Beams fintech helps create 2 soonicorns in India’s startup ecosystem

Beams Fintech Fund, a leading Fintech focussed Growth Stage Fund will complete the calendar year 2022 on a high having its portfolio companies raised more than $150 million at a combined valuation of over $1 billion.

Beams Fintech Fund achieved its first close in March 2022 at $36 million corpus & made two investments during the year. Beams has now crossed more than 50% of its target corpus raise of $120 million and is in advance stages of making 3 more investments.

Founded by Fintech veteran Sagar Agarvwal & Navin Surya and Founders of Venture Catalysts – Anuj Golecha, Dr Apoorva Ranjan Sharma, Anil Jain and Gaurav Jain, Beams primarily invests in Series B & C rounds of Companies operating at the intersection of financial services and technology.

In a year when most Fintech companies struggled to raise capital, both of Beams portfolio companies saw newer rounds from marquee investors. Multiples Private Equity invested in Niyo while Beams invested alongside Google and Tiger in Progcap.

Beams has built a team of 8 investment professionals and more than 10 mentors, advisors, CXOs to help build the portfolio for Beams and create tangible value add for portfolio companies.

Beams has also brought in marquee Financial Institutions as LPs in the Fund including Yes Bank, Infibeams, Capri Global, ECG, etc., to cross pollinate with its portfolio companies.

Beams is being appreciated by the founder community for its strategy of identifying key gaps in the portfolio companies’ accessibility and providing the same in partnership with its LPs. Very similar to Canapi Ventures in the US, Beams will be building the largest ecosystem of by Banks, NBFIs, Insurance Companies and DFIs within India & Outside to create value for its companies.

Beams portfolio companies also created significant impact in 2022. Our Portfolio companies provided access to financial services to over 5 Million Consumers, SME’s and MSME’s with over $1 Billion in loans financed and enabled annualized payments of over $1.5 Billion for the underserved and blue collar workers.

During 2022, Beams has been recognised as one of the most unique upcoming investor in the Indian Fintech space which led to Beams being invited to multiple Global and Pan India Events. Beams was part of the Global Fintech Fest 2022, which is India’s largest Fintech event. Beams was also a part of the Global LP/GP Event, Superreturns at Amsterdam, Singapore and Dubai. Our Managing Partner, Sagar Agarwal was invited to share his views on Growth stage Fintech Investments in India.

“2022 has been an eventful year at Beams. As a relatively new platform in the ecosystem and creating a category focussed fund can be interesting at times, especially in a year that was marked by high inflation, geopolitical tensions and cool-off of the tech ecosystem. However, we have been very fortunate to have such high-quality investors support us. We have achieved more than what we had set out to at the start of the year and are proud to be regarded as India’s first Growth Stage focussed Fintech Fund,” said Sagar Agarvwal, Co-founder and Managing Partner, Beam Fintech Fund.

“CY ’23 looks even more promising & positive for us as markets have corrected significantly both in the private and the public space given us an opportunity to invest with high quality teams and businesses at more attractive prices and our existing portfolio companies are already performing phenomenally well. We expect to close the fund out at a target raise & deploy more than $60-70 mn in CY ’23. We follow a thesis driven approach towards investments & have narrowed down on the following themes for CY ‘23: Embedded Finance/Managed Marketplaces, SAAS Platforms for Banks/FIs, SAAS Platforms for Enterprises, Global Enterprises SAAS, Open Banking & Digital Financial Inclusion,” said Navin Surya, Co-founder & Operating Partner, Beam Fintech Fund.

Beams Fintech Fund is India’s 1st Growth Stage Focussed Fintech Fund investing in companies operating at the intersection of Financial Services & Technology. Beams Fintech Fund is backed by Venture Catalysts. Beams is a second Fund for the group, after, 9 Unicorn, a $100 Mn Seed stage Fund launched in ‘20.

Beams Fintech Fund is an offering of Ecosystem, Value Add & Capital for Fintech market leaders of tomorrow. The Fund will create a concentrated portfolio of 10-12 investments by investing $8 -$10 Mn in high quality Fintech founders & companies in their Growth rounds ($50-500 Mn EV). Beams is a thesis driven investor & will focus on following Fintech themes in the Fund: Embedded Finance, Platforms & Technologies for the Incumbents or Disrupting the Incumbents, Global Enterprises SAAS, Open Banking & Digital Financial Inclusion.

With a target size of $100 million, the Fund has been received well & marquee Indian Financial Institutions, Banks, Family offices & Unicorn Fintech Founders are investors in the Fund thus validating the Team, Strategy, Thesis & Opportunity.

Group has invested in 30+ Fintech/FS Companies with $4 Bn+ in portfolio value creation. Founder’s current & past Fintech/FS investments include BharatPe, Dukaan, Flobiz, Klub, Esskay Fincorp, Suryoday, Centrum Forex, MFS Africa, Bank Open, Jai Kisan, GetVantage, Impact Guru, Creditwise, OTO, Liquiloans, Lenden, Junio etc.

The Parent, Venture Catalysts is the largest Network investing platform (6000+ investors) in Emerging Markets today with $225 Mn deployed capital across 180+ investments. Venture Catalysts has ranked top 3 globally for the past 3 years in no of deals.. AUM today is at $325Mn.