Safi Keshvargar has joined Walmart, the US-listed retailer, to become ecosystem head for Store No. 8 – Walmart’s incubation unit.
He had previously lead the expansion into New York City of Brand Capital, the strategic investment arm of the Times Group – India’s largest media conglomerate – whose portfolio consists of more than 900 investments, including AirBnB, Uber, Coursera, Headspace, Square Panda and Oddup.
Kesvargar remains an investor at angel network GoingVC Partners, which backs early-stage health tech, consumer marketplaces and consumer product brands.
Walmart has been increasingly active at starting up and backing startups. Last week, Walmart’s financial technology startup Hazel said it would merge with two others, Even and One, to create a bigger business in which it would retain majority control.
The company has backed retailing peers JD.com and Flipkart in China and India, respectively, as part of its global expansion through corporate venturing.
There is increased attention on embedded finance – the use of financial tools or services, such as lending or payment processing, by a non-financial provider. (The Global Financial Council will have a Chatham House-governed roundtable on this topic at the GCVI Summit in California in June.)
Nik Milanović, head of business development and strategy for Google Pay, part of the Alphabet internet conglomerate, has recently set up an early-stage fund, The Fintech Fund, with $4m in committed capital, including Better Tomorrow Ventures’ Sheel Mohnot and Jake Gibson; Cowboy Ventures’ Jillian Williams; Sriram Krishnan, founder of Angel Collective Opportunity Fund; Bain Capital Ventures and founders such as NerdWallet co-founder Jake Gibson, Orum.io’s Stephany Kirkpatrick and The Block’s Mike Dudas, according to news provider TechCrunch.
The Fintech Fund is investing at the pre-seed and seed stages, and so far has backed 10 companies, including Goldfinch, 3Box, Ponto and Paysail’s $4m seed round, TechCrunch added.
“The goal is to make this kind of a community fund, rather than an undifferentiated out-of-the box venture fund,” Milanović told the news provider. “Our focus is to give the people and institutions working deeply in fintech a way to reinvest in the fintech ecosystem.”
