Bengaluru based online lending startup Avail Finance has raised $17.2 million in a Series A round that saw participation from the founders of marquee Indian Internet companies including Ola's Ankit Bhati and Bhavish Aggarwal, Freecharge founder Kunal Shah, Flipkart founder Binny Bansal along with Mswipe founder Manish Patel.Matrix Partners led the round. The funding round was a mix of both equity and debt for the company with the debt coming in from banks and other non-banking finance companies.
Avail Finance lends to consumers who work as office boys, cleaning staff and in other blue collar jobs at big companies and plans to grow their portfolio with the latest round.
"We plan to be able to disburse loans on a click of a button and make our decision making the process quicker, for that we will need to strengthen the platform with our fresh funds," said Ankush Aggarwal, chief executive officer, Avail Finance.
Lending within the broader range of Rs 5,000 to 60,000 for an average tenure of eight months, the non-banking finance company has tied up with more than 12 corporate entities to source its prospective borrowers.
"We have a net outstanding of around Rs 5 crore since February last year when we went live and have disbursed 4000 loans so far," said Agarwal. While the company is extending short duration term loans as of now, it has plans to enter into a line of credit business as well.