Founder of fintech firm Cred and a serial entrepreneur, Kunal Shah has acquired a non-banking finance company through an entity he has floated.

Through Newtap Technologies Pvt. Ltd., Shah has acquired Parfait Finance & Investment. People briefed on the matter and said that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has approved the acquisition.

Shah had cofounded Freecharge and in 2015, sold it to Snapdeal for $400 million. Cred has also applied to the banking regulator for a payments aggregator licence.
To lend on their own, fintech firms in India are increasingly looking to have their NBFCs. To enable users to on-lend to other Cred customers, Cred launched Cred Mint in August.

Cred has forayed into lending, e-commerce, payments and now investment segments since its launch as a credit card repayment player in 2018.

In August Shah said that its commerce business now has over 2,000 brands and about 25-30 per cent of all credit card bill payments in India were happening through Cred.

“Cred (Dreamplug Technologies Pvt. Ltd.) has not applied to acquire an NBFC. Newtap Technologies Pvt. Ltd, in which Kunal Shah has invested in a personal capacity, has applied to the RBI for approval to acquire a stake in Parfait Finance & Investments Pvt. Ltd,” the company said.

At a time when credit card issuers are charging extremely high rates for rollover and EMI facilities, there is an opportunity to provide cheaper, seamless credit to the premium segment, said an industry expert.

In its third fundraising round this year, Cred closed a $251 million funding round in October, taking its valuation to $4 billion.