Eklavya Gupta, Founder/Co-CEO, Recur Club shared his views about the organization, technology and the future ahead in an exclusive interview with team IT-Voice:
Prateek: Give us an overview of Recur Club and its journey so far?
Eklavya Gupta: For startups across the globe, equity financing is the most popular fundraising method. But it is also one of the most expensive and time-consuming ways of raising growth capital. With the aim to revolutionize how founders can raise capital to run their businesses, Recur Club, Asia’s first trading platform for companies to trade their recurring revenue contracts for upfront capital, was launched in 2021. Recur Club is for any company that has predictable recurring revenue streams in SaaS, Services, Ed-Tech, D2C Subscription, Media, Insurance, and other industries. Recur Club began operations in India and is currently working with companies such as Avatar Ventures-backed Heal Software, Keka HR, Apis partner-backed Xoxoday, co-living firm Hooliv, and others. The platform of Recur Club allows institutional investors to bid on providing financing to these customers.
Our USP is the creation of a new asset class, Recurring Revenue. It is also the only trading platform for companies in Asia today that allows them to raise capital instantly without any dilution, restrictive debt, collateral, or share pledge.
Abhinav Sherwal and Eklavya Gupta, who have known each other since their days at IIM Calcutta, were intrigued by the difficulties startup founders faced when trying to raise capital. An IIT Delhi graduate and technologist, Abhinav, during his career as a product manager, saw many startups giving discounts on their products to retain customers, which affected their cash flow and hampered their growth plans. Solving the cash flow problems of startups despite them having a consistent source of revenue in the form of subscriptions, is the company’s north star
Prateek: What is Recur Club offering, and how is it different from its competitors?
Eklavya Gupta: The AI/ML-backed underwriting platform unlocks a company’s trading limit within 48 hours by connecting to their financial and billing data with just a simple click. This enables companies to raise capital as per their convenience without having to deal with investor pressure or restrictive debt covenants. The offerings of the company have proved to be of tremendous help to several organizations that are availing its services to enhance their customer base, improve their products and boost their valuations.
It is different from its competitors because it is the only trading platform for companies in Asia today that allows them to raise capital instantly without any dilution, restrictive debt, and collateral, or share pledge. Recur Club’s technology platform enables startups to raise funding in a non-dilutive manner and gives an opportunity to financial institutions to participate in the growth story of these new-age companies. Their AI/ML-backed underwriting platform is revolutionary as it facilitates capital influx by connecting with the companies’ data and unlocking trading limits within 48 hours. Upon onboarding companies can raise capital at the click of a button by simply trading their contracts on the Recur platform. Recur believes that founders know best how to grow, so they provide restriction-free capital.
Recur believes that with so many new-age companies entering the finance sector, companies also need to upgrade at a fast pace. The ambitious firm wishes to become a pioneer in the finance field through its consistently innovative efforts and offerings.
Prateek: Tell us about your network in India and the brand’s footprint?
Eklavya Gupta: The financial technology startup operates in India called Recur Club Technologies, a Delhi-based subsidiary of the financial technology, the investment arm of Info Edge (India), has invested $2 million in the parent company’s equity. Since January, Recur Club has grown by 200 percent month over month; both in terms of funding and the number of companies it has onboarded. The company presently serves over 550 clients and has a yearly revenue of more than $150 million. Recur Club intends to utilize its funding to expand its presence across a variety of geographies including the United States and the APAC region. Meanwhile, Recur Club appears to be optimistic about its prospects. In 2022, the startup hopes to reach over 2,000 customers and generate $1 billion in tradable revenue.
Prateek: What are Recurs long-term goals? What are your visions for the brand?
Eklavya Gupta: We aim to use the funds raised ($30 million seed funding) to accelerate our growth by delivering best-in class product experience, expand our sales and engineering teams with an endeavor to become the largest and most accurate financial metrics benchmark for recurring revenue companies. By 2025, we aim to be a full service financial suite to recurring revenue companies.
Prateek: What are your plans for expansion? Top priorities for 2022?
Eklavya Gupta: We are working to have 2000+ recurring revenue companies registered on the platform with $1B+ tradeable ARR to provide them with non-dilutive growth capital instantly.
