The Bangalore-based fintech company FamPay, which has crossed 2 million registered users within 8 months of its launch, has been averaging 100% month-on-month growth.
Where, recently FamPay raised $38 million (approx. Rs 278.4 crore in Indian currency) in its Series A round, which was led by Elevation Capital along with its General Catalyst, Rocketship VC, Greenoaks Capital and existing investors Sequoia Capital India, Y Combinator, Global Founders Capital and Venture Highway, who were also a part of this new round.
This has backed FamPay to achieve a raise of $42.9 million to date. The company aims at building India’s first neo-bank for teenagers and the amount of this new investment has made it one of the largest Series A rounds in India.
As per FamPay, these fresh funds are said to be utilized with the aim of building its leadership team and launching new features on the platform. Also, in the long-term perspective, the company envisions seeking demographics into consideration for taking the next step in their financial journey to turn into the only bank one will ever need.
The company aims at investing largely in user experience and product innovation thereby making simple and convenient payments accessible for teenagers. They believe that there should be a financially aware generation who can easily understand personal finance fundamentals and can execute financial decisions confidently.
The competition in this segment is anticipated to be stiff. Modern banking tech company Zeta had recently entered the unicorn club after having raised a new round from SoftBank and has joined hands and tied up with FamPay to power their neo-banking solution.
FamPay Startup Highlights
| Startup Name | FamPay |
| Company Legal Name | FamPay Inc. |
| Founded | May 9, 2019 |
| Headquarters | Bengaluru, Karnataka, India |
| Founders |
|
| Startup Industry | Financial Services, Fintech |
| Employees | > 50+ |
| Latest Funding Round | Series A on June 15, 2021 |
| Funds Raised | $38 Million |
| Total Funding Rounds | 3 |
| Total Funding | $42.9 Million |
FamPay Beginning
Both the founders of FamPay, Kush Taneja and Sambhav Jain had an entrepreneurial instinct, owing to which during their engineering tenure at IIT Roorkee, they created a mobile app.
This app could be used at the college messes leading to a substantial reduction in wastage. It made them realize that it was when they could build something together. For this purpose, they both pursued internships in several startups during their final year of college studies.
These companies included the social networking-based ShareChat, Logistics firm Rivigo and the Video streaming service Hotstar. This made them learn the real-world functioning of the young companies and their operations, along with practical reality checks.
They planned to risk the much-coveted placement opportunities and rather decided to go with their passion for building a startup.
So, after extensive research, they came to the conclusion that children, especially in the age bracket of 12-18 years, at an early stage required to be taught about financial literacy.
However, these budding entrepreneurs didn’t know where and how to start. The finance world is vast, highly regulated, and complex and takes years to reach its peak.
As an initial endeavour, they visited malls and shopping centres started meeting people randomly and asked parents about how they provide money to their children. According to that study, they concluded that 80-90% of parents give cash to their children for general use or as pocket money.
Further ahead, they discussed this with their college seniors, after which they applied for the notable Y Combinator platform and got selected in the month of June year 2019. They also feel humbled and owe due credit for getting generous time and guidance from entrepreneurs like Kunal Shah who is the Founder of CRED and Amrish Rau who is the CEO of Pine Labs.
Their efforts were all worth it as the Y Combinator platform provided them with much-needed access with regards to mentor-ship, paving a way towards connecting with important organizations and most importantly building their startup.
Since then there was no looking back and for about 3 months, FamPay thereon built their product, a numberless card for financial transactions. At this stage, they required a banking partner and got connected to an organization viz. National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) as their technology platform was digital.
FamPay Logo
Fam formally known as Fampay, here is their logo history
Old:
New Logo:
About FamPay & FamCard
The FamPay platform is a convenient medium for teenagers to make online and offline payments with the help of the FamPay app along with the FamCard. FamCard is a numberless card for teens (it is a prepaid card provided by IDFC First Bank) that enables secure payments.
Teenagers can facilitate FamPay after seeking their parents’ consent and can start making payments without setting up a bank account. The FamPay App keeps the device lock protected and contains all the card details that can be accessed anytime.
The Security of the app is made stringent in order to ensure safety and support features that are appreciated by teenagers and trusted by their parents. Additionally, the app in the payment products category also offers a gamified savings experience and an in-app exclusive community, which helps teenagers learn, earn and grow.
According to Co-Founder Kush Taneja, their company is creating a market segment that many companies are not focusing on in the present times. They are witnessing rapid growth in their company, where their users are simply in love with the product as they didn’t have access to something like this before.
Also, it is the first card that a teenager can hold ownership of and cherish as an achievement/sense of belonging as they do with their first prized possession of an electronic gadget, bicycle, etc. This brings a sense of responsibility when it comes to money, leading towards the initial foundation into adulthood.
So, the company plans to stick around with them from the first step itself and throughout the teenager’s financial journey by evolving the product as the teenager grows.
Fampay: How does it work?
By now, you must have come to know that FamPay’s numberless product FamCard is provided directly to teenage child after seeking consent from their parents. FamCard works as a digital wallet, which can be used like a debit card by a teenager. It enables parents to add money to their wallets without the need to set up a bank account.
Also, the process is very transparent owing to the fact that all the transactions made by the teenager can be tracked down by the parents.
