Lentra Raises $27 Mn in Extended Series B Round

• The extended Series-B round was led by MUFG Bank and Dharana Capital
• The fastest growing enterprise SaaS company had raised $60mn in Series-B round in November 2022

Lentra, the fastest growing cloud-lending firm, announced raising $27 Million as a part of their extended series B round led by MUFG Bank and Dharana Capital. The software as a service startup had raised $60mn in series-B round on November 22 by its existing investors Bessemer Venture Partners and SIG Venture Capital with participation from Citi Ventures.

MUFG Bank, through its Ganesha investment fund for Indian start-ups, has invested in Lentra, a leading cloud lending platform that empowers financial institutions and non-banking financial institutions (NBFCs). This deal marks the first joint investment by the bank and MUFG Innovation Partners Co., Ltd (MUIP), a corporate venture capital under the MUFG Group. With this collaboration, both the entities are poised to support Lentra to further explore synergies within the Group, including its strategic partner banks in South-east Asia.

Shashank Joshi, Deputy CEO of MUFG India, said “This is a testimony to Lentra’s status as the leading Enterprise SaaS (Software as a Service) Platform and the transformational role it stands to play in the evolving digital lending landscape. This partnership affirms our commitment to be at the forefront of supporting digital innovation in India and its expansion to other geographies.”

“We are proud to back Lentra in its mission to become the one-stop ecosystem across the entire lending lifecycle of leading global financial institutions. The Lentra team has scaled the business in a highly capital efficient manner and is well positioned to benefit from the tailwinds of digitization across markets." added Vamsi Duvvuri, Founder and Managing Partner, Dharana Capital. 

Having successfully scaled as the fastest growing SaaS, Lending cloud provider in India, Lentra extended its presence to Vietnam, Philippines Indonesia and the US by successfully setting up subsidiaries and accelerating GTM (go to market). Lentra has also successfully completed the launch of its Loan management system called 1LMS that enables lenders to fulfill needs of billions of borrowers at accelerated speed and accuracy. In a strategic partnership with Google Cloud, 1LMS was previewed in the Indian markets in an event curated for the leading banks and NBFCs earlier in May.

D Venkatesh, Founder & CEO, Lentra, “We have been scaling at a fast pace and this extended round is a strategic step towards fueling our ambition of empowering lenders globally. We are very excited that MUFG Bank and Dharana Capital are getting added to our cap table alongside our existing marquee investors like BVP, Citi, HDFC and SIG.”

About Lentra

Founded in 2019, by D Venkatesh and Ankur Handa, Lentra is a Cloud-native platform designed and developed to empower financial institutions with tomorrow’s lending ecosystem, today. With its full-stack, fully digital, secured products and solutions, Lentra is the future of smart, seamless, secure digital lending. The lending cloud platform services more than 60 financial institutions and has processed more than US$27 billion worth of loan applications on its platform. For more information visit https://lentra.ai/

About MUFG and MUIP

Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc. (MUFG) is one of the world’s leading financial groups. Headquartered in Tokyo and with over 360 years of history, MUFG has a global network with approximately 2,100 locations in more than 50 countries. The Group has about 160,000 employees and offers services including commercial banking, trust banking, securities, credit cards, consumer finance, asset management, and leasing. The Group aims to “be the world’s most trusted financial group” through close collaboration among our operating companies and flexibly respond to all of the financial needs of our clients, serving society, and fostering shared and sustainable growth for a better world. MUFG’s shares trade on the Tokyo, Nagoya, and New York stock exchanges. For more information, visit https://www.mufg.jp/english.

MUFG Innovation Partners, Inc. (MUIP) is a US$450 Million corporate venture capital firm established by MUFG to invest in fintech-related startups worldwide. For more information, visit https://www.ip.mufg.jp/.

About Dharana Capital:

Dharana Capital is an investment firm with an exclusive focus on making concentrated investments into category-defining technology companies in India and other emerging markets. It is an affiliate of Vy Capital which has technology investments globally in market leaders such as Reddit, Neuralink, Upgrade, Coalition, Zomato and Urban Company.

