Fintech player Pepper Money Pvt. Ltd, which runs Pepper Money, on Monday said that it is planning to invest $150 million to set up a fintech facility in India.
The KKR-backed Sydney-headquartered company said in a release that it plans to deploy the corpus over the next four years, with the aim to target the 15 crore households in Tier II and III cities. It is planning to launch the platform in the second half of the ongoing calendar year.
With a focus of hiring 200 employees for its consumer finance products, Pepper Money is also looking to build a network of strategic partnerships, including co-branded card partnerships and collaborations with co-lenders.
The company, led by Abhishek Kothari, former founder of FlexiLoans, is looking to introduce personal finance products for consumers in Tier II and III cities. “With Pepper Money India, our vision is to transform the experience of Tier II and III consumers by localising and personalising financial products for them,” said Kothari.
Pepper, which has an existing presence in Australia, the UK, Europe, South Korea, Japan and South-East Asia, first entered India via its Pepper Advantage brand in 2019.
“We are extremely confident about the Indian economy, which has been amongst the high growth performers in recent years. With 65% of the population under 35 years of age and over 90% smartphone adoption between 18-35 years, India has the potential to become one of the largest markets for us in the next five years. Abhishek’s fintech experience and deep understanding of the consumer will be instrumental in building the Pepper Money brand across India," said Mike Culhane, group chief executive officer (CEO) of Pepper.
Pepper Group, which was founded in 2000, claims to have $21 billion in assets under management (AUM) of self-generated loans via its Pepper Money brand. It also says that it has $55 billion in AUM of third-party loans under credit management via Pepper Advantage.
In November 2017, global investment firm KKR acquired Pepper Money for $657 million, leading to its delisting from Australian Securities Exchange Ltd (ASX). The company returned to ASX in May 2021.