1.1 million in pre-seed funding. The round was led by Eximius Ventures along with DSP HMK, Capri Global, Upsparks Capital, MGA Ventures, Climber Capital, and angel investors including Arun Venkatachalam (Murugappa Group) and Pratekk Agarwaal (General Partner, GrowthCap Ventures).
Vegapay plans to use the funds towards developing its technology to enable frontline adoption for traditional and non-traditional institutions, the company said in a statement. It also aims to create an omnichannel lending solution, which would help institutions customise the type of product they choose to offer, such as co-lending, secured credit, and unsecured credit.
Founded in October 2022 by Gaurav Mittal, Himanshu Agrawal, Puneet Sharma, and Abhinav Garg, Vegapay is building a lending tech stack and a card management system that enables regulated entities and fintech firms to issue and increase penetration of card and lending in India.
“Banks and fintech players take months to launch new financial products like credit cards and lending offerings. However, we can help them reduce the time taken to bring products to the market by 90%. This would enable our partners to launch their products in just one week,” said Gaurav Mittal, Co-founder and CEO of Vegapay.
“Our mission is to assist our partners in achieving the $1.5 trillion AUM by providing customised digital lending solutions at an unprecedented speed,” added Mittal.
Other news
ONDC launches WhatsApp chatbot ONDC Sahayak for sellers
The has launched a WhatsApp chatbot called ‘ONDC Sahayak’ to help sellers familiarise themselves with digital commerce.
The feature, which is currently in the beta phase, aims to spread awareness among sellers about ONDC’s advantages, showcase live categories, connect sellers with seller network participants, and simplify the onboarding process. In addition to English and Hindi, the chatbot will soon be able to understand and communicate in Marathi, Kannada, and Tamil. It will also receive more improvements and updates in the next few months, according to a statement.
The digital commerce protocol now supports 12 regional languages, including Assamese, Bengali, Gujarati, Malayalam, Marathi, Oriya, Punjabi, Tamil, and Telugu.
The expansion highlights ONDC’s commitment to embrace India’s diversity and foster inclusion in the digital realm, ensuring that Indians can engage with the ONDC protocol in their chosen language, starting from August 15, the statement said.
TIDE partners with North Eastern Handicrafts & Handloom Development Corporation
TIDE, a UK-based firm focused on small and medium enterprises, has signed a memorandum of understanding with North Eastern Handicrafts and Handlooms Development Corporation to promote nearly 2.1 million handloom weavers and 3.5 million handicraft artisans across 800 clusters in Northeast India.
The partnership will also assist in widening market reach and enabling financial inclusion of small weavers.
This comes at the helm of the handloom development corporation’s technology and innovation drive, which includes projects for digitalisation of the handloom sector using artificial intelligence (AI) and internet of things (IoT) and ERP implementation for inventory tracking and mapping, according to a statement.
North East contributes 65% of India’s total handloom production and has the highest concentration of handloom weavers in the country, with women’s participation at around 88%.
This partnership will help elevate Tide’s India Chapter of ‘Women in Business’ and enable women handloom weavers across North East India to benefit from the mentoring and knowledge sharing sessions that will help grow their businesses and overcome administrative challenges, said the firm.
North Eastern Handicrafts and Handlooms Development Corporation works under the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region, Government of India. It attempts to develop and promote the indigenous crafts of the region by connecting craftsmen withprospective markets and consumers.
(The story will be updated with latest news throughout the day)
