Israel-based Rapyd Acquiring PayU's Global Payments Organisation (GPO) for $610 Mn, To Enable PayU Focus on India Fintech Biz

Rapyd, Israel's fintech-as-a-service startup, is acquiring PayU’s Global Payments Organisation (GPO) for a total cash consideration of $610 million. The transaction will enable PayU to focus on the large payments and fintech opportunity in India, announced the company.

The acquisition of PayU Global Payment Organisation (GPO) does not include PayU’s India, Turkey and Southeast Asia operations.

PayU is a payments and fintech business of Prosus, a Netherlands-based consumer internet group and a technology investor that operates and invests in markets with long-term growth potential.

PayU’s GPO business provides advanced ecommerce payment solutions for global merchants in over 30 countries across Latin America, Central and Eastern Europe and Africa. The business contributes around 30% of PayU's overall revenues. In FY23, total payment volumes for GPO grew 12% year-on-year to US$34bn. This is around 3x growth in 5 years.

PayU will now focus on the "rapidly growing Indian payments and credit business", according to a statement from Prosus, under its subsidiary PayU India, through which it is serving more than 450,000 merchants and more than 2m credit customers.

For Rapyd, the acquisition of PayU GPO expands its global reach, strengthening its position in key vertical markets including eCommerce, logistics and transportation.

PayU CEO Laurent le Moal, said,"PayU's payments business is one of the largest, fastest growing, and most profitable non-banking businesses in India, with 42% year on year growth in the last year alone." Overall, India's digital financial services opportunity remains large and underserved, providing healthy growth for PayU India".

According to the company's consolidated financial statement for 2023, PayU's India business alone generated $399 million in revenue in FY23, growing 31% year on year.

To recall, in October last year, Prosus had terminated a $4.7 billion deal to buy Indian payments firm BillDesk despite receiving approval from the Competition Commission of India (CCI).

Prosus is majority-owned by South African multinational Naspers, and through its subsidiary Prosus, Naspers has claimed to have invested close to $6 billion in Indian technology companies since 2005.

In July 2021, Prosus, along with SoftBank, led the $1.25 billion financing round of Swiggy and holds about ~ 38% stake in the Indian food delivery giant.

PayU Rolls out UPI AutoPay feature For Subscription Payments

PayU merchants can offer customers subscription payments across OTT, education, online delivery, utility bill payments and other sectors

PayU, India's leading online payment solutions provider, today announced the integration of the UPI AutoPay feature for merchants. A front-runner in offering innovative solutions, the step re-affirms PayU India's commitment to equip merchant partners with the latest technologies. With this integration, PayU merchants can offer UPI AutoPay to all customers and automate collection of recurring payments of up to Rs. 2000 per transaction.

UPI is one of the most popular payment modes on the PayU platform and UPI AutoPay is poised to be a game-changer for frequent, small ticket and daily transactions. This feature will greatly increase consumer convenience by streamlining recurring payments across segments such as mobile bills, electricity bills, EMI payments, education, entertainment/OTT subscriptions to name a few. Setting a new standard of innovation, UPI AutoPay will enable merchants to automate billing, improve cash flows and offer better pricing.

Commenting on the integration of UPI AutoPay, Manas Mishra, Chief Product Officer, PayU India, said, "The enhanced subscriptions payment model, powered by UPI AutoPay, is set to bring in a new wave of business efficiency and consumer convenience. It furthers PayU's vision to create a frictionless payment experience. Merchants can now optimize their billing plans, improve revenues, and cash flow and experience the versatility of a subscription suite. Given the benefits of UPI AutoPay such as fixed payment schedules, easy, and customizable integration, we expect a majority of our merchants to adopt this feature."

Krupal Parchure, Head UPI Product and Strategy at NPCI, said "With UPI AutoPay, customers can now subscribe to merchant services after one-time authentication through their UPI app. Merchants can debit customers for payments based on various frequencies and can offer easy cancellation services with zero fees and no refund-related hassles. A pre-notification will inform customers about charges to be levied. At NPCI it's our constant endeavor to innovate and bring in customized digital solutions for the customers and provide them an exceptional digital payments experience."

With UPI AutoPay, customers can create, approve, modify, pause as well as revoke auto debit mandate on the 'mandate' section of their UPI-enabled application. The mandates can be set for one-time, daily, weekly, fortnightly, monthly, bi-monthly, quarterly, half yearly and yearly. UPI users can create e-mandate through UPI ID, QR scan or Intent.

