An Indian bitcoin wallet startup Zebpay has secured support from a group of angel investors and plans to further promote bitcoins in India.

Among the principal investors Zebpay lists the Vice Chairman of Claris Lifesciences Arjun Handa (invested roughly $450,000), the managing director at Jindal Worldwide Amit Jindal ($150,000) and the founder and chairman at Jaipur-based Triangle Engineers Nagendra Chaudhary ($150,000). All of them have made the investments in a personal capacity.

In his interview for Times of India, a Zebpay co-founder Saurabh Agrawal noted:

“The environment in India for cryptocurrency is extremely positive and we are planning to utilise the amount to promote bitcoins as a reliable currency and investment option, enlist more e-vouchers on our mobile platform with a target to expand our user base from 25,000 to around 100,000 within the next one year and ultimately become a bitcoin payment gateway.”

Part of the raised funds is intended to be used in order to develop the blockchain technology by means of setting up of a laboratory dedicated to blockchain.

According to one of the investors, Amit Jindal, despite the relative unawareness of bitcoin in India, he envisions long-term perspectives for the cryptocurrency. “It is still an attractive investment destination because one or two years down the line, the prospect of cryptocurrency is promising,” he said.

In January 2015 Zebpay launched a mobile wallet app for Android which enables users to send bitcoins to anyone in their address book only using the recipient’s mobile number, without bitcoin addresses or QR codes. Later, in March 2015 the company organized the "Future of Money" bitcoin conference in Ahmedabad, India. And in November 2015 Zebpay announced a bitcoin sale with 10% discount on the occasion of the day of Lakshmi and Kubera, the gods of money.

Anna Lavinskaya