Razorpay joins the club of 'unicorn' startups after new round of fundraising

Payments Gateway Razorpay has raised $100 million from Singapore's sovereign wealth fund GIC and its existing Sequoia India in the latest round of funding, joining the elite group of startups valued over a billion dollars, known as 'unicorns'.

Other partners in the Series D round of funding included its existing investors Ribbit Capital, Tiger Global, Y Combinator and Matrix Partners.

Razorpay is the fifth fintech startup to join the group of startups valued over $1 billion knows as 'unicorn'. BillDesk, Flipkart-owned PhonePe, PolicyBazaar, and Paytm, which joined the group in 2018 is the most valued starup of India at $16 billion, are the others.

The Bengaluru-based firm will use the funding to develop new products for neo-banking business Razorpay X and lending business Razorpay Capital. With 1,300 employees now, the startup also plans to hire 500 more people across functions.

“GIC is a good long-term investor to have. Their knowledge about public markets and investment in firms like Bajaj Finserv Ltd and Bandhan Bank Ltd will help us in our journey to go public. With this fundraise, we will focus on going deeper into the Indian market and broaden our product portfolio to grow our business and achieve profitability," Harshil Mathur, chief executive and co-founder of Razorpay, told Mint.

In the longer run, Razorpay wants to go public but, meanwhile, in 2-3 years the startup is focusing on profits. It will also eye acquisitions in business-to-business space and is in talks with five startups, the publication reported.