SME Corner raises Rs 90 Cr in mix round of equity and debt

SMEs-focused digital lending platform SME Corner has picked up Rs 90 crore in a mixed round of equity and debt.

Accion Frontier Inclusion Fund managed by Quona Capital put in Rs 35 crore whereas existing investors including Accion Venture Lab infused Rs 10 crore in the Mumbai-based startup.

The rest amount (i.e; Rs 45 crore) has come in the form of debt from Northern Arc and Vivriti Finance.

The Samir Bhatia led company plans to use the fresh capital to scale up operations to reach 30 cities by next fiscal year. Currently, it is operating in nine cities across three states.

Founded in 2012, SME Corner runs two product under its portfolio. While Unsecured Business Loan facilitates hassle-free unsecured loan up to Rs. 30 lakhs to small retailer including readymade garment stores, chemists, kirana stores, and food outlets, its second product provides loan against property up to Rs. 1 crore.

The firm has deployed machine learning, data science, and artificial intelligence to provide the aforementioned services in quick time.

With an average ticket size of Rs 6.5 lakh at an interest rate of 24 per cent, SME Corner claims to onboard 3,000 customers on its platform.

According to Bhatia, the company will be ending the fiscal year with Rs 230 crore of loan disbursals and aims to reach Rs 900 crore by 2020 to serve 12,000 customers, reports ET.

Last, SME Corner had raised $7 million in a mixed round of equity and debt from Capital First, existing investor Accion Ventures, and a clutch of high net worth individuals.

Lendingkart, Capital Float, IndiaLends, OfBusiness among others compete with SME Corner in this space.