DMI Finance Announces the Closure of a $400 Mn Equity Investment Round Led by Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc. With Participation From Existing Investors Including Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank Limited

DMI Finance Private Limited (“DMI Finance”) today announced the closure of a USD 400 million equity investment round led by Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc. through its consolidated subsidiary MUFG Bank, Ltd (“MUFG”), with participation from existing investor Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank Limited (“SuMi TRUST Bank”). This round includes primary and secondary transactions.

DMI Finance is a pure-play digital lender with products including consumption, personal and MSME loans. It leverages technology to optimize every step in the lending stack, from sales and underwriting through to customer service and collections.

DMI Finance sources and services customers through multiple digital channels – in particular it is an embedded digital finance partner of choice for leading businesses including Samsung, Google Pay and Airtel which work with DMI Finance to provide diverse financial products to their customers across India.

DMI Finance covers 95% of India's pincodes and has an accessible customer base of 25 million which is expected to grow to 40 million+ in FY24. It is projected to disburse over USD 2.5 billion in FY24 across products.

DMI Finance is AA- rated by ICRA and supported by leading Indian and international banks.

Shivashish Chatterjee, Co-Founder and Joint Managing Director of DMI Finance said: “Powered by world-leading digital infrastructure, India is in the midst of an unprecedented transformation. DMI Finance aims to be the trusted partner for Indian households and small businesses in addressing their rapidly growing financial needs. We are delighted to welcome MUFG and SuMi TRUST Bank on this pioneering mission, on which we embarked in 2016, of providing credit in real time to our clients. We are grateful to them for this display of confidence in the ability of our team to deliver superior results, both for our clients and our investors.”

Yuvraja C. Singh, Co-Founder and Joint Managing Director of DMI Finance said “We feel that the Indian financial market has huge potential for growth over the next decade (or two) and are fortunate to have the strategic investors that we do, who share our values and long-term vision. There is a large underserved population when it comes to financial services in India, and it is our goal to promote financial inclusion and support this market. It is very important to us that all stakeholders have a positive experience working with DMI, and this requires us and our investors to have philosophical and strategic alignment. With their patience and deep experience in the financial markets, we feel that MUFG and SuMi TRUST Bank, are the perfect investors for us. We look forward to working together.”

Masashige Nakazono, Managing Director, Head of Global Commercial Banking Planning Division of MUFG Bank said: “For MUFG, Asia is a significantly important and second home market, and India is one of our most expected growing markets with the rapid population growth and foundation of digital infrastructure, showing a strong trend and potential of expansion on digital financial services to the unbanked customers. We strongly believe that DMI Finance has been building up a robust and distinguished business model with external partnership based on the power of its cutting-edge technologies. We’re excited to support DMI Finance’s growth through our investment as a strategic partner and to contribute to the financial inclusion in India. We are looking forward to accompanying DMI Finance’s promising voyage in the digital financial market.”

Masaya Noda, Managing Executive Officer of SuMi TRUST Bank said: “We feel honoured to participate in this equity investment round and contribute to DMI’s growth as a “Strategic Investor”, following our initial investment that was also the first by a Japanese company in December 2021. We are confident that DMI’s digital financial services, which organically combine fintech and last-mile reach capabilities, will continue to contribute significantly to India’s growth, and that DMI itself will achieve further growth. We also look forward to creating business opportunities to collaborate with DMI as its business partner, and to growing together with DMI through India-related business.”

About the DMI Group

DMI Finance is a Systemically Important Non-Banking Financial Company and part of the DMI Group. For more information, please visit: https://www.dmifinance.in.

Founded in 2008 and supported by a deeply experienced team across 40+ offices in India, the DMI Group is a pan-India financial services platform with core businesses in digital finance, housing finance and asset management. It has raised over USD 1.5 billion of equity investment and is supported by global institutional investors, strategic family offices and leading Indian and international banks.

Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc. (MUFG) is one of the world’s leading financial groups. Headquartered in Tokyo and with over 360 years of history, MUFG has a global network with approximately 2,100 locations in more than 50 countries. The Group has about 160,000 employees and offers services including commercial banking, trust banking, securities, credit cards, consumer finance, asset management, and leasing. The Group aims to “be the world’s most trusted financial group” through close collaboration among our operating companies and flexibly respond to all of the financial needs of our clients, serving society, and fostering shared and sustainable growth for a better world. MUFG’s shares trade on the Tokyo, Nagoya, and New York stock exchanges. For more information, visit https://www.mufg.jp/english.

About Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank, Limited (SuMi TRUST Bank)

Established in 1925, SuMi TRUST Bank is Japan's largest trust bank with JPY 224 trillion (~USD 1.95 trillion) of custody assets and JPY 87 trillion (~USD 760 billion) of assets under management. SuMi TRUST Bank provides a wide range of services concerning commercial bank business, asset management and administration, and disposal of assets, with trustee business such as pension trusts and investment trusts, and complementary businesses such as real estate brokerage and stock transfer agency services. SuMi TRUST Group's purpose is "Creating new value with the power of trusts and let prosperous future for our clients and society bloom" and is promoting initiatives to achieve both social value creation and economic value creation. For more details, please visit www.smtb.jp/english.

Japan's MUFG Bank Sets Up "Ganesha Fund" to Invest $300 Mn in Indian Startups

MUFG Bank, a core-banking subsidiary of Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc. (MUFG), a Japanese bank holding and financial services company, announced that it plans to invest USD 300 million in Indian startups through the new MUFG Ganesha Fund.

Through this fund, MUFG Bank will invest in middle- to late-stage Indian startups. In the future, we will aim to leverage our group strengths to provide a wide range of financial services to our portfolio companies.

India, aided by strong economic growth, has seen an increase in the number of startups leveraging digital technology, given the rise of young digital natives in the country, the rapid spread of the Internet, and the promotion of governmental policies that support digitalization. Many of these startups are using technology to solve social issues, such as fintech companies that support unbanked segments within the country who were previously unable to receive financial services as well as companies specializing in the environmental sustainability and renewables sectors.

Since positioning the capture of Asian growth, responding to the digital shift, and contributing to environmental and social issues are priority strategies, MUFG has pursued initiatives in the region, such as building a business platform through investments in partner banks and supporting startups via Mars Growth Capital [1]. We will further contribute to the development of new industries and the sustainable development of local communities by financially supporting the growth of startups in India. Through the fund, MUFG will also drive collaboration with promising companies in the areas of tech and IT, and explore new business opportunities.

[1] For details on the business of Mars Growth Capital, please refer to the following press release: https://www.bk.mufg.jp/global/newsroom/admin/newse0117.pdf

Mitsubishi's MUFG Bank Acquires Stakes in Indian Firms including Tech Mahindra, Tata Global Beverages

Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG), one of the main companies of Japan's Mitsubishi Group, has acquired significant stakes in several Indian companies, including Dr Reddy's, Tech Mahindra, Tata Global Beverages, Godrej Consumer, Marico and Cyient through acquisition of entities that hold shares of the companies.

The acquisitions of indirect stakes in different companies follow MUFG's acquisition of First State Investments (UK), First State Investments (Singapore) Colonial First State Asset Management (Australia), First State Investments Ltd, Mitsubishi UFJ Trust and Banking Coporation and Mitsubishi UFJ Kokusai Asset Management on August 2.

These entities held stakes in the said companies, according to separate regulatory filings.

Godrej Consumer Products Ltd (GCPL) said following the transaction, MUFG has an aggregated interest of 5.47 per cent.

Similarly, Marico Ltd said MUFG's stake in it has gone up to 6.47 per cent from 0.02 per cent earlier.

Pharma major Dr Reddy's said MUFG has acquired an indirect interest amounting to 8.41 per cent, up from 0.05 per cent stake earlier.

Likewise, MUFG also acquired an indirect interest of 9.93 per cent stake in Tata Global Beverages Ltd following acquisition of entities that hold shares of the company.

A filing by Tech Mahindra showed that MUFG had acquired an indirect interest of 9.01 per cent. "The thresholds for disclosures ...are met and currently, MUFG has an aggregated interest in Tech Mahindra of 9.01 per cent ordinary share capital as on August 2, 2019, which is the date of acquisition. This is based upon a total of 88,786,599 shares held and a total of 9,85,201,274 voting rights on issue," it said.

Similarly, a filing by Cyient said MUFG has acquired an indirect interest of 9.81 per cent in the company. PTI RKL SR