About PayU India

PayU, India's leading online payment solutions provider, is regulated under the Reserve Bank of India and has advanced solutions to meet the digital payment needs of the Indian market.

PayU provides payment gateway solutions to online businesses through its cutting-edge and award-winning technology.  In India, PayU serves more than 350,000 merchants with 70+ local payment methods and is the preferred payments partner for nearly 60% of the e-commerce merchants, including all leading e-commerce companies and a majority of airline businesses.

PayU also developed LazyPay in 2017, an alternate lending platform to offer credit solutions such as Small Ticket Credit (Buy Now Pay Later), App-based loans (Instant personal loans) and Point of Sale Credit (Merchant EMI). LazyPay Buy Now Pay Later is currently live on 100+ merchants such as Byju's, Swiggy, Flipkart, Makemytrip, Dunzo, Vodafone, Zomato, Bookmyshow, Oyo, Tata Sky and many more.

True Balance offering UPI Service as a New Payment method to Users in Collab with PayU India

Taking India one step closer to become a cashless economy, TrueBalance, Softbank-backed balance and data management mobile app has tied up with PayU to connect customers and merchants by enabling seamless payments through a digital platform. 

TrueBalanceis on the verge of expanding its business by way of providing e-commerce platform enabling customers to have the benefits of EMI on payment, insurance, and purchase of products.

UPI
launched in India in 2016, allows bank-account holders to transact
using their smartphones by just feeding in their Aadhaar numbers or
mobile phone numbers instead of entering bank account details. PayU is a
Netherlands-based fintech company providing a safe payment technology
to online merchants. This True Balance-PayU tie-up strengthens the Digital India initiative through TrueBalance’s vision of targeting the untapped one billion mobile phone users without access to digital financial services.

Commenting on the launch, Mr. Charlie Lee, CEO, True Balance said, “Foreseeing the announcement of the launch of 1 lakh Digital Village in India during the budget, UPI will play a key role in empowering the next Billion. We have recently launched our KYC compliance for customers, and I am extremely delighted to introduce our new fintech service in India in collaboration with PayU India.”

All True Balance app
users will be able to make safe and seamless payments of all the
existing products and utility bill payments using the UPI platform.

Further elaborating on the partnership with True Balance, Rahul Kothari, Chief Business Officer, Enterprise Business, PayU India, said,
“UPI clocked whooping 672 million transactions till last month. This
clearly indicates that UPI has changed the way people look at money. We
can see the paradigm shift in consumer behavior, moving towards digital
payment alternatives than cash-based transactions. Our partnership with True Balance will also open new opportunities for people in tier 2/3 regions and help them quickly stride on the UPI wave,”

In 2014, the mobile application True balance was launched in Korea by Mr. Cheolwon Lee (Charlie Lee), an alumnus of the University of Chicago. In 2016, True Balance was founded in India to empower the next billion and to enable seamless mobile bill recharges; which has garnered more than 70 million downloads so far. True balance is ‘One Stop Payment “solution for all utility bill payments and foresees to provide small loans for these services to its users.

In March 2016, True Balance raised an undisclosed amount from SoftBank Ventures Korea .

True Balance is aiming to serve India 2 and 3 with utility payment and providing financial platform for all. True Balance is
aligned with the mission of digital India and focus on providing the
rural population an experience for easy and safe utility bill management
and payments through use of mobile technology.

PayU India To Shut Down Its Mobile Wallet 'PayU Money' Operations By 31st January

Digital payments gateway PayU India, which is backed by South Africa's Nasper, is shutting down its mobile wallet-- PayU Money-- and will focus on its credit-based product LazyPay to push its consumer facing business, reported Times of India.

PayU will be closing down all the services of PayU Money wallet on 31st January 2018.

PayU will continue to offer its wallet services through Citrus even though it may not aggressively push it from now on.

Since early 2017, PayU has been focusing its energies in building its consumer vertical and launched its flagship product ‘LazyPay’. LazyPay is PayU India's flagship offering that allows consumers to pay later for goods purchased.

LazyPay is currently live on merchants such as PVR, Box8, Zomato, Jazz Cinemas, Netmeds and Innerchef, D Vois, AbhiBus, Fasoos, FreshMenu and many more.

Notably, after buying out Citrus Pay in 2016, PayU ended up having two mobile wallet entities so for the very reason along with few other the company is shutting down its mobile wallet service.

