NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Thursday, May 5, 2016

The increase of smartphone ownership in India is fueling the rise of mobile wallets in the country. One company leading the charge, MobiKwik, has topped up its own funds with a $50 million Series C round announced today.

Primarily a mobile wallet, MobiKwik’s range of services include online recharge (topping up mobile phone credit), bill payments, money transfers, coupons and ticketing. The startup claims to have over 30 million users and support for more than 75,000 retailers.

The funding was led by two interesting strategic investors: GMO, a publicly listed Japanese internet company involved in payments among other things, and semiconductor firm Mediatek. Existing investors including Sequoia and Treeline Asia also took part in the round, which takes MobiKwik to more than $80 million in moneyraised to date.