Matrix-backed dezerv. raises $21M in Series A funding led by Accel Partners

Mumbai, 8th August 2022: India's leading wealth-creation platform, dezerv. has raised $21M in Series A funding led by Accel Partners with participation from existing investors Matrix Partners India and Elevation Capital. The fresh round of funding comes after the startup has shown significant growth with more than INR 800Cr invested through the platform.

dezerv. was founded in 2021 by Sandeep Jethwani, Vaibhav Porwal and Sahil Contractor who have 20+ years of experience in managing over INR 50,000Cr. It has been an invite-only platform since inception. However, now they have opened access to all working professionals in India, giving them an opportunity to invest like the ultra-wealthy do. The platform allows users to invest as low as INR 50,000. It is the next big step in dezerv.'s mission of making expert-led investing available to professionals using its unique Integrated Portfolio Approach (IPA) which is built on decades of investing expertise and modern portfolio science.

With this fundraise, they intend to focus on strengthening the user experience, introducing new investment opportunities and growing the talent pool within the company.

The need for expert-led investing has been validated as the platform has witnessed over one lakh working professionals who have signed up for access and this number is growing multifold. The non-traditional investment offerings, which include high-yield debt and pre-IPO deals have received great response with most of the offerings being subscribed to within 24 hours. The startup has recently received an AIF and PMS license to broaden the investment options available to its users.

Sandeep Jethwani, Co-Founder of dezerv. said, "This fundraise is one more step towards our vision of delivering real investment expertise to India's working professionals. The need for better investment outcomes has never been felt as acutely as in the current volatile environment. The overwhelming response in our early days coupled with this fundraise further strengthens our mission.'

"Indian wealthtech is at a tipping point, with an influx of new affluent investors over the last few years, who now need expert advice to navigate uncertain markets. dezerv.'s expert led platform spans across asset classes and provides custom solutions, to create a portfolio for long term investors. The team is off to a fast start, growing AuM 7x over the last 6 months. We are excited to double down on our investment here and welcome Accel to the partnership', said Vikram Vaidyanathan, Managing Director, Matrix India

Commenting on the fundraise, Abhinav Chaturvedi, Partner, Accel Partners said "We're excited to partner with dezerv. in their journey to provide investment expertise to working professionals in India. As the information asymmetry increases when it comes to investing and financial products, the need for domain experts managing money and delivering sustainable returns has only increased. We believe that the team at dezerv. with decades of experience is best equipped to fill this gap that working professionals in India face.'

Mridul Arora, Partner, Elevation Capital said "We partnered with dezerv. in their seed round based on the belief that they were perfectly poised to deliver on two of our deeply held convictions - financialisation of savings and democratising access to financial products. In a short period of time, dezerv. is quickly developing into a go-to platform for the emerging affluent in India. We cannot think of a better team to keep building on this vision and are thrilled to deepen our partnership in this fundraise'

About dezerv.:
dezerv. is an expert-led, wealth creation platform that aims to deliver sustainable returns to their clients through its unique, Integrated Portfolio Approach (IPA) for mutual fund portfolios which is built on decades of investing expertise and modern portfolio science. The platform was created with the intent to make this expertise that was earlier accessible to the ultra-wealthy available to Indian working professionals through a seamless digital experience.

Sandeep Jethwani, Vaibhav Porwal and Sahil Contractor are the founders of dezerv.. The trio were part of the early-founding team at IIFL Wealth before they came together to form dezerv.. With experience of over 20+ years between them, they have managed assets worth over INR 50,000 crore for 6500 of the wealthiest families in the country.

The platform has marquee investors like Accel, Elevation Capital and Matrix Partners India, as its backers along with Whiteboard Capital and Blume Founders Fund, Asish Mohapatra of OfBusiness, Revant Bhate of Mosaic Wellness, Kunal Shah of Cred, Varun Dua of Acko & Vidit Aatrey of Meesho are also some of the early investors in the startup.

Website - https://www.dezerv.in/
LinkedIn page - https://www.linkedin.com/company/dezerv-in/

About Matrix Partners India:
Founded in 2006, the firm invests in companies targeting the Indian consumer and enterprise market at the seed, early and early growth stages. Matrix India has invested in several market leading financial services companies, such as, Razorpay (payments and SME Neobank), OfBusiness (B2B Commerce, Fintech), Five Star Business Finance (SME lending), Mswipe (mobile POS), OneCard (mobile-first credit card), LiquiLoans (P2P lending) and Jupiter (consumer neobank).

Other marquee investments include Ola (mobility), Dailyhunt (mobile local language platform), Ola Electric (electric vehicles), Stanza Living (tech enabled student housing platform), DealShare (social commerce platform), MoEngage (SaaS), Country Delight (D2C dairy & fresh foods brand), Captain Fresh (seafood marketplace), GoKwik (e-commerce enablement platform), Bijnis (B2B platform for factories), Zupee (leading skill-based gaming app) and Oxyzo (a tech-enabled smart financing solution provider) among others. Matrix India has advisory offices in Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai. Matrix Partners has a global network of funds investing in the US, China and India, with approximately $5 billion under management. Further information is available at www.matrixpartners.in. To know more about our investment philosophy, check out the #MatrixMoments podcast series.

For more information, contact:
pr@matrixpartners.in