Bengaluru-based Helpchat agrees to acquire hyperlocal discovery platform Niffler

BENGALURU: Bengaluru-based Helpchat,a chat-based personal assistant application has announced that it will be acquiring Mumbai-based deal-discovery platform, Niffler for an undisclosed amount.

Niffler, a deal-discovery platform for local offline stores, was founded in July 2014 and recently introduced chat-based interactions between consumers and local businesses. It had raised funding worth $1 million in March 2015 from SAIF partners.

"In Helpchat, we found the perfect partners to further our mission of plugging the information gap that exists in India. We share Helpchat’s vision of assisting consumers in getting more done by doing less, using its chat-based personal assistant app," said Niffler co-founder Edul Patel.

"(This) Acquisition will also help Helpchat accelerate the growth of its personal assistant engine across the areas of offline commerce and local deals based on user's intent," said Ankur Singla, CEO and Founder of Helpchat.

Sequoia-backed Helpchat's Android application has had over 7,50,000 downloads since it was launched in January and sees over 1 million chat sessions in a month, according to the company.

It hopes that this move will allow a faster acquisition when it launches in Mumbai and Pune, where Niffler already has a presence.

"We are geared for aggressive pan-India growth in the coming few months. The acquisition of Niffler is one of the first major steps in this direction," said Singla.