Indian Fintech Startup Jar Turns Profitable After Ninefold Revenue Growth, Reaching 35 Million Users with Gold Investment App

Fintech startup Jar, based in India, has achieved profitability by assisting millions of first-time savers invest in gold through its innovative app. Unlike many consumer fintech companies focusing on affluent urban users or credit products, Jar has found success by offering a culturally familiar asset – gold – as an accessible entry point to savings.

Targeting low- to middle-income individuals, who are often overlooked by traditional financial institutions, the four-year-old startup enables these users to save in gold for as little as ₹10 (approximately $0.11) per day. This approach has allowed Jar to amass over 35 million registered users across 12,000 zip codes. Around 60% of its user base comes from India’s smaller cities and towns (known as tier-2 and tier-3 towns), with over 95% saving formally for the first time.

The company’s financial performance reflects this growth momentum, with two sources reporting that Jar is planning to go public next year. Investment bankers are currently engaging with the startup in preparation for its Initial Public Offering (IPO).

Jar’s operating revenue, primarily generated from its gold-saving app, increased ninefold in fiscal year 2024 to ₹2.08 billion (roughly $23.6 million), as stated in its latest filing. Total revenue across all business lines during the same period reached ₹24.50 billion (approximately $279.3 million), representing a 49-fold increase from ₹500 million ($5.7 million) in the previous financial year (FY24).

This total revenue figure encompasses earnings from digital gold transactions, jewelry sales through Nek platform, and fees from third-party distribution partnerships. The jewelry component is a significant part of this diversified approach. Launched early last year, Nek offers gold, silver, diamond, and lab-grown diamond jewelry across over 8,000 zip codes, operating on a drop-shipment model with zero inventory. Nek achieved annual revenue of ₹1 billion (approximately $11 million) in its inaugural year and has been growing steadily since.

The startup reported profitability after tax for the last two consecutive quarters. Its strategic shift in operations, moving from a third-party digital gold provider to a vertically integrated model, allows Jar to capture a larger share of the gold value chain and even distribute its gold through third-party platforms like PhonePe, the Walmart-owned fintech firm.

In early 2021, Jar partnered with BharatPe and Unity Small Finance Bank to enable users to make digital payments – both to individuals and merchants – directly through the Jar app using India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) system. UPI is India’s dominant digital payment network that facilitates instant bank-to-bank transfers using smartphones. This move introduced a new revenue stream and aims to boost user engagement and retention by expanding the app’s utility beyond gold savings.

Jar has also embraced UPI AutoPay, a feature launched in 2020 that enables recurring payments on the UPI platform. This feature has helped the startup, which only supports UPI-based payments for gold savings, drive repeat transactions from users.

“Daily savings is our hero feature, and that’s what most of our users use it for,” said Nishchay, CEO and co-founder of Jar, when asked about the impact of UPI AutoPay on the company’s growth.

The app caters to a diverse user base, including skilled professionals in IT and manufacturing, small business owners, and daily wage workers such as electricians, plumbers, carpenters, and construction laborers. The app supports nine Indian languages, enabling it to reach users across education and income levels.

To offer a personalized experience, Jar’s app includes gamification and nudges to encourage gold savings. The growth team continually builds different cohorts based on various attributes and data signals, such as phone usage, location, language, consistent saving patterns, and more, in order to identify the consumer and optimize the app accordingly.