Online peer-to-peer lending platform i2ifunding.com has raised ₹2 crore from three investors in its first round of funding, Vaibhav Pandey, founder and CEO, told BusinessLine . The company, which began operations last October, allows individuals to borrow money from other individuals, bypassing the traditional banking system.

The company has so far received 1,200 registrations, with 200 of these as investors who have made investment commitments of ₹1.5-2 crore. The platform has so far facilitated the disbursal of ₹50 lakh in loans at an average interest rate of 18-23 per cent.

Investor stake

Pandey declined to give details about the stake that the investors picked up in the company or the valuation. The funds will be used for upgrading the platform’s technological capabilities and create a mobile app that can capture data about borrowers, including geo-tagging them, monitoring mobile purchases to create their risk profile. The company, which currently focuses on salaried borrowers, will also begin focusing on smaller companies. It aims to reach the top 20 cities in the next 12 months.

P2P lending, an established form of fund-raising in the West, is a growing sector in India, so much that the Reserve Bank of India published a consultation paper on the subject last month. Close to 20 new online P2P lending companies were launched in the last one year and presently, there are around 30 start-up P2P lending companies in India, the paper said.

According to the proposed regulations in the paper, P2P companies must act only as intermediaries and their role must be limited to bringing the borrower and the lender together. They will also need to maintain a minimum capital of ₹2 crore and not assure returns to lenders.

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