 "RIL dips into MF kitty, may retire debt")
Ahmedabad-based mobile bitcoin startup Zebpay on Wednesday announced raising nearly $1 million in a series 'A' funding. The funding was led by growth equity investor Arjun Handa, CMD & VP of Claris Life sciences and Amit Jindal, MD of Jindal worldwide, among others.
Making the announcement, Zebpay said that the funding is aimed at further escalating the company’s growth and customer service success. The mobile bitcoin company, which was co-founded by Mahin Gupta, Saurabh Agrawal and Sandeep Goenka, intends to utilize the fund to ramp up innovation of its blockchain based services and talent acquisition to proliferate reach of its bitcoin wallet in India. Zebpay's mobile bitcoin wallet allows its over 25,000 users to buy, sell, store and use bitcoins to buy e-commerce site vouchers as well as recharge mobile airtime across India.
By adding 100,000 users to its mobile app, Zebpay aims to touch a Rs 500 crore turnover by the end of the year.
Zebpay has set up a dedicated blockchain lab in order to leverage blockchain power to innovate authentication, authorization and proof of existence. It is working with a few government sections to offer innovative blockchain solutions which can save thousands of crores in redundant expenses.
"Governments worldwide have acknowledged the fact that blockchain technology has potential to disrupt current financial systems and are exploring ways to benefit from it. It is currently in the nascent stage as what Internet was during the Iraq war. Even RBI, in its recent report on financial stability, has appreciated the strengths of the underlying 'blockchain' technology. Contrary to its previous note of caution, it has praised the intrinsic potential of the technology to help check counterfeiting and bring a major transformation in financial infrastructure, collateral identification and the payments system," Agrawal said.
Making the announcement, Zebpay said that the funding is aimed at further escalating the company’s growth and customer service success. The mobile bitcoin company, which was co-founded by Mahin Gupta, Saurabh Agrawal and Sandeep Goenka, intends to utilize the fund to ramp up innovation of its blockchain based services and talent acquisition to proliferate reach of its bitcoin wallet in India. Zebpay's mobile bitcoin wallet allows its over 25,000 users to buy, sell, store and use bitcoins to buy e-commerce site vouchers as well as recharge mobile airtime across India.
By adding 100,000 users to its mobile app, Zebpay aims to touch a Rs 500 crore turnover by the end of the year.
Zebpay has set up a dedicated blockchain lab in order to leverage blockchain power to innovate authentication, authorization and proof of existence. It is working with a few government sections to offer innovative blockchain solutions which can save thousands of crores in redundant expenses.
"Governments worldwide have acknowledged the fact that blockchain technology has potential to disrupt current financial systems and are exploring ways to benefit from it. It is currently in the nascent stage as what Internet was during the Iraq war. Even RBI, in its recent report on financial stability, has appreciated the strengths of the underlying 'blockchain' technology. Contrary to its previous note of caution, it has praised the intrinsic potential of the technology to help check counterfeiting and bring a major transformation in financial infrastructure, collateral identification and the payments system," Agrawal said.
Meanwhile, on their part, equity investors Handa and Jindal said that the funding was a result of a combination of tech and business acumen found among the founders.
