Posted by Bangalore: Twid, a reward point-based payment solutions platform raised $12 million in Series-A funding led by Rakuten Capital.
With this funding round, Sunil Gopinath, Rakuten India CEO will join the Twid Board of Directors on behalf of Rakuten Capital, Rakuten Group’s corporate venture capital arm.
Google, ICMG Partners, JAFCO Asia, January Capital and Reddy Futures Fund along with existing investors BEENEXT and Sequoia India’s Surge also participated in this funding round.
Twid will utilise the raised funds for scaling and building its merchant and issuer network, expanding product roll-outs, and building tech capabilities primarily in Data Science and hiring.
Previously, Twid has raised capital from marquee investors such as BEENEXT and Sequoia India’s Surge in 2021.
Founded in 2020 by Amit Koshal, Rishi Batra, and Amit Sharma, Twid is a network effect platform that combines multiple loyalty/reward points across issuers such as banks, fintech firms, and retail/e-commerce brands.
“Twid is on a mission to revolutionise how rewards are viewed, understood, and used across platforms by creating a completely new network. We are bringing together various industry stakeholders nudging them towards a cashless ecosystem and future,” said Amit Koshal, Founder and CEO of Twid.
“By enabling Reward Points to be Ubiquitous and fungible, we are witnessing very high customer delight. Customers are able to stay updated with their points and are able to save, earn and pay every time when using “Pay with Rewards”. This reaffirms our approach to delivering long-term value to merchants, issuers and customers,” added Koshal.
He further added, “We are happy to have mission-aligned investors who are also helping us with global expertise in technology. This investment will accelerate our next phase of growth, further strengthening our innovations, product and offerings.”
With over 40 million registered users, and 50,000+ live merchants, Twid has a payment network of banks, brands, payment gateways, merchants, and customers. Additionally, it provides access to over $2 billion in reward points pool with its issuer partners and processes over 5% of digital transactions for many of its marquee merchant partners.
“ I’m thrilled to join the Twid board of directors and look forward to working with Amit Koshal, Rishi Batra, Amit Sharma and their very capable team to transform the way reward points are viewed and used in India,” said Sunil Gopinath, CEO of Rakuten India.
According to the Q1 2022 Global Loyalty Programs Survey, Loyalty Programs Market is expected to grow by 12.6% on an annual basis to reach US$ 142636.8 million in 2022.