Lightspeed Leads Rs 50 Crore Investment in ItzCash

Lightspeed Venture Partners has led a Rs 50 crore investment round in Essel Group-promoted Itz Cash Card, picking up an undisclosed stake in the Mumbai-based multi-purpose pre-paid card company. Existing investors Matrix Partners India and Intel Capital, who invested $10 million in the company in 2007, have also participated in this round. The company will use the money to venture into the retail payments space, apart from expanding its product portfolio.

Bejul Somaia (in photo), managing director of Lightspeed India, will join the Itz Cash Card board. The Menlo Park, California-headquartered venture and growth capital investor, which invests out of New Delhi and Bangalore here, sees “significant growth potential for this product given that cash accounts for approximately 97 per cent of the country’s retail payments, which exceed $500 billion,” said Somaia in a press release.

Some fast facts about ItzCash (from its website):

• Launched in 2005
• 6 million unique active users
• 50,000-70,000 daily transactions
• Available in 550 Tier I and II towns

Back to Lightspeed, the firm typically invests between $2 million and $10 million in early-stage companies and between $10 million and $20 million growth-stage companies. It is currently investing in India out of the $800 million Lightspeed VIII fund raised in 2008.  Other investments in India include 4Interactive and TutorVista. The firm also runs a pretty useful blog on venture capital and entrepreneurship — link here.