Not just this yet, each transaction executed through the card is protected with device locks viz. fingerprint, Face ID, pattern lock or a PIN. So, there is no scope and fear of card information getting divulged in case the card gets stolen or lost. In a scenario of a stolen or theft case, it can be paused, blocked, and can be managed on the app.
Besides these features on the card, the teenagers are provided with a unique UPI ID.
Fampay: Business Model
As most fintech companies function, the business model of FamPay also works in the same fashion. Where it gets a certain amount of commission on every transaction being made.
FamPay: Founders and Co-Founders
FamPay, a 2019 founded startup company was initiated by IIT Roorkee alumni Sambhav Jain and Kush Taneja.
Fampay: Core Team
Founders:
- Sambhav Jain
- Kush Taneja
Other Team Members:
- Harjot Singh Oberai, Engineering
- Aayush Gupta, Growth
- Chirag Maheshwari, Engineering
- Anchit Shukla, Design
- Sai Prem, Data Analytics
- Saransh Agarwal, Growth
- Hrishkesh Kogje, Creative
- Elisha Anthony, Growth
- Pratik Gajjar, Engineering
- Ritwick Bhaduri, Community
- Diya Kaveramma, Creative
- Chitra Yadav, Talent
- Aditi Chopra, Growth/Community
- Vishnu Ramachandran, Design
- Shifa Kareem, Customer
- Tiara D’Souza, Finance/Operations
- Supriya Puri, Growth/Community
- Charvi Saraf, Growth
- Sajal Jajoo, Creative
- Akash Srivastava, Finance
- Saurabh Gothi, Engineering
- Janani Sathviga, Talent
They have a big team of 40 members from around the country.
Fampay Funding Rounds and History
| [FamPay Funding] | [FamPay Investors] |
| 2019 – Pre Seed Round – $150K | Y Combinator |
| 2020 – Seed Round – $4.7 Million |
|
| June 2021 – Seed A Round – $38 Million |
|
| Total Valuation: | $42.9 Million |
FamPay Funding rounds dates:
- May 17, 2019, Pre-Seed Round, $150K, Lead Investor: Y Combinator
- Mar 12, 2020, Seed Round, $4.7M, Lead Investors: Sequoia Capital India, Venture Highway
- Jun 15, 2021, Series A, $38M, Lead Investors: Elevation Capital, Sequoia Capital India
The company has attained a total of $42.9 million to date after the recent funding round, which includes a $4.7 million seed round that was raised in March 2020 from Y Combinator, Venture Highway, Sequoia, Global Founders Capital and angel investors Kunal Shah and Amrish Rau.
Interestingly, the recent funding is also one of the largest Series A rounds to happen to any Indian startup.
As per the current times, before FamPay’s recent funding, in the Series A round, Ola Electric and Ananth Narayanan-led Mensa Brands were leading the list having $56 million and $50 million raised respectively.
Adding another feather to the FamPay founder’s cap, Kush Taneja and Sambhav Jain were featured in the Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia 2021 list.
FamPay Investors
Top Entrepreneurs who invested in FamPay
- Neeraj Arora, ex Whatsapp
- Kunal Shah, Founder CRED
- Amrish Rau, CEO of PineLabs
- Kevin Lin, Founder of Twitch
- Vlad Tenev, Founder, Robinhood
Top Companies that invested in FamPay
- Y Combinator
- Venture Highway
- Sequoia Capital
- Elevation Capital
- Global Founders Capital
- General Catalyst
- Rocketship VC
- Greenoaks Capital
Fampay: Valuation in 2023
From the company’s commencement till now, FamPay has raised a total of $42.9M in 3 rounds. The latest funding happened this year on June 16, 2021, from a Series A round. By now, in totality, FamPay is funded by 19 investors, where Greenoaks Capital and Elevation Capital have been the most recent investors.
Seeing this brand idea of introducing financial products for teenagers from a global perspective, it had been aced by market players viz. Greenlight, Step and PIXPAY. On the other hand, looking at the Indian market, FamPay fintech company competes with companies like Junio, Better Capital-backed Walrus and Yodda.
“To this Mridul Arora, a partner at Elevation Capital mentions (TechCrunch) “If you’re able to serve them at a young age, over the course of time, you stand to become their go-to product for a lot of things. FamPay is serving a population that is very attractive and at the same time under-served.”
According to him, there will be a lot more offerings from FamPay and this is just the beginning. Though not revealing much information, the company is said to have future plans of coming up with a range of services that will cater as a Neobank for youngsters (where their target group is seeking to cater to 250 million adolescents who are GenZ in India) to retain them with their platform forever.
FamPay Website | Careers | Facebook | LinkedIn
FamPay’s current app download is 1M+ with a rating of 4.1 and 65K reviews which says a lot about its success achieved till now and the future growth they are yet to gain.
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FamPay: FAQs
What is FamPay’s valuation in 2023?
After securing $38 million in Series A funding FamPay’s valuation raised to $42.9 million.
Yes, FamPay is an RBI-licensed payments app for teens.
What is FamPay funding status?
In the 2019 pre-seed round, FamPay raised $150K, then in 2020 seed found they raised $4.7M and recently on Jun 15, 2021, in the series A round, FamPay raised $38M.
Who are the founders of FamPay?
Mr. Sambhav Jain and Kush Taneja are the co-founders of FamPay.
When did FamPay start?
FamPay, Inc. was founded in 2019 by two IITans, Sambhav Jain and Kush Taneja.
