Japan’s Credit Saison to give $100 million debt to ZestMoney

ZestMoney, the country’s largest AI-driven, EMI financing platform, has entered into a strategic partnership with Credit Saison, a Japanese financial services company and owned by Mizuho Financial Group.

Under this partnership, Credit Saison will deploy $100 million through ZestMoney for expanding the EMI financing market in India. The $100 million will come in as debt and not as equity.

This is the first-of-its-kind partnership between a fintech in India and a Japanese financial institution.

Credit Saison is the third largest credit card issuer in Japan and has over 20 million cardholders. Commenting on the strategic partnership, Lizzie Chapman, co-founder and CEO of ZestMoney, said: “We are proud to partner with Credit Saison and become the first fintech to bring a Japanese financial partner to India”.

Expansion of EMI financing to the mainstream has the potential to bring affordability to a billion Indians, and “today, we are excited to power this given the success of our advanced AI and data science technology”, she said.

ZestMoney is backed by leading investors such as Ribbit Captial, Xiaomi, Naspers Fintech and Omidyar Networks. The company has over 5 million registered consumers, and has raised $ 42 million to date in 4 financing rounds.

Presha P, Chief Operating Officer at Credit Saison India, said that India is turning into one of the most developed fintech markets in the world. “We are excited to have meaningful participation in the same by supporting the expansion of the EMI financing industry with ZestMoney.”