– Sistema Asia Fund, today announced that it has sold its stake in Qwikcilver, the Indian technology company that is the world’s first end-to-end gift card solution provider. The deal is part of the transaction that sees Pine Labs, a point-of-sales solution company, buy Qwikcilver.
The deal marks the first exit and monetisation for Sistema Asia Fund. Sistema Asia Fund first invested in Qwikcilver in 2016, and has exited the company with multifold returns within three years of its investment. Sistema Asia Fund has had a preliminary closure of its fund in October 2018, and plans a final closure of the US$ 120 million fund by the end of 2019. The funds generated from the exit will be returned to Sistema Asia Fund’s LPs.
“Since investing in Qwikcilver in 2016, Sistema Asia Fund has helped strengthen Qwikcilver’s leadership position in the gift market in India, expand to the Middle East and Southeast Asia, and strengthen their technology platform. Qwikcilver’s growth over the last few years underlines our strategy of investing in companies with exceptional teams, global scaling potential, and solid revenue streams. We are confident that Qwikcilver will continue their stellar journey in the next phase of their growth,” said Andrey Terebenin, Managing Partner, Sistema Asia Capital (India).
Qwikcilver was the first Indian company to develop the gift card business and became the undisputed leader in the market. The company annually issues over 250 million gift cards across 16 countries and 15,000 e-commerce portals and mobile applications. Over the past few years, Qwikcilver has shown annual growth of over 250%. The company processes over 700 million transactions per year.
Sistema Asia Fund is a venture capital fund sponsored by Sistema PJSFC, a publicly-traded diversified Russian holding company. The fund is primarily focused on investing in technology enabled, consumer and business oriented startups in India and Southeast Asia with exceptional teams, global scaling potential, and solid revenue streams.
Post this exit, Sistema Asia Fund is currently invested in nine companies, including Kissht (consumer lending FinTech platform), Faasos (online food on demand app), HealthifyMe (health and fitness mobile app), Netmeds (India’s largest online pharmacy), Lendingkart Techonologies (online financing company focusing on financing working capital for SMEs), and Licious (direct-to-consumer meat and seafood brand).