Former BharatPe co-founder and managing director Ashneer Grover, in his memoir “Doglapan,” speaks out against investors in the fintech company he co-founded, BharatPe, saying that Sequoia Capital “or rather, this political organization is a man, has the greatest ax to grind against me”.
UPDATE – 12:31 PM, Wed – 1/4/23
New Delhi: Former BharatPe co-founder and managing director Ashneer Grover, in his memoir “Doglapan,” speaks out against investors in the fintech company he co-founded, BharatPe, saying that Sequoia Capital “or rather, this political organization is a man, has the greatest ax to grind me”.
Grover, along with his family accused of defrauding at least Rs 886 crore during his tenure at BharatPe, wrote that they were initially a reluctant investor but they (Sequoia Capital) were the largest shareholders with a 19% stake in BharatPe , valued at more than $500 million.
“With the banking license and the launch of PostPe, I’m emerging from Shailendra’s (Sequoia India Managing Director) investment in Pine Labs, which was supposed to deliver the biggest return for Sequoia via an IPO, over a decade long, “He said.
“They got the most out of the merger between BharatPe and Pine Labs — something that would not have been possible on my side,” Grover claimed.
According to his book, Sequoia owns 70% of Pine Labs and Amrish Rau (CEO of Pine Labs) “is known to be close to Sequoia’s managing director, Shailendra Singh, both based in Singapore”.
“Pine Labs is Shailendra’s investment – so whatever it’s worth, it’s high on their priority list. In fact, Sequoia Capital has authorized Amrish to take Pine Labs public at a valuation of over $3 billion, thereby earning $50 million dollars of personal gain,” Grover wrote.
However, with the rise of UPI, “Pine Labs was one of the biggest losers, card transactions stagnated and credit was added to UPI’s orbit”.
“I wrote to Sequoia Capital and made it clear that they should stop the dogs. This angered Shailendra, who in turn called Micky Malka (Ribbit Capital founder) and told him my boots were too big. Micky agreed though Sequoia’s political character, but he advised me that I shouldn’t have written to Sequoia and said they were likely to dump my stock,” Grover further claimed.
According to Grover, Micky is the smartest fintech investor on the planet.
“He strongly believes that US funds invested in BharatPe, backed by the funds he invested,” he wrote.
With that background, “Is he easily spooked, worried that the Kotak question will make BharatPe’s banking license disappear? Or is he just upset that I didn’t heed his cues and soft messages instead of continuing to participate in the Shark Tank competition , and think it’s time for me to return to my position?” objected to him.
