The farmer-focused fintech firm, Navadhan Capital, raised ₹111 crore in the Series A funding round. The round was led by Nabventures Fund, a part of the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD).
Navadhan was founded by Nitin Agrawal, Amit Biswal, Vijay Haswani, and Anirudh Ramakuru. These founders each have 15–25 years of experience in the financial sector. This fintech firm was founded to serve the smallholder farmers and small businesses. They aim to improve access to finance for these people and help them to leverage their income in generating better opportunities. The company has secured ₹700 crore in debt from over 25 banks and NBFCs.
The founders developed a tech platform, AceN, which provides working capital financing to the rural micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs). Navadhan operates with an on-ground presence and a digital workflow. The government of India is focusing on enhancing employment in the rural and semi-urban areas.
Navdhan serves 700+ PIN codes across these states: Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Karnataka, and Odisha. This raised capital is expected to be used to expand the operations in other regions of India, giving more power to the rural entrepreneurs.
Nitin Agrawal expressed in an interview, “We are happy to find investors who share our mission of creating new wealth (Nava-dhan) for the rural-preneurs. At an early stage, tech investors helped us in building the AceN tech platform. We are very excited now to have NabVentures since rural MSMEs are our core customer segment.”