Additionally, in a statement given to ToI, PayU India MD Jitendra Gupta also confirmed that PayU is also slated to bring German credit startup Kreditech to India next financial year.

Last month, Indian cab hailing startup Ola has roped in PayU India co-founder Nitin Gupta to head its financial services business -- Ola Money.

PayU is now betting on different other segments to dominate the fintech space in India by tapping small businesses (both exports and imports), data and credit. Moreover, the company has also made three startup investments in companies —Kreditech, Paysense and ZestMoney — for consumer and SME lending.

PayU India To Shut Down Its Mobile Wallet 'PayU Money' Operations By 31st January

Digital payments gateway PayU India, which is backed by South Africa's Nasper, is shutting down its mobile wallet-- PayU Money-- and will focus on its credit-based product LazyPay to push its consumer facing business, reported Times of India.

PayU will be closing down all the services of PayU Money wallet on 31st January 2018.

PayU will continue to offer its wallet services through Citrus even though it may not aggressively push it from now on.

Since early 2017, PayU has been focusing its energies in building its consumer vertical and launched its flagship product ‘LazyPay’. LazyPay is PayU India's flagship offering that allows consumers to pay later for goods purchased.

LazyPay is currently live on merchants such as PVR, Box8, Zomato, Jazz Cinemas, Netmeds and Innerchef, D Vois, AbhiBus, Fasoos, FreshMenu and many more.

Notably, after buying out Citrus Pay in 2016, PayU ended up having two mobile wallet entities so for the very reason along with few other the company is shutting down its mobile wallet service.

Additionally, in a statement given to ToI, PayU India MD Jitendra Gupta also confirmed that PayU is also slated to bring German credit startup Kreditech to India next financial year.

Last month, Indian cab hailing startup Ola has roped in PayU India co-founder Nitin Gupta to head its financial services business -- Ola Money.

PayU is now betting on different other segments to dominate the fintech space in India by tapping small businesses (both exports and imports), data and credit. Moreover, the company has also made three startup investments in companies —Kreditech, Paysense and ZestMoney — for consumer and SME lending.

PayU India's Co-founder Nitin Gupta To Head Ola Money

Indian cab hailing startup Ola has roped in PayU co-founder Nitin Gupta to head its financial services business, Ola Money to be precise.

An Ola spokesperson confirmed that Gupta is joining to lead Ola Money and the company’s financial services business.

The Economic Times first reported the development yesterday. Citing two people familiar with the matter, the report also suggested that Ol could also be eyeing a payment bank license for its financial services business.

Launched in 2015, Ola Money is cab-hailing firm's online wallet platform and till very late its only been used by its customers to make payments for the cab rides however now the firm has also offering the wallet platform to buy goods and services from its partners. It also had signed up around 20 partners including Domino's, Pizza Hut, Cafe Coffee Day and Bookmyshow with whom the wallet could be used to buy their offerings.

Ola is getting into the financial services business by tapping its million-strong driver network as a captive customer base to begin with.

Nitin Gupta is an alumnus of IIT-Delhi and IIM-Ahmedabad. He joined PayU India in 2011 and then in September 2016 quit after the company acquired rival Citrus Pay. Prior to PayU, Gupta was the founder and CEO of coupon firm Khojguru Infotech.

PayU India's Co-founder Nitin Gupta To Head Ola Money

Indian cab hailing startup Ola has roped in PayU co-founder Nitin Gupta to head its financial services business, Ola Money to be precise.

An Ola spokesperson confirmed that Gupta is joining to lead Ola Money and the company’s financial services business.

The Economic Times first reported the development yesterday. Citing two people familiar with the matter, the report also suggested that Ol could also be eyeing a payment bank license for its financial services business.

Launched in 2015, Ola Money is cab-hailing firm's online wallet platform and till very late its only been used by its customers to make payments for the cab rides however now the firm has also offering the wallet platform to buy goods and services from its partners. It also had signed up around 20 partners including Domino's, Pizza Hut, Cafe Coffee Day and Bookmyshow with whom the wallet could be used to buy their offerings.

Ola is getting into the financial services business by tapping its million-strong driver network as a captive customer base to begin with.

Nitin Gupta is an alumnus of IIT-Delhi and IIM-Ahmedabad. He joined PayU India in 2011 and then in September 2016 quit after the company acquired rival Citrus Pay. Prior to PayU, Gupta was the founder and CEO of coupon firm Khojguru Infotech.

