Smallcase Technologies, the Bangalore-based company that operates platforms for individual investors to invest in portfolios of stocks and ETFs (called smallcases) with their existing demat accounts, announced that it has raised $8 million from leading investors.
The Series a round was led by Sequoia India, with participation from existing investors Blume Ventures, Straddle Capital, Beenext Pte Ltd, WEH Ventures & DSP Adiko.
“We are building smallcases as a new investment instrument class that helps you take portfolio exposure to stocks & ETFs while having no expense ratio, making them cost-effective. Since the underlying securities are held in the investor’s demat account, they have complete control & transparency into their investments. Our goal is to make smallcases the preferred investment option of the modern investor,” says Vasanth Kamath, CEO and co-founder, smallcase Technologies.
To expand the reach for this new instrument, the company is:
● Building platforms that help retail brokerages offer smallcases to their clients
● offering tools for research firms & individuals to create their own smallcases
● Developing infrastructure for investment advisors & advisory platforms to enable transactions in exchange-traded products
Smallcases are currently available on 5 of the largest and fastest growing brokerages including HDFC Securities, Zerodha, AxisDirect, Edelweiss & 5Paisa and more partnerships are in the pipeline. Types of small cases available includes strategies like asset allocation, thematic, smart beta and sectoral. smallcases are created & managed by entities like research divisions of brokerages like HDFC Securities, AxisDirect, 5Paisa & independent research houses like the in-house smallcase Research team, Capitalmind & Weekend Investing
Since the launch of the small cases Platform in July 2016, a total user base of 2.5 lakhs investors have transacted over Rs. 2000 cores in small cases.
“As retail participation in equity investments grows in India, investors are increasingly looking for easy to understand, transparent, low cost investment products”, said Harshjit Sethi, Principal, Sequoia Capital India Advisors. “Sequoia India is excited to partner early with them, working with small case as it pioneers a new way to invest in equity markets, and grows rapidly on the back of its partnerships with top brokerages in India.”
"The small case team of Vasanth, Anugrah and Rohan are building an innovative set of equity investment products that will shape the choices of the next generation of public market investors”, said Karthik Reddy, Managing Partner, Blume Ventures. “By creating simplicity and transparency for direct investors, investment advisors and brokerage houses to offer low cost equity investing, they've quietly risen to $100s of millions of portfolio construction in a short span of time. We hope to see them at the forefront of the equity market development. We are happy to see Sequoia join the journey."
Deepak Gupta, Founding Partner, WEH Ventures also commented, "India's investors need better ways to invest via transparent, low-cost, easy to use products. Small case is on a mission to fulfill this need and we are delighted to back them on this journey."
About smallcase Technologies Private Limited
Small case enables retail investors to invest in portfolios of stocks & ETFs (called smallcases) with their existing trading & demat accounts. Smallcases are available on 5 top tier brokerage platforms like HDFC Securities, Zerodha, AxisDirect, Edelweiss and 5 Paisa. smallcase Technologies was started in 2015 by 3 IIT Kharagpur graduates and has a 50+ team of finance professionals & engineers with prior experience at Goldman Sachs, Nomura, Edelweiss; based out of Bangalore.
