CoinSwitch Kuber becomes 2nd cryptocurrency 'unicorn' in India with $1.9 billion valuation

CoinSwitch Kuber has become India's second crypto exchange to gain unicorn status after Coindex. The company on Wednesday informed that it has raised Rs 1,943 crore (USD 260 million) in the latest funding round, which now takes the company's value to $1.9 billion. A unicorn is a private firm with a value of over $1 billion.

Founded 16 months ago by Ashish Singhal, Vimal Sagar and Govind Soni, it is the 30th Indian company to become a unicorn. The others include PayTM, Byju's, OYO, Udaan, Delhivery, Dream11, BigBasket, Lenskart, Unacademy, Cars24, FirstCry, CRED, Groww, Urban Company, BlackBuck, BharatPe, Udaan, Ola's Electric Vehicles (EV) and UpGrad among others.

CoinSwitch Kuber said that it raised funds from Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Coinbase ventures and prior investors Ribbit Capital, Paradigm, Tiger Global and Sequoia Capital India. "'a16z' is a venture capital firm known to back bold entrepreneurs building the future through technology, while Coinbase is one of the early pioneers of creating a crypto economy and operates one of the world's largest crypto exchanges," the company said in a statement.

"We are incredibly excited about the crypto market opportunity in India, and with its breakout growth, CoinSwitch has emerged as the leading retail platform in the country," David George, general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, said.

The crypto exchange said that it will use the money to make cryptocurrencies a household name and is targeted to add 50 million Indians to its platform. The funds will be used to hire experts across engineering, data, product, growth and for adding new asset classes and onboarding institutional clients.

"CoinSwitch Kuber is on a mission to build wealth for Indians by making crypto more accessible. I believe, simplifying crypto investments for the Indian youth has helped us to stand out," said Ashish Singhal said, adding that the startup has reached unicorn status within 14 months of its operation.

About Coinswitch Kuber

CoinSwitch Kuber is an app-based cryptocurrency platform that caters Indian market. It supports trade in over 100-plus cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, Litecoin, Dash and others using the Indian rupee. The CoinSwitch Kuber application is available on iOS's App Store and Android's Google Play Store.