PayU India's LazyPay Partners With Ridlr To Offer Its Commuters ‘Buy Now Pay Later’ Service

LazyPay, PayU India’s deferral payment offering has announced its partnership with 'Ridlr', the mass transit app in India, to enable ‘Buy Now Pay Later’ facility for its users. Using this premium check out experience Ridlr users can purchase bus tickets and recharge passes on BEST as well as Mumbai Metro, in a single step without having to make a payment at the time of the transaction. Ridlr is pioneering efforts to

Ridlr is pioneering efforts to digitize mass transit in India. It’s one of the major providers of traffic and transport information in Indian cities and has facilitated mobile ticketing on BEST, NMMT, MBMT buses and Mumbai Metro. It will be expanding its mobile ticketing service to other cities shortly.

Commenting on the development, Jitendra Gupta, MD, PayU India said, “LazyPay will act as a boon to BEST bus travellers in Mumbai who have to buy tickets daily almost twice a day and follow cumbersome payment process. Our goal has always been to drive frictionless purchase experience. LazyPay will target over 1 million users through this key partnership with Ridlr."

The customers are allowed to make the payment for all their tickets at one go, within 15 days from the date of the transaction. This saves daily commuters from the hassle of going through the payment process on every journey. The transaction process through LazyPay is as simple as tap and go and provides convenience and seamless purchase experience to travellers while standing in a crowded bus. Ridlr and LazyPay will further extend this facility to buy tickets for other mass transit systems as well.

“Normally our users are booking tickets on the go, either on the bus or at bus stops and the primary mode of payments has been wallets. However, with LazyPay, the bottleneck of adding money is eliminated making the process very smooth for our users. We are excited to further deepen our partnership with PayU who have been our online payments partner from the first day we launched ticketing,” said Brijraj Vaghani, CEO, Ridlr.

PayU is one of the leading online payment service providers in 16 high growth markets, dedicated to creating a fast, simple and efficient payment process for merchants and buyers. Our various payment methods and PCI certified platforms are designed to meet every consumer’s needs.

In India, PayU covers nearly 60% of the airline business and 80% of the entire e-commerce and processes over Rs 40,000 crore of Digital payments in India annually. Driven by the zeal to create powerful financial services solutions, PayU acquired Citrus Pay, a Mumbai based Fintech Company in September 2016. After the merger, PayU has been focusing its energies in building its consumer vertical and launched its flagship product ‘LazyPay’ in early 2017. LazyPay is currently live on merchants such as PVR, Box8, Zomato, Jazz Cinemas, Netmeds and Innerchef, D Vois, AbhiBus, Fasoos, FreshMenu and much more.Recently, PayU India CEO Amrish Rau and managing director Jitendra Gupta invested $250k in Bengaluru-based

Recently, PayU India CEO Amrish Rau and managing director Jitendra Gupta invested $250k in Bengaluru-based fintech startup Open.

Bengaluru Based Fintech Startup Open Secures $250k From PayU India CEO and MD

Fintech startup Open has bagged $250k in a seed funding round led by PayU India CEO Amrish Rau and managing director Jitendra Gupta. The firm plans to utilise freshly infused funds for branding and expansion of the 12-member team.cp_two_third]text[/cp_two_third]

Set to launch in August 2017, Open is co-founded by Anish Achuthan and his wife, Mabel Chacko in May 2017.Open is all set to offer digital banking, bookkeeping, invoicing and other services to micro-entrepreneurs. Earlier in 2015, Achuthan and Chacko had founded Zwitch, a payment startup which was acquired by Citrus Pay.Commenting on the development, Amrish Rau told ET, "Small businesses and entrepreneurs have started moving to app-based banking, and Open offers a whole range of services.

Commenting on the development, Amrish Rau told ET, "Small businesses and entrepreneurs have started moving to app-based banking, and Open offers a whole range of services.The company is tying up with a private bank for backend account

The company is tying up with a private bank for backend account servicing and has also partnered with a GST Suvidha provider (GSP) to offer small businesses help in filing invoices under the new GST regime. The company will also tie up with an NBFC to offer lending products to these businesses.

"We want to provide a complete solution for micro-entrepreneurs, freelancers and startups with only a handful of employees to manage their business banking and also offer analytics. We aim to reach about 10,000 such small entrepreneurs in six months," concludes Achuthan.