Tiger Global leads $50 mn funding round in NoBroker

By Narinder Kapur

  • 03 Oct 2019
Credit: 123RF.com

Property listings portal NoBroker.com has raised $50 million (around Rs 350 crore) in a Series D round of funding led by US-based investment firm Tiger Global Management.

The capital infusion comes barely four months after the startup, operated by Bengaluru-based NoBroker Technologies Solutions Pvt. Ltd, secured $51 million in a Series C round led by private equity firm General Atlantic.

US-based General Atlantic contributed to the new round as well, NoBroker said in a statement.

The round takes the total funding it has raised so far to $121 million. 

NoBroker is a home rental and purchase platform that helps users find homes without paying any brokerage. It was founded in 2013 by Indian Institute of Technology alumni Amit Kumar Agarwal, Akhil Gupta and Saurabh Garg. The company claims it has more than 30 lakh properties registered on its platform and that 70 lakh individuals have used its services.

NoBroker.com had raised $10 million in its Series B round from Beenext, Beenos and other investors in 2016, and secured $3 million from SAIF Partners and Fulcrum Capital in 2015.

Scott Shleifer, partner at Tiger Global, said in the statement that NoBroker has built a tech-driven business to make residential and commercial real estate transactions “convenient and affordable”.

NoBroker co-founder Gupta said the company is using machine learning and artificial intelligence to make transactions faster and cheaper for users.

The startup operates in a market that has well-funded firms such as Info Edge (India) Ltd’s 99acres, QuikrHomes, MagicBricks and News Corp-backed PropTiger. News Corp also owns the company that publishes VCCircle.

Tiger Global’s bets

The firm has increased the pace of its investments in India, clocking several investments in the previous month. It led a Series B funding round worth $23 million (around Rs 163.7 crore) in Wow! Momo Foods Pvt. Ltd, which operates and owns brands Wow! Momo and Wow! China.

Separately, it took part in financial technology startup OkCredit’s $67 million (around Rs 476.2 crore) Series B round, leading it along with Lightspeed Venture Partners.

It made at least three investments in August. The investor led a $42 million (around Rs 300 crore) Series C funding round in education-technology startup Vedantu Innovations Pvt. Ltd along with private equity firm WestBridge Capital.

Tiger Global also took part in a $120 million (Rs 862 crore) funding round in financial-technology startup Cred, and invested $15 million (Rs 108 crore) in INDwealth, an artificial intelligence-based wealth management venture.