Online travel company Yatra raised a 100 crore venture debt from Temasek backed InnoVen Capitalmarking it India’s largest venture debt transaction yet as per the source Livemint.
This is InnoVen’s second funding in Yatra. The venture debt provider had previously extended $4 million to Yatra in 2013.
“After having raised $92 million through our Nasdaq listing in December 2016, this debt funding provides us additional capital for our growth needs,” said Alok Vaish, chief financial officer, Yatra.
Yatra plans to use the funds to meet growth and diversification needs and to add service offerings.
“This financing round by InnoVen Capital is the largest venture debt funding provided to any Indian business and also the largest venture debt deal funded by any venture debt firm in India,” said Chin Chao, interim chief executive, InnoVen Capital India and chief executive of InnoVen Capital South East Asia.
The Yatra transaction has been a significant divergence from InnoVen’s usual early-stage bets, which were comparatively small.
According to Chao, the transaction represents an evolution of the venture debt ecosystem in the country and that of InnoVen Capital.
“In the past, we have generally done $1-2 million type of loans, which we continue to do. What has happened is that a lot of portfolio companies that we lent to in the past have gotten bigger. And we are seeing that venture debt requirement is not just at early-stage companies. We are seeing larger companies come to us for financing,” said Chao.
“Larger ticket sizes is one of the areas where we think we are able to better leverage our platform and we will continue to look at this opportunity going ahead,” he said.
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On the larger end of the deal spectrum, InnoVen is looking at average ticket sizes of around $10 million.
The Indian venture debt market has grown in size and seen new sources of capital emerge.
Till date, it has provided over 165 loans to more than 120 start-ups across various stages and geographies, including Oyo Rooms, Swiggy, Pepperfry, Shopclues, Byju’s, Freecharge, Myntra, Firstcry, Capillary and Practo in India and 123RF, RedDoorz, M17 Entertainment and Oway in South-East Asia.