Hyderabad-based Zaggle Prepaid Ocean Services Pvt. Ltd, which operates digital payments and cashback company Zaggle, has bought online coupons firm Pennyful in a cash-and-stock deal, a statement said.
The acquisition will help Zaggle offer benefits to consumers and corporate employees, and develop technology products and solutions, the statement added. The financial details of the transaction were undisclosed.
Following the acquisition, the 20-member Pennyful team will join Zaggle’s digital marketing, product and technology teams.
“Zaggle is moving towards an omni-channel marketing platform following the acquisition of Pennyful. Zaggle, over a period of five years, has built a huge repertoire of business-to-business clients. The focus is on the business-to-business-to-consumer market of over 25 million [customers], and we want to create more and more value for this set of consumers,†Raj N Phani, founder of Zaggle, said.
Bengaluru-based Pennyful Online Pvt. Ltd was founded by engineering graduate Ravitej Yadalam in 2011 in the US. The firm entered the Indian market in November 2012. The cashback and coupons company has 1,000 brands and claims to have customers from more than 800 cities.
Zaggle was founded in 2011 by Phani and currently has six offices across India with over 1,000 corporate clients and over 1,500 merchants on board.
Other players in the deals segment include Nearbuy, mydala, CouponDunia and CashKaro, among others. Last month, online deals startup Couponhaat raised pre-Series A investment from Austria-based angel investor Axel Wawrina.
In November 2016, rewards app Kloseby, which helps users earn rewards when visiting stores, raised $100,000 (around Rs 68 lakh) in seed investment.
In September last year, deals and discounts site Nearbuy raised venture debt of Rs 15 crore (about $2.25 million) from non-banking financial company BlackSoil Capital Pvt. Ltd. The firm was earlier Groupon India and was rebranded in 2015 when the NASDAQ-listed parent firm sold a majority stake in its India unit to Sequoia Capital and the company’s management.
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