Property search aggregator Square Yards Consulting Pvt. Ltd has acquired Mumbai-based rental and property management platform Azuro.
Azuro investors Kae Capital, Mumbai Angels and White Unicorn Ventures will become shareholders in Square Yards as per the deal, according to a press statement. It didn’t disclose any other financial details.
The entire team of Azuro, including its founders, will also join Square Yards. Azuro, operated by Fittr Technologies Pvt. Ltd, was founded in 2016 by IIT-Bombay alumni Ayush Agrawal, Altaf Ahmad, Sudhanshu Mishra, Vishal Chauthmal and Sushant Kumar.
Square Yards founder and chief executive officer Tanuj Shori said the move will help the company in adding synergies to its value chain because of Azuro’s approach to gaining market share in the large rentals and property management space.
“Both rentals and property management are multi-billion-dollar opportunities but are currently underserved in India,” Shori said.
Separately, Ahmad said Azuro would integrate its end-to-end property management system with Square Yards’ platform and leverage the latter’s reach, operational resources, and consumer-facing portal.
Azuro says its platform offers a complete rental and property management solution by addressing the logistical and tactical issues involved with tenant-acquisition and background checks. Its other services also include automated rent collection, property maintenance, and tenant exist.
In 2016, the firm raised an undisclosed amount of seed funding from White Unicorn Ventures, Kae Capital, and Mumbai Angels. At the time, it said it would utilise the funds for expanding its operations across Mumbai and building out its technological infrastructure.
Square Yards, meanwhile, was set up in 2014 by Shori and Kanika Gupta. It is used by buyers, agents, and developers. The company claims to have ties with about 500 developers while it's home loan unit, Square Capital, has partnerships with 90 banks and non-banking financial companies.
In September last year, the technology-enabled real estate platform raised $20 million (around Rs 142.2 crore) from a clutch of investors including media house Bennett Coleman and Company Ltd and Japanese investment company Genkai Capital. Before that, it raised $10 million in early 2017 from investors including the Lohia Group and Andre Hoffman, the chief executive of cosmetics company L'Occitane.
