Mumbai : IIFL Fintech Fund, one of India’s largest early-stage investors in fintech space today said that it has made an investment in Kolkata-based AI startup – Data Sutram for an undisclosed amount.

Data Sutram is an AI-backed location intelligence data platform that aggregates data from 250+ partners to provide intelligence on places and people. The firm was started in 2018 by three Jadavpur University engineering graduates, Rajit Bhattacharya, Aisik Paul, and Ankit Das.

In August, IIFL Group, backed by Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd., launched a dedicated Rs 100-crore early-stage fund to invest in Indian fintech startups. Data Sutram is IIFL Fintech Fund’s second investment after FinBox, which is India’s only platform that simplifies rollout of embedded lending by handling all compliance integrations, risk management and lender integrations.

Besides investing in Data Sutram, IIFL Finance and IIFL Securities sponsors of the fund have also entered into a strategic partnership with Data Sutram for key sector knowledge and insights. This partnership also marks Data Sutram’s entry into BFSI space, where it wants to expand further.

Rajit, Founder and CEO of Data Sutram said “After working extensively in retail manufacturing, Data Sutram is now eyeing the BFSI segment which is the intent behind the raise. After early success with several fintechs, banks and NBFCs, we have found great applications of alternate data in – evaluating assets, predicting delinquencies, adjudging risk, recollection planning, etc. We are delighted to get IIFL on board as investors  and hope this will give us an edge in the space”

Speaking on the latest development, Nirmal Jain, Founder, IIFL Group said, “It is heartening to see start-ups such as Data Sutram using cutting edge technology to solve some of the most pressing problems for the BFSI space. We hope our contribution will help the company build a superior product for the market.”

Earlier, Data Sutram had been invested in by 100x.VC (as a part of their Class 01) & Indian Angel Network. Ninad Karpe, Partner, 100X.VC said “We are delighted that Data Sutram is on a path to offer their world-class data solutions to the BFSI sector — banks, fintechs and NBFCs. In a hyper competitive world, solutions from Data Sutram will help companies in the BFSI sector to maintain their leadership position. As the first institutional investor in Data Sutram, 100X is confident that Data Sutram will become a global leader in its space in times to come.”

The geospatial data and analytics market is one of the fastest growing markets in the world, and is poised to become worth $157 billion by 2027. By 2022, it is expected that 30% of customer interactions will be influenced by real-time location analysis, up from 4% in 2017, as per a Gartner report.