Manish Khera led FINO Raises Rs.150 Crore Date:   Thursday , August 04, 2011 Blackstone Group, a PE firm, has invested 150 crore in FINO, for a minority stake. FINO is a provider of technology solutions for banks and microfinance institutions. The fund will be used for overall growth of the company and meeting long-term capital requirements. E&Y was the sole advisor for this funding. Headquartered in Mumbai, FINO was founded in 2006. It is an inventor, innovator and implementer of integrated technology solutions for institutions like Banks, Microfinance Institutions, Government entities, and Insurance companies, to enable financial inclusion environment for the micro customers. They provide complete electronic platform projects and their solutions are anchored around using biometric smart cart, hand-held devices and Micro Deposit Machines to perform field operations and biometric authentication. They raised 70 crore funding from VCs like Intel Capital, Headland Capital and International Finance Corporation in 2009. Manish Khera, CEO and Director of FINO, has led the company since inception to connect micro-customers with businesses, banks, government and investors. He began his career with ICICI Bank in 1993. During his 13 years at ICICI, he has worked in various areas including credit, government and rural banking, technology and alternate channels. For his leadership and business vision, he was conferred as the Young Global leader by World Economic Forum in March 2011. The company has more than 35 million customers and plans to double its customer base in the next couple of years. It has over 2,500 employees and about 20,000 business correspondent agent, spread across 239 offices. Khera said that the company has done well, the outlook is even stronger with the government focus of using the business correspondent channel for cash subsidies, and the RBI's derive to achieve financial inclusion.