Bangalore-based Bluebear Technology, which owns & operates a student education financing platform, Propelld, has has raised $250,000 in seed funding from Indian Angel Network and IAN Fund, led by IAN members Ambarish Raghuvanshi, former CFO at Naukri, Alok Sharma former CEO of Apple India and Satish Jajodia former CEO of Education Dynamics.

Founded in 2016 by IIT-Madras alumni - Bibhu Prasad Das, Brijesh Samantaray and Victor Senapaty, Propelld addresses the problem of students not getting access to financing from traditional financial Institutions due to low/non-existent credit or work history. Propelld uses its proprietary employability outcome algorithm to include earning potential when determining the ability of a borrower to repay.

Propelld now works with institutes covering both technology and non-technology certification and skilling courses across Bengaluru and Hyderabad. Propelld-partnered institutes have an annual intake of about 30,000 students.

“The education space has traditionally been overlooked by financial players. Its challenges are unique. At the same time, this translates into a massive opportunity, especially with year-on-year increased spending in the space,” said IAN member Ambarish Raghuvanshi.

In a similar model like Propelld, Mumbai-based Eduvanz, a skill development loan provider to students, raised $500,000 investment led by Blinc Advisors, in February this year. Eduvanz has recently been granted the NBFC Licence by the RBI to start providing Loans in the multi-billion skill development sector.

In October last year, Bengaluru-based student micro-financing startup, SlicePay, raised $2 million in a Series A round funding from Russian early-stage investor Simile Venture Partners and Japanese investment fund Das Capital with participation from existing investor Blume Ventures

Delhi-based education financing startup GyanDhan, also founded by IIT alumni, has an an online marketplace for education loans for students who want to study abroad. In 2016, GyanDhan raised an undisclosed amount in seed funding from Stanford Angels and Entrepreneurs with participation from Harvard Angels, and other individual investors including Pravin Gandhi.

Last April, industry veteran Ronnie Screwvala launched Asia's first and largest Online Scholarship Fund with a first closing of 100 Crore with an aim to get to 400 Crore in the next 3 - 4 years.
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