Tala has raised $145 million (Rs 1,088 crore) as part of its Series E funding round led by AI-based lending platform Upstart, along with Stellar Development foundation, the company said on Friday.
New investors Kindred Ventures and the J Safra Group as well as existing investors including IVP, Revolution Growth, Lowercase Capital, and PayPal Ventures also contributed to the funding round, it added.
A US-based Technology Startup company, Tala, is trying to make financial services more accessible.
Founded by Shivani Siroya in 2011, Tala offers microloans for the people of countries like India, Kenya, Mexico, and the Philippines ranging from US$10 to US$500. Since the beginning, the company has provided credits of more than US$2.7 billion over 6 million customers. The company has made a strong base of more than half-million customers after its entry into India last year.
Freshly raised funds will be utilized by the company to expand its team across some of the countries including India and provide crypto-based products by leveraging Stellar’s network.
Shivani Siroya, founder and CEO of Tala, said, “the company spent the past seven years delivering critical and valued services in markets where the financial system is fundamentally broken for millions of people”.
“Upstart shares Tala’s belief that technology is the key to unlock access for the underserved, and we’re excited to support them in serving the next 1 billion people entering the financial system,” said Paul Gu, co-founder and head of product at Upstart, started by former Google employees in 2012.
Earlier in August 2019, Tala had raised $110 million (Rs 785.5 crore) in its Series D round of funding led by RPS Ventures, a fund set up by former SoftBank managing director Kabir Misra.
Tala is strongly seeking to stand ahead of its competitor startups in India like Lendingkart, Ziploan, Biz2Credit, ZestMoney, and Avail Finance which have also got millions of dollars in funding from various Venture Capital firms.
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