Ofbusiness’s financial services arm Oxyzo raises $200 mn Series A, turns unicorn

Oxyzo Financial Services Wednesday announced that it has raised $200 million in Series A at a valuation of $1 billion, making it the largest ever fundraise in the first round by an Indian startup.

Oxyzo Financial Services is the lending arm of SoftBank-backed business-to-business (B2B) commerce startup OfBusiness.

With this, Oxyzo has become the latest addition to India’s growing list of unicorns. The unicorn round was led by Alpha Wave and co-led by Tiger Global, Norwest Venture Partners, Matrix Partners and Creation Investments.

Oxyzo is one of OfBusiness' three verticals. The other two are the B2B e-commerce vertical and SaaS offerings.

Oxyzo was instituted to give affordable loans to SMEs to help them buy raw materials in sectors such as manufacturing and sub-contracting.

"Both OfBusiness and Oxyzo have a strong borrowing profile enjoying confidence across 50+ financial institutions," Asish Mohapatra, OfBusiness Group CEO, quoted as saying by a leading news outlet. 

His wife and co-founder Ruchi Kalra, who is the CEO of Oxyzo said, "With the emergence of the digital economy, we see a marked shift in the emerging needs and servicing approach in the B2B segment. We want to be at the forefront of this as a diversified financial services company, differentiated through its innovative financial products and digital platforms on the back of strong credit and origination capabilities."  

She has been running the financing business at OfBusiness and looking to go for an IPO this year.