New Delhi, March 31: E-commerce player Snapdeal has bought a majority stake in online financial services company RupeePower for an undisclosed amount through a cash-and-stock deal.
The move will help Snapdeal to enter the Rs 4,500- crore domestic online financial services market.
"We want to create the largest financial services marketplace in India," said Kunal Bahl, co-founder and chief executive of Snapdeal. He added that the partnership would help to solve distribution challenges in the financial services ecosystem and make it more inclusive.
According to Bahl, the online financial services market is estimated at $30 billion by 2020. Snapdeal already provides capital support to its sellers via its platform Capital Assist. "Alibaba has done this in China to create credit availability in the market," Bahl said.
Founded in 2011, Gurgaon-based RupeePower acts as a match-making platform between lenders and borrowers. The marketplace includes a wide range of financial services such as personal loans, educational loans, credit cards, auto loans, home loans and extended warranties.
RupeePower has enabled Rs 1,500 crore of credit disbursal during 2014-15 and expects to disburse around Rs 6,000 crore in the next 24 months.
"The share of digital origination of credit is poised to grow from 7.5 per cent to 40 per cent over the next four years, in a Rs 400,000-crore retail credit market growing at 20 per cent annually," RupeePower founder and CEO Tejasvi Mohanram said.
He said the platforms would be integrated to allow Snapdeal consumers to make purchases using the finance options offered by RupeePower.
Flipkart move
Flipkart is believed to be in talks to raise around $600 million (about Rs 3,750 crore) from a group of investors.
The e-commerce firm, valued at around $11.5-12 billion (about Rs 71,000-75,000 crore), is also looking at a higher valuation, sources said.
Flipkart did not offer any comments.
Sources said the Bangalore-based company's bid for a higher valuation would depend on the ongoing fund-raising talks with investors.
