Aditya Hadi Pratama · · 1 min readFintech platform bags $145m to serve underbanked in India, Kenya, others
Tala (formerly called InVenture), a US-based fintech startup, raised a US$145 million series E funding round led by lending platform Upstart.
Tala founder Shivani Siroya / Photo credit: Tala
Kindred Ventures, J. Safra Group, and Stellar Development Foundation – a nonprofit organization that supports the open source protocol Stellar – also participated in the round, joined by existing investors such as IVP, Revolution Growth, and Lowercase Capital.
The investment boosts the company’s total funding to date to US$350 million.
Founded by Shivani Siroya in 2011, Tala offers microloans ranging from US$10 to US$500 to the underbanked population of India, Kenya, Mexico, and the Philippines. Since its inception, the company has disbursed more than US$2.7 billion in credit to over 6 million customers. The startup entered India last year, and it has since onboarded more than half a million users in the country.
In a statement, Tala says that there are over 12,000 new users who sign up for its service every day.
The company plans to use the fresh funds to hire more employees across its existing markets, expand to new countries, and provide crypto-based products by leveraging Stellar’s network.
As part of the round, Upstart co-founder Paul Gu and Stellar Development Foundation CEO Denelle Dixon have joined Tala’s board of directors.
Editing by Miguel Cordon and Lorenzo Kyle Subido
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