Offline-to-online merchant platform 'Dot' raises seed funding from PayU, Fosun RZ Capital, Info Edge Ventures and others

Dot, offline-to-online (O2O) commerce and fintech platform founded by entrepreneur and PayU India's ex co-founder Shailaz Nag today announced that it has raised an initial seed funding of around USD 8 million.

PayU, the payments and fintech business of Prosus, and Fosun RZ Capital led the seed funding round, which also saw participation from Info Edge Ventures and other well-known angel investors in the country.

Dot is a technology start-up, providing novel digital transformation and commerce solutions to brick & mortar outlets, which serve 1.3 billion Indian customers with market size of USD 1 trillion.

Dot aims to revolutionize the offline-to-online market space by combining its fintech capabilities with extensive customer engagement offerings and smart tech innovations.

Dot, with its unique product offerings, is expected to have the first-mover advantage and will be well-positioned to capture the strong growth from the market.

"There is a huge potential in the offline-to-online commerce and fintech sector, offering immense opportunities for the right product. India has the second-largest number of internet users in the world and a rapidly increasing smartphone user base," said Shailaz Nag, founder, Dot.

"This, coupled with the recent digitisation push both from the government and the private sector is generating tremendous demand for digital transformation solutions by brick and mortar stores. I personally see a significant potential in this space, which has led to the conception of Dot," added Nag.

"Shailaz has played a vital role in PayU India's growth and we wish him the best for his new business venture. PayU has worked extensively towards creating an encouraging and supportive environment to promote entrepreneurial dreams such as Shailaz's. We look forward to working with bright and promising minds who have the potential and seek support in making their ventures a success," said Anirban Mukherjee, CEO, PayU India.

"Dot is a great fit to PayU's larger vision of developing a fintech ecosystem in India and its aim to deliver a complete value proposition to our growing customers. We are creating alliances through investments in companies whose vision is aligned to ours. With this investment in Dot, we aim to play a pivotal role in helping offline merchants with their digitization journey," he added.

"The Dot team has a deep and intrinsic understanding of the Indian fintech space and a proven history of creating and running successful companies, be it PayU or Ibibo. The current digital experience of offline merchants is broken at many levels and the engagement with customers is non-existent. Dot will change that and consequently create immense value," said Tej Kapoor, co-executive president of Fosun RZ Capital.

"We believe that Dot has identified an important untapped market segment. It is founded by a stellar team and has the first-mover advantage, which is a winning combination," said Sanjeev Bikhchandani, Founder and Executive Vice Chairman, Info Edge.

Dot is Shailaz Nag's second stint as an entrepreneur after PayU. A doyen of the fintech space, he co-founded PayU India. Under him, India became the largest market for PayU's global operations, accounting for more than 50 per cent of its business. Shailaz helped PayU grow as the largest online payment solution provider and played a vital role in making it a profitable enterprise.

Dot is led by an experienced team, three ex-PayU employees - Shailaz Nag, Gyanesh Sharma and Anurag Gupta, all having proven expertise and knowledge of the fintech e-commerce space as well as experience in building and managing companies.

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