AdalFi raises $7.5m in funding round to power loans across Pakistan

By Leandra Monteiro

Pakistan’s end-to-end digital lending infrastructure provider AdalFi announced a $7.5 million funding round. The funding round was led by COTU Ventures, Chimera Ventures, Fatima Gobi Ventures and Zayn Capital alongside angel investors including execs from Plaid.

With AI-powered credit scoring and underwriting models, AdalFi has built the critical infrastructure to power smart, instant loans for consumers and SMEs in Pakistan. These include unsecured loan products such as term loans, credit cards and revolving finance facilities for consumers and SMEs respectively.

Salman Akhtar, CEO and co-Founder of AdalFi said, “Pakistan has 50 million bank accounts yet only 2 million of these individuals and businesses have any credit relationship with their bank. The high cost of loan origination driven by physical verification of identity, assets and financial health (in the absence of credit scoring) has restricted credit access to a thin, top tier of customers. AdalFi’s digital lending platform allows partner banks to instantly credit score the other 95% of their existing customers who have never been lent to and cross-sell loans to them.”

AdalFi’s proprietary technology scores the financial transactional data already possessed by banks, enables personalized digital marketing to qualified prospects and, finally, provides the customer journeys which are embedded within the bank’s digital presence to enable real-time disbursement of loans.

Salman Akhtar added, “In essence, we have built better underwriting models for banks. Not only have we lowered the cost of credit scoring and underwriting and therefore the cost of credit but we changed their outlook and got them to change their approach. Banks have been drawn to AdalFi because we offer rigorous credit scoring to ensure portfolio quality with zero-cost customer conversion (from depositors to borrowers). Moreover, we enable a breakthrough in customer experience with instant, smart loans which completely transform customer value delivery.”

AdalFi’s vision for the future is to continue to drive innovation in the lending space, providing consumers and SMEs with the best possible experience by powering the lending infrastructure across a wide range of products and channels. The company aims to be the premier digital lending solutions provider in the APAC region and beyond.