Finja, Pakistan’s leading digital lending platform, announced today that it has closed $9 Million of a $10 Million Series A1 financing round.
This latest round brings in new investor ICU Ventures, with all previous institutional investors participating again including BeeNext, Vostok Emerging Finance, Quona Capital, and Gray MacKenzie Engineering Services (a Descon company).
Under the terms of the financing, the company has the flexibility to raise an additional $1 Million as a part of this round.
Finja subsidiaries operate under dual licensing regimes of the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) and the Securities & Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) for its lending and digital payments businesses. With this first-of-its-kind support from both regulators, Finja has forged digital partnerships with banks, FMCGs, distributors, kiryana stores, and small businesses.
The company has clocked over Rs. 100 Billion in transactional volume with its assets under management growing more than 110% during the pandemic year.
Supported by the credit books of its partner banks, Finja has disbursed over 50,000 unsecured digitally scored Islamic and conventional loans to businesses and salaried individuals. Small business and consumer lending represent an Rs. 10 Trillion (USD 60 Billion) market in Pakistan of which less than 4% is currently penetrated. As a result of this sector being neglected, small businesses have largely struggled to grow due to the unavailability of capital.
‘‘With this new capital injection along with our strong partnerships with SECP, SBP, banks, FMCGs, distributors and so many other parts of the supply chain and payment ecosystem, we are fully equipped and supported by the industry to rapidly scale to create unprecedented impact,” said Qasif Shahid, Finja’s Co-Founder and CEO.
Finja’s Co-Founder and Chairman Monis Rahman added, “We are excited to scale our efforts to help small businesses and consumers reach their goals with dignity. We are grateful for the support of some of the world’s best fintech funds which have invested in Pakistan for the first time through Finja.”
“Through this capital injection along with our upcoming licenses, we will be accelerating scale in our loan portfolio and partnerships with banks to participate in our marketplace,” said Qasif Shahid, Co-Founder, and CEO of Finja. “We are grateful for the privilege of partnering with highly respected names in emerging-market fintech venture capital as we approach our upcoming Series A1 financing round to rapidly grow our business” added Monis Rahman Co-Founder and Chairman of Finja.
Johan Bosini, partner at Quona Capital said, “We are excited to be part of Finja. We have seen similar models succeed in other exciting markets that we have invested in, including high growth markets in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.”
Source: Pro Pakistani
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