India’s Mobikwik has landed £25 million in a Series B round led by Singapore-based hedge fund Tree Line Asia.
Cisco and American Express also took part in the bumper round, along with existing investor Sequoia Capital.
Mobikwik is aiming toward a $100 million Series C round in the second half of this year, TechCrunch reported, and raised $5 million in Series A funding in 2013.
Mobile wallets are coming out on top in a country with low credit card penetration and bank account usage. But while smartphone adoption is growing rapidly, it is still in its nascent stages. With a network of 100,000 physical retail points where customers can load money onto their wallet, Mobikwik is hoping to push the adoption of its digital service throughout India.
Larger rival Paytm received a reported billion dollar valuation earlier this year after an investment from Alibaba‘s Ant Financial. While it claims 25 million registered users, Paytm also provides an e-commerce payment service as well as a mobile wallet and recharge service. Mobikwik boasts “over 15 million” registered users for its payment wallet, but is aiming to reach 100 million by the end of 2015.
The mobile wallet firm has also said it plans to follow rival Paytm by applying for a payment bank licence.
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