Digital trade financing network Vayana Network Services Pvt Ltd has raised $15 million (Rs 114 crore) as part of its Series C funding from International Finance Corporation (IFC) and PayU.
The Pune-based company plans to use the fresh proceeds to build MSME-focused products.
In January, VCCircle reported that the World Bank’s investment arm IFC planning around $8 million (Rs 59.4 crore) investment in Vayana Network.
IFC has an active LP (limited partner) portfolio in India. It also makes direct private equity (PE) investments and also lends to companies.
In India, IFC’s commitments for the fiscal year ending June 2021 stood at $1.7 billion, marking 51% from last year.
India, as a country, is IFC’s largest client globally.
The announcement comes just after Vayana raised Rs 283 crore in a Series C funding round led by venture capital firm Chiratae Ventures and the UK development finance institution (DFI) and impact investor CDC Group, in November last year.
The company has been catering to MSMEs in the long tail of the supply chains.
It also claims to be one of the largest goods and services tax (GST) providers in the country and facilitates GST, e-way bills, e-invoices for many corporates and SMEs.
Vayana said it has India network spread across 600 cities. It also claims to connect more than 1,000 corporates and their trade ecosystems to the digital arena and offers affordable access to credit for their payables and receivables.
Vayana, which terms itself India’s largest supply-chain finance platform, also claims to have financed more than $8 billion, including more than $1 billion of finance, through business-to-business (B2B) card flows to over 22,000 MSMEs for more than 1,000 supply chains in 25 different sectors.
The company’s network also extends to 20 countries across the globe.
“While we are set to do more than $10 bn of trade financing in India alone this financial year, we are focusing on creating tools and infrastructure to help small businesses manage their working capital efficiently and sourcing trade finance at the most affordable rates.
We will continue to build on our leadership role in public trade infrastructure including GST, e-Invoice and e-Way Bill and embedding credit for every business in the supply chain,” said Ram Iyer, Founder and CEO, Vayana Network.
“In FY 23 also will see the launch of Vayana ITFS (International Trade Finance Services) platform at GIFT City (Gujarat), which will enable exporters and importers access international trade finance facilities at competitive rates,” he added.
