7th unicorn of '22 is Livspace🦄, Pine Labs acquires Qfix🏹, Razorpay 🤝🏻 Curlec
Livspace turns unicorn, Pine Labs acquires Qfix, Razorpay marks international foray, Funding Deals & more.
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Livspace turns unicorn after raising $180 million🦄
Home renovation platform Livspace on Tuesday crossed a valuation of $1 billion after raising $180 million in a late-stage funding round led by KKR & Co.
The home renovation platform is the 86th Indian startup unicorn. It is also the seventh startup of 2022, and the second in two days. We reported yesterday that ElasticRun, a kirana-focused business-to-business ecommerce firm, had joined the club after raising $300 million in a round led by SoftBank Vision Fund II.
Swedish retailer Ikea, and other early backers Jungle Ventures, Venturi Partners and Peugeot Investments, also invested in the round. Livspace, a Singapore-registered firm with significant operations in India, has raised about $450 million to date.
Founded in 2014 by Ramakant Sharma and Anuj Srivastava, Livspace claims to be the largest omnichannel home interior and renovation company.
IPO-Bound Pine Labs acquires Qfix as it adds more thrust to Online Payments foray💸
Pine Labs, a digital payments and financial services provider has announced the acquisition of Mumbai-based online payments startup Qfix Infocomm for an undisclosed sum.
The acquisition comes as Pine Labs adds more thrust to its foray into online payments in a move to diversify ahead of its U.S. IPO later this year.
The Mumbai-based Qfix is a cloud-based end-to-end platform, offering integrated online payments and billing services to multiple sectors.
With HDFC Bank as its lead distribution partner, the platform currently hosts more than 5,000 merchants, including educational institutions, governments and clubs.
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Mintifi, a digital lending platform for distributors and retailers, has raised $40 million (roughly Rs 298.6 crore) as a part of a fresh funding round led by Norwest Venture Partners and Elevation Capital.
Virtual events platform Airmeet has raised $35 million in its Series B round led by Prosus Ventures and Sistema Asia Fund.
Y-Combinator-backed crypto investing platform Mudrex has raised $6.5 million in a pre-series A round from Arkam Ventures and Tribe Capital.
Ad-tech influencer marketing platform, Kofluence, has raised $4 million in a Pre-Series A funding round led by Nikhil Kamath, Co-Founder of Zerodha and True Beacon.
Razorpay makes its first international foray by acquiring Curlec🌏
Fintech unicorn Razorpay marks its first international acquisition after buying a majority stake in a Malaysian fintech firm Curlec. Razorpay expects to complete the full acquisition in the next one-and-a-half years.
This is Razorpay's fourth acquisition overall and comes just over a month after raising $375 million in funding. Prior to this, Razorpay acquired TERA Finlabs, Opfin and Thirdwatch.
“This acquisition will allow us to quickly ramp up and start scaling in Southeast Asia as a market. Curlec have been powering recurring payments for multiple companies in the Malaysia market,” said Harshil Mathur, CEO and Co-founder, Razorpay.
Razorpay claims to serve over 8 million businesses including the likes of Facebook, Ola, Zomato, Swiggy, Cred and has achieved $60 billion Total Payment Volume (TPV) as of early December 2021.
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