Social Investment Start-up StockGro concluded $32 Million in Series A Round

StockGro, India’s largest social investment platform, announced that it has concluded a 32 million USD Series A round. The round was led by marquee global investors including BITKRAFT Ventures, General Catalyst, and Itai Tsiddon (Co-founder of Lightricks – Unicorn in Israel), with participation from existing backers such as Roots Ventures, Creed Capital Asia. The above also included commitment for Secondary financing for its early backers which would lead to multi-fold returns on their previous investments.

A syndicate of Prominent angel investors which includes Base10 Capital Founders, Junglee Games founder Ankush Gera, Nazara Technologies founder Nitish Mittersain and Founding member of Robinhood also participated in this round. StockGro plans to use the funding to tap into more markets, introduce new product offerings and aggressively ramp up its hiring across all functions.

Founded in January 2020 by former venture capitalist Ajay Lakhotia, StockGro is Asia’s first social investment platform with a fun and interactive virtual interface that enables users to learn about and participate in stock markets. StockGro doubled its user base in the last quarter from 5M in October to 10M as of January 2022. “The above user base marks a significant milestone for our Company as it demonstrates strong conviction and love from our users for our platform,” commented Ajay Lakhotia on the above growth.

This is among the largest Series A rounds raised by fintech start-ups in India, raising the total funding commitments for the Bengaluru-based company to about USD 40 million.

“Having set up a solid foundation, our aim is to build a disciplined culture of trading in India and help the digital generation of today to invest in an informed and learned manner. The funding further reinforces the faith of our investors in our vision of bringing this transformation,” said Ajay Lakhotia, Founder & CEO, StockGro.

Commenting on the fundraise, BITKRAFT Ventures said, “The democratization of finance and investment is an important global theme that is re-defining the culture and values of younger generations. Nowhere is this more clear than in India, where less than 2% of the population currently invests in the stock market. Gamification and competitions not only engage new and aspiring investors, but also drive superior educational outcomes with a “play & learn” product. StockGro has a unique opportunity to facilitate the transition of wealth into new asset classes, not just with stocks but also with its expansion into crypto and other assets, and we are proud to be working with Ajay on the front lines of this transformation.”

General Catalyst added, “We are very excited to be investing in StockGro and to partner with Ajay and his ambitious team. We were captivated by their vision to help educate Indian consumers on how to become better investors. StockGro empowers them to do so via engaging with a fun and interactive product. We are looking forward to seeing team StockGro scale their user base with the funds from this round in order to achieve their compelling vision.”