Indian fintech Kissht secures $80m investment

Indian payments and lending fintech Kissht has completed an $80m (£64m) funding round, led by Vertex Growth and Brunei Investment Agency. Existing investors Vertex Ventures SEA & India and Endiya Partners also participated. Kissht also announced its foray into credit-backed cards and the launch of a millennial focussed brand, ‘Ring’.

Ring aims to be a brand that appeals to young, aspirational millennials. This segment has a credit card penetration of less than 2 per cent. The factors driving low penetration are lack of POS infrastructure in non-top tier merchants and the inability of banks to service these customers, given the higher costs of acquisition and inferior risk understanding. The company aims to solve these issues through a fully-digital credit and payments app. Customers can use Ring to pay for eCommerce transactions, and for pay-to-merchant, pay-to-self, and pay-to-friend transactions.

The $80m investment will be used to enhance the product offering for millennials and to add other relevant financial products. Further, the company plans to build a strong loyalty offering in line with the evolving needs of the target segment. The focus will be on driving higher stickiness by offering rewards on the most relevant categories, such as grocery, travel and lifestyle.

“There are over 150m people, of which the majority are young millennials, who are either underserved or un-served on transaction credit,” said Kissht Founder and CEO, Ranvir Singh. “The transaction usage of millennial consumers is constantly evolving and they always look for ease and convenience. We are offering a one-stop credit and payment solution, which can be used any and everywhere and will change the way people use credit. With these transactions, we want to create a bond with the customer to help them across other banking needs.”