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Janaadhar (India) Pvt Ltd, the Bengaluru-based affordable housing company, on Thursday announced that it has raised Rs 54 crore from a clutch of investors.
The investment was led by Treeline Asia Master Fund (Singapore), a hedge fund based out of Hong Kong and Singapore. Narayan Ramachandran, ex-country head of Morgan Stanley India, Vallabh Bhansali, a market expert, and Vikram Gandhi, an investment banker who recently returned to India to work on social impact initiatives, also invested in this round, the company said in a statement.
Janaadhar is among the earliest and one of only a handful of affordable housing companies focused on the lower end of the housing market -- typically known as economically weaker section (EWS) and lower income group (LIG) sections. Also, it is the only affordable housing company in India that claims to have its structure as a social business, with the entire promoter stake being held in a not-for-profit Section 25 Company, Jana Urban Foundation. It is founded by Ramesh Ramanathan, a social entrepreneur, and co-founder of the Jana Group of institutions.
India's affordable housing space has been receiving increasing attention from policy makers and governments, an acknowledgement of the size of the housing challenge, and the need to catalyse credible private sector affordable housing projects.
Speaking about the transaction, Raghunath Srinivasan, Executive Director of Janaadhar, said, "It's a validation of our approach to address issues of affordable housing in a social business model. We look forward to executing on our ambitious plans and expanding our affordable housing footprint across multiple cities in the coming two-three years, within the institutional structure of a social business."
