BharatPe gets funding at $2.85 bn valuation, appoints Suhail Sameer as CEO

Mumbai | Bengaluru: Online payments startup BharatPe said it has raised $350 million in new funding, which has catapulted its post-money valuation to $2.85 billion, as investors line up to back domestic internet businesses.

The new financing will help the New Delhi-based company enter the fast growing club of Indian unicorns this year, making it the 19th entrant into the group. Unicorns are privately held companies that are valued at $1 billion or more.


Leading the new financing round at BharatPe was New York-based Tiger Global, which has been extremely aggressive in the Indian market, besides participation from two new investors Dragoneer Investment Group and Steadfast Capital. BharatPe’s existing investors Coatue Management, Insight Partners, Sequoia Growth, Ribbit Capital and Amplo have also participated in the latest round. The company also said it has completed a $20 million secondary share sale as part of an employee share buyback programme.

On the back of the new financing, BharatPe has elevated Suhail Sameer as the company’s chief executive officer. Sameer had joined BharatPe as group president last year. In his new role, Sameer would be responsible for the overall business, merchant network expansion, monetisation, lending, banking foray and the brand.

Ashneer Grover, cofounder and CEO of BharatPe, will transition into the role of managing director.

ET had reported last month about these leadership changes that were being planned at BharatPe. We also reported about the closure of the current $350 million funding led by Tiger Global.

“We now have $500 millon cash on books and are extremely well-capitalised to deliver on our mandate to build India’s first truly digital bank,” Grover said. “Rarely does one witness the original thesis play out without any pivot. BharatPe will remain maniacally focused on lending as the core business and small merchants as our primary target segment.”

In June, BharatPe along with Centrum Bank received an in-principle approval from the Reserve Bank of India to take over distressed lender PMC Bank and set up a small finance bank. The fintech company currently claims to have disbursed loans worth Rs 1,800 crore to its merchants in partnership with various licensed lenders. ET reported in a deep dive on this alliance, how it snagged the license and the road ahead.

Also Read: Making sense of BharatPe’s banking foray

“I am excited to be stepping in his (Ashneer Grover) shoes and taking over the responsibilities of CEO,” Sameer said. “I am sure that with his continued guidance and focus on building a strong tech and product core, we will be able to scale the business 10x from here. We have the team, capital, technology, brand, product, market and regulatory regime to create an immensely valuable business.”

The firm also said it has brought on board 7 million merchants, processing $10 billion worth of annualised transactions. With the new round, BharatPe has joined a growing list of fintech startups that have attracted risk capital from equity investors in 2021 including Cred, Razorpay, Cashfree, Groww among others.