Swiss-based EST Group plans to invest USD 250 mn into Indian startups in next 18 months

Swiss-based EST Group on Friday said it is planning to invest USD 250 million (around Rs 1,770 crore) in next 18 months into Indian startups that are focused on fintech applications and related business models.

The group is very bullish about India market and believes that when markets are slow they provide new opportunities, its chief executive officer and director Sindhu Bhaskar said in a statement.

"India's largest asset is its intelligent and educated human capital and it is important to use these resources by allowing them to innovate in a problem area and then giving access to capital," he added.

"EST Group is planning to invest USD 250 million in next 18 months into India-based startups focused on fintech applications and related business models that will plug into larger EST's vision of building an aggregated platform for capital that will allocate impactfully to help growth sectors in our economy," the statement noted.

Sajid Jamal, who is heading the venture fund of EST Group, said capital is not scarce but scattered and EST's vision is to aggregate unused capital by investing in technology and then use AI (artificial intelligence) voice command technology to disburse capital to SMEs, startups and agriculture verticals.

"For this, we have decided not to start from scratch but to invest in existing platforms and then connect this platform to one larger ecosystem platform that will help in enhancing growth in the economy by solving grassroot problems of the economy," he added.

EST Group provides financial advisory, asset management, semi banking operations, custodial, clearing and settlement and security issuance services. It has operations in Latin America, Europe, London and Southeast Asia.

The group's fintech arm recently established in London is looking at investing in existing disruptive platforms in financial markets, banking operations, and wealth management using AI, machine learning and blockchain technology.