AsiaTechDaily – Asia's Leading Tech and Startup Media Platform
Groww, the Bengaluru based Fintech platform has become the second Fintech to enter the Unicorn Club of 2021. They crossed the Billion dollar threshold in April, after their Series D funding rounds.
Groww is an online brokerage platform founded by four former Flipkart employees, Lalit Keshre, Harsh Jain, Ishan Bansal and Neeraj Singh. The firm began its operations in 2017, offering flat discount brokerage services in IPOs, Equity, and Direct Mutual Funds. It is the brand name for the SEBI registered stockbroker Nextbillion Technology Pvt Ltd (NTPL), which is also a member of BSE as well as NSE.
Out of the 1.4 Billion people in the country, 200 million are working individuals capable of investing. However, only a fraction of them invests their money. Almost 90% of individuals do not invest at all.
This is mainly because of how complicated it is for people to start investing. India has a lack of platforms that simplify the process and make it more transparent. By tapping into this market, Groww can bring more people into the fold. This will enable earners to diversify their income sources through investments, and boost the businesses and the economy by drawing in more finance from the populace.
Groww also wants to create a safe and reliable platform for people to learn as well as to invest. The firm has put in a lot of effort to research and learn what the app needs. They want to attract investors by providing them with a user-friendly platform and simplify investments for the masses.
Groww began as a direct Mutual fund investment platform in 2017. After popular demand rose, they have also added options for IPOs, Digital Gold, ETFs and Intraday trading in 2020.
The platform offers a multitude of options for investment to the customer base, and this is key to user retention. Unlike traditional regular mutual fund investments that go through distributors, Groww provides direct investment options. Their main source of income is the fee that they charge from Mutual Fund houses instead of users, unlike in regular investments where the commission is charged from the users.
Today, Groww is trusted by over 1.5 Crore users across 900+ cities for their investment needs. As a platform that makes an opaque and mostly tedious process easier, they are popular among plenty of new investors. This in turn has attracted a lot of attention to the startup.
Groww closed its Series D funding rounds, declaring a total investment of over $83 Million in April 2021. This is just 6 months removed from a $30 Million in their Series C rounds, in September 2019. The Series D round was led by Tiger Global, and existing investors Sequoia Capital, YC Continuity, Ribbit Capital and Propel Venture Partners. The company is now valued at over a billion dollars.
By harnessing the untapped potential of the uninvesting masses, Groww has all the scope to become a major player in the online investment sector, if not the biggest name. Their platform offers a simplified and transparent process of investing, as opposed to the murky and tedious traditional methods. This disruption can not only change the investment behaviour of the population but also boost the business ecosystem by creating a larger, decentralised flow of funds.