Indian fintech startup raises funds for helping banks loan funds to others
Lentra has shown outstanding metrics on revenue retention and has revealed a 20x growth
India originally became well-known in the tech sector when it became a significant hub for business process outsourcing. This heritage has now changed completely in the fintech sector with the introduction of embedded finance technologies. By this token, Lentra, an Indian embedded AI-based financial firm, recently revealed they’d raised $60 million in a Series B investment, valuing the company at over $400 million.
Susquehanna International Group (SIG) and Bessemer Venture Partners served as the round’s lead investors, with strategic support coming from Citi Ventures, a division of New York based Citigroup, the largest investmentment bank in the world.
Citi Ventures’ first investment in an Indian fintech company demonstrates how far the ecosystems for integrated finance and fintech have come in recent years. Lentra is profitable and has been growing significantly. In 2019, the first year of operations, Lentra registered $1 million from its ‘annual consumption rate’ which is the amount of money the company makes through the use of its APIs. As of this year, it is up to $10 million, and by 2024, it’s expected to reach $100 million.
Commercial banks’ digital lending services are run by the Mumbai-based company. Federal Bank, Standard Chartered, HDFC Bank, and IDFC First Bank are a few of its most significant clients. Lentra has managed more than 50 clients’ $21 billion in loans and more than 13 billion transcriptions since its founding. Venkatesh states that the company has expanded tremendously without ever recruiting a single sales executive up until April of this year.
The company’s objective is similar to that of several other fintechs that have entered the fray with the idea of working alongside conventional financial services providers as opposed to entirely upending and disrupting them. These suppliers have found that they are unable to keep up with the innovation of their more swiftly developing, technologically advanced rivals.
