September 23, 2017Times of India

MY STARTUP IDEA: OfBusiness and FlexiLoans founders on their eureka moment

‘I found small businesses were underserved’: Ruchi Kalra

The idea: OfBusiness, an online e-commerce and financing platform for SMEs

Eureka moment: Ruchi Kalra’s nine years at McKinsey gave her a deep insight into the financial technology space. She used to interact with banks and found that SMEs were important, yet underserved. “I wanted to do something related to manufacturing, which was core to India’s growth. That was also the time I was expecting, so I wanted to start something new at the same time.”

Early days: A lot of people tried to dissuade her, but she quit her job along with six of her friends in the manufacturing and fintech spaces and started OfBusiness in 2016. They started a platform for procurement of raw materials, and set up two hubs – in Trichy and Faridabad – to interact with SME clusters.

Now: They have started providing working capital to SMEs. The venture has received $16 million in funding from Matrix and Zodius Capital, and has around 2,000 SMEs on the platform. It is planning to add more services.

Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/people/ofbusiness-flexiloans-eureka-startup/articleshow/60807591.cms