11 July 2024, London & Bangalore: Lightrock, a global investment platform that backs purpose-driven companies, today announces that the Lightrock Growth Fund I (LGFI) has successfully exited Ummeed Housing Finance (Ummeed), a financial inclusion-focused housing finance company extending loans for new house construction and house improvements in India.
LGFI invests in growth-stage businesses across Europe, Latin America, and India, focusing on the themes of People, Planet, and Productivity.
Founded by Ashutosh Sharma and Sachin Grover in 2016, Ummeed is a specialist financing company focusing on home loans, business loans, and loans against property for lower and middle-income Indian families in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities. The company primarily serves those in the informal sector, who often struggle to access credit from traditional lenders. To address this, Ummeed developed a proprietary credit assessment system to determine customer eligibility based on 20 vocations in the informal sector, implementing strict disbursal norms and maintaining risk levels at strong benchmarks.
LGFI invested in Ummeed in 2018, providing support for the company’s strategic development as well as optimising its impact management and methodology. Since Lightrock’s investment, the company has grown to 1300 employees and has served more than 45,000 customers. Ummeed’s assets under management (AUM) have grown to over US$200 million.
Lightrock has been a steadfast partner to Ummeed since their initial investment in 2018. Their active contributions on the Board around growth and capital structure parameters have been valuable in helping Ummeed scale to its size today