June 17, 2025, Mumbai, India: Saswat Finance, a pioneering fintech platform has raised $2.6 million in a Pre-Series A funding round led by Ankur Capital. This marks the second investment from Ankur’s third fund. Existing investor Incubate Fund Asia hasdoubled down on their commitment to Saswat in this round. The funding marks a significant milestone in Saswat’s journey of using data driven approaches to unlock financial services opportunities in untapped markets and mega supply chains, starting with the $135 billion dairy industry.
This funding round will enable Saswat to expand their tech capabilities, add new financial products to their platform, and scale operations across Maharashtra, Karnataka, and Uttar Pradesh. The infusion of capital will also be used to enhance the data and analytics infrastructure, and to broaden their product portfolio.
For Saswat, India’s dairy sector is a strategic entry point. While the sector is growing at a CAGR of 16% and projected to become a $180 billion industry by 2032, the potential for penetration offormal financial services remains immense. Saswat has already onboarded over 6000 customers on their platform and enabled the disbursal of INR 55 Crores+ in asset-backed loans - making rapid strides towards Saswat’s vision of accelerating tech-led doorstep financial services in underpenetrated sectors.
Started in mid-2022 by seasoned banking veterans Arun Tiwari, Indrajyoti Bhattacharjee, and Ravi Ranjan Chaudhary—each bringing over 18 years of industry expertise—Saswat Finance is focused on transforming accesses to capital and insurance, through a differentiated tech-first approach of leveraging their proprietary platform to bring in superior capabilities on credit origination, managing insurance partnerships, and digital collections.
Saswat’s data-driven model is based on a unique blend of traditional and alternative data, including milk production, cash flow trends, weather patterns, geographic factors, and social indicators.This refined approach allows Saswat to enable faster and better targeted delivery of financial products. Starting with enabling cattle loans, insurance and para-veterinary services, the company is rapidly expanding into broader offerings tailored to small businesses with strong adjacencies.
Arun Tiwari, CEO & Co-Founder of Saswat Finance, said, “In a country where over 65% of the population resides in rural areas, India’s rural economy holds immense potential, however systemic barriers like informal lending, inadequate documentation, and lack of efficient last-mile distribution have ensured that a large financial services opportunity is underserved. Saswat is uniquely positioned at the intersection of fintech, agritech, and insuretech to redefine access to financial services for underpenetrated segments. At Saswat, we’re blending tech and trust to deliver credit, risk protection, and productivity advisory services directly to customer’s doorstep. This new funding will empower us to advance our mission by investing in technology, deepening our reach, and aggressively scaling our operations.”
"When we first met Saswat's team, we were impressed by the thoroughness of their tech-first approach for enabling financial solutions to markets with large untapped potential, strategically starting with income-generating assets like cattle. With the ongoing digital transformation of the dairy sector and other large supply chains as a tailwind, Saswat is addressing a critical gap in the market by using their tech platform and leveraging alternative data for delivering substantial value at the last mile. We're excited to back Saswat's vision to transform financial services for this large economic market.“ added Krishnan Neelakantan, Partner at Ankur Capital.
“Saswat Finance is building a full-stack finance platform to unlock credit access to rural India with a very unique approach of blending the credit at the point of sale with a mix of strong alternative data. We are delighted to double down on our partnership with Saswat Finance, a team with a unique mix of strong financial services experience and execution capabilities”, said Rajeev Ranka, Partner at Incubate Fund Asia.
Backed by early-stage investors like Seedstars VC, Sparrow VC, and Incubate Fund Asia in their earlier seed round, Saswat has associated closely with the dairy cooperatives ecosystem (AMUL in Maharashtra, Britannia, Shahaj & Srijini, Nandini, Schreiber Dynamix, Lactalis, Hatsun), insurers (Iffco Tokio General Insurance, Agriculture Insurance Company (AIC), Credit Access Insurance), and lending institutions (RBL Bank Ltd, Shivalik Small Finance Bank, Ambit Finvest, Western Capital, etc.) to extend its distribution and product capabilities.
As India accelerates its march in expanding digital finance, Saswat Finance is proving that the next big fintech revolution isn’t in mega cities—but in mega supply chains where cows, code, and conviction are unlocking markets.
About Saswat Financial Technologies Pvt Ltd
Started operations in 2022, Saswat Financial Technologies Pvt Ltd is a Mumbai-based fintech platform delivering affordable, tech-enabled financial services to India’s smallholder farmers and nano/micro enterprises. The platform offers credit enablement , insurance, and advisory services through a proprietary, low-cost digital infrastructure that enables doorstep delivery and collection. Saswat is currently operational in Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, and Karnataka.
For more information, visit www.saswatfinance.com
About Ankur Capital
Founded in 2014, Ankur Capital is an early-stage venture capital firm in India, investing in digital and deep science technology companies. Ankur Capital has backed 31 companies across sectors, including category leaders such as Captain Fresh (B2B Commerce), Vegrow (B2B Commerce), StringBio (Synthetic Biology), OffGrid Energy Labs (Battery Chemistry), Agrizy (B2B Commerce), Superfone (Neo-telco), and Niramai (AIMedtech) among others. The firm has offices in Mumbai, Delhi, and Bangalore.
About Incubate Fund Asia
Incubate Fund Asia, originating from Japan, is a renowned venture capital fund specializing in seed-stage investments. With a history of nurturing over 200 startups in Japan and Asian regions, they expanded to India in 2016 and started Incubate Fund India, which was rebranded recently as Incubate Fund Asia. They actively engage with startups, offering hands-on support and mentorship, making them a vital partner for entrepreneurs. Incubate Fund Asia takes on a prominent role as a lead investor by committing a substantial 80% of its funds to Indian startups. This commitment spanned various sectors, including B2B, B2C, Supply Chain, and theconsumer tech market.
To know more- https://www.incubatefund.in/
