Khatabook raises $100 mn; announces $10 mn ESOP buyback plan

Digital bookkeeping app Khatabook announced on Tuesday that it has raised $100 million in a Series C funding, with a valuation nearing $600 million. US-based VC firms Tribe Capital and Moore Strategic Ventures (MSV) led the round.
 
The round was oversubscribed and saw participation from investors such as Alkeon Capital, B Capital Group, Sequoia Capital, Tencent, RTP Ventures, Unilever Ventures, and Better Capital. Balaji Srinivasan, Sriram Krishnan participated as independent investors.
 
The company said that it will buy back $10 million worth of ESOPs to acknowledge and reward their current and former employees, as well as early investors who showed faith in Khatabook. Eligible employees will be able to sell as much as 30 per cent of their vested options. The company has said that it has expanded its ESOP pool to $50 million.
 
Khatabook added that it will accelerate its hiring drive, especially in engineering, product, design, analytics, and data science functions.
 
It said that it will now focus on financial service disbursement through our tech platforms that have been widely accepted for MSMEs. It will digitally foster lending, payment and deposits-related efficiencies in the MSME space.
 
The digital bookkeeping app said that it is looking for the right partnership opportunities to enable the seamless rollout of solutions for economic aspirations of small businesses.
 
Co-founder Arjun Sethi said, "Khatabook has successfully built such a network by empowering this seismic shift among MSME businesses to move from paper to digital, literally."

Formed two-and-a-half years ago, Khatabook currently has an active user base of 10 million. Apart from the lead product, they also have SaaS business management solution Biz Analyst, staff management platform for businesses Pagarkhata, and Cashbook for those who want a digital solution for only cash handling and tracking.

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