NiYO raises $13.2 million in Series A funding for payroll and benefits in India

NiYO Solutions Inc., an emerging fintech startup for salaried employees, on Wednesday raised $13.2 million (Rs 85 crore) in Series A funding to drive the continued expansion of its payroll and benefits platform in India.

Besides the existing investor Prime Venture Partners, the investment also invested participation of Social Capital, JS Capital LLc (the family office of Jonathan Soros), and Horizons Ventures.

In total, the company has raised more than $14 million in venture capital. Adding on to its continued growth and popularity among businesses across India, NiYO aims to serve 5000 organisations and over 1 million salaried employees by the end of 2018.

Founded in 2015 by Vinay Bagri and Virender Bisht,  NiYO was launched in July 2016 as a pilot in Bangalore and has already clocked more than 500 corporates and is being used by over 100,000 salaried employees in these organisations, through its partnerships with YES Bank and DCB Bank.

The startup is a one-stop solution for all employee payouts and its solutions include salary accounts, meal cards, canteen solutions, corporate gift card, reimbursements account, international travel card and corporate credit cards.

Commenting on the development, NiYO CEO & Co-founder Vinay Bagri said  these are exciting times at NiYO.

"We deeply believe that the rapidly growing number of salaried employees in India have not seen much innovation when it comes to their own payroll and benefits. They are mobile and app-savvy and very demanding. At NiYO, our core objective is to maximize employees' effective salary by bringing innovations in payroll and benefits processes,"he said.

Bagri said the company's aim is to optimise the product suite for employees in areas of taxation, lending and wealth. "We have been fortunate to partner with JS Capital, Social Capital, Horizon Ventures and Prime - all of whom are top tier investors with deep fintech and operational expertise to take us to the next level,"he said.

Prime Venture Partners Managing Partner Sanjay Swamy said NiYO's strong growth since its inception is testament to both the innovative nature as well as rapid customer adoption of their solution which addresses a massive opportunity - providing effortless and innovative solution to manage payroll and benefits, powered by mobile.

"The combination of SmartPhone penetration and IndiaStack makes the timing right for NiYO's patent-pending innovations to come to market. We are privileged to be associated with this stellar team from the start of their journey and be part of their vision to disrupt the payroll landscape,"said Swamy.

With this fresh funding, NiYO plans to strengthen and expand its product suite for the salaried segment besides taking the product to tier 2 and tier 3 towns. The funding will also be used for further product development, team expansion and increasing presence in tier 1 cities.

The addressable market is close to 75 million salaried employees in India who can benefit through a simple payroll & benefits solution which can increase the take home salaries and simplify financial planning & other banking needs.