India’s Beams Fintech Fund looks to expand into the UAE and beyond
India’s first dedicated Growth Capital Fintech Fund – Beams Fintech Fund – is looking to expand globally and sees the UAE as well positioned to be the international hub for the rest of the Gulf, north and eastern African regions.
As one of the biggest trading partners, remittance partners and FDI investor in India, UAE is equipped to provide the necessary capital and infrastructure to support the Fintech companies out of India.
Institutions such as Shuaa Capital, Mubadala, ADQ, ADIA, ADIC, Etisalat, Emaar, Banks etc have been active in India for some time and can work with Beams and its portfolio companies to create a larger and stronger Fintech economy between the two countries which will foster further innovation and development.
Given the favourable demographic factors, the conducive regulatory framework pushed forward by the RBI, the CEPA, and historical relationship between the two countries, this is the right time for institutions and investors in the region looking to build Fintech portfolio to diversify geographically by evaluating newer opportunities coming out of India.
India is the third-largest Fintech market globally after the US and China in terms of the number of startups and capital invested and the number of Unicorns. In 2021, 18 companies turned Unicorns in the Fintech space out of 43 total Unicorns in India – BharatPe, Digit, Cred, Meesho, Groww, Five Star Finance, Zeta, Chargebee. 1/3rd of all Unicorns in India are in the Fintech space.
With a target size of $120 million and a greenshoe option, Beams strategy is to invest $15 million-$20 million in Growth Stages, Series B & C rounds of Fintech companies led by high-quality founders. Beams follows a very strong co-investment approach towards investing and actively offers co-investment opportunities to its LPs.
Concentrated porfolio
Beams Beams Fintech Fund plans to build a concentrated portfolio of a dozen Fintech companies in a market currently valued at $80 billion+ and is likely to touch $250+ billion by 2030.
Beams is being launched by India’s first and largest integrated incubator, Venture Catalysts, that also has 9 Unicorns, a $120 million early-stage sector-agnostic accelerator fund in its stable.
Beams is co-founded by Fintech veteran Sagar Agarvwal and Founders of Venture Catalysts – Dr. Apoorva Ranjan Sharma, Anuj Golecha, Anil Jain, Gaurav Jain. In the Middle East, Deepak Ahuja, Senior Vice President and Chief Revenue Officer of Sehteq, has been roped in as the Founding member and Fintech Expert Partner.
Deep experience
Asuman Dayican Abdullatif has also joined the platform as Venture Partner. Sudhanshu Garg will be acting as an Institutional Advisor for the region.
The founding team of Beams has deep experience of more than 20 years of investing in and building 300+ companies including fintech and financial services companies, such as BharatPe, Dukaan, Flobiz, Esskay, Impact Guru, Suryoday, Centrum, OTO Capital, Klub, GetVantage, LenDenClub, LiquiLoans, and Junio.
Beams Fintech Fund has already started investing from its Fund and has invested in Niyo, India’s leading Digital Banking platform along with Accel and Lightrock. Beams is also completing its second investment which is in the supply chain finance space along with Tiger Global, Google, Sequoia and Creations.
Founder-first
Beams Fintech Fund has a founder-first approach and a focused strategy of offering founders with capital and ecosystem support to build large successful fintech companies. It would provide a network of local and International Banks, Insurance companies, NBFCs, Fintechs, Mentors and Advisors to not only access capital at affordable rates but also to expedite the go-to-market strategy of its portfolio companies in India and Middle East.
With more than 2.6 million members and a 30% population share, Indians constitute the largest expatriate community in the UAE and becomes the natural entry point for Beams portfolio companies. Middle East Banks, NBFCs and Large Tech Founders can become part of Beams ecosystems to support the Middle East Fintech ecosystem.
Emphasising the opportunities in the Fintech sector, Sagar Agarvwal, Co-founder and Partner, Beams Fintech Fund, said, “Fintech is consuming an increasingly larger slice of the software pie. We are in fintech 3.0 right now globally, with the first wave of lending and payments companies having received a significant amount of capital and now the capital is moving across segments. Seasoned professionals and high-quality founders are moving out from larger firms to target newer categories to solve the long tail financial services demand globally.”
Anuj Golecha, Co-Founder and Partner, Beams, said, “Fintech opportunity is huge in India as it is the only tech segment in India that has created over $80 billion in value in India and $8 bn in M&As. Our returns in BharatPe are a testament to the opportunity in the Fintech space in India. We have given 90x return to investors from BharatPe exit which turned Unicorn last year and are creating more Unicorns in this space. We have one of the best Fintech investing teams in India with an excellent track record.”
“Middle East and especially UAE plays an important role into India’s Tech ecosystem. Middle East investors are not only actively investing in India but supporting our Companies expand into Middle East. ADGM & ADIO has come up with special incentives to encourage Indian companies to come into Middle East and we are excited to help build the Fintech ecosystem in the region,” said Deepak Ahuja, Fintech Expert Partner, Beams.
Tech adoption
With higher adoption of technology and growing interest from banks and FIs in UAE looking to collaborate on Technology, Product Creation and Partnerships with Fintechs, this would be the right time to bring models from India. Indian fintechs can not only offer technology partnerships but also build larger outcomes in the region by the acquisition of domestic fintech players.
