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Business Standard
19-05-2025
- Business
- Business Standard
ZikZuk Receives In-Principle Approval from RBI for Issuance of Prepaid Payment Instruments (PPIs)
VMPL Hyderabad (Telangana) [India], May 19: ZikZuk, a fast-growing fintech startup headquartered in Hyderabad, announces that it has received in-principle authorisation from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to issue Prepaid Payment Instruments (PPI). With this strategic approval, ZikZuk is set to enter India's dynamic digital payments space with powerful prepaid wallet and card-based payment offerings. PPIs are instruments that facilitate the purchase of goods and services, conduct financial services, and enable remittance facilities, against the value of money stored within themselves. PPIs are designed to facilitate cashless transactions. Some of the applications of PPI include smart cards for mass transit & travel, digital wallets, or mobile apps that store money for financial transactions. Users can load money and use them for various payments, including online purchases, bill payments & in-store transactions. RBI now allows users of PPIs to conduct UPI payments through third-party UPI apps like Cred, Google Pay, Amazon Pay, etc. With this approval from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), PPI issuers can issue prepaid wallets and cards and enable UPI payments. ZikZuk is set to operate as a full-fledged domestic player in one of the world's most dynamic FinTech markets. "We're extremely excited to receive this in-principle approval from the RBI," said Rahul Rasa, Co-founder of ZikZuk Technologies. "This is a big step in our journey to build innovative financial products from the ground up, designed specifically for the Indian market. With PPIs, we'll be able to empower users with secure, seamless, and scalable digital payment tools." This approval signals the RBI's growing support for new-age Indian fintech players, enabling them to participate more meaningfully in the country's expanding digital economy. ZikZuk's entry into the PPI space is expected to bring fresh energy and user-first innovations to a sector currently dominated by established names such as PhonePe, Paytm, MobiKwik, Scapia, and Jupiter. With this green light from the RBI, ZikZuk joins a select group of companies poised to shape the future of India's digital payment infrastructure.
Time of India
29-04-2025
- Business
- Time of India
In Fierce UPI Fight, Fresh Faces Gain Some Ground
Newer Unified Payments Interface (UPI) apps such as Flipkart-backed Navi, Bhim, and Cred are increasing their share in the payment market amid a spike in UPI transactions, luring consumers with cashback offers and other incentives. #Pahalgam Terrorist Attack India stares at a 'water bomb' threat as it freezes Indus Treaty India readies short, mid & long-term Indus River plans Shehbaz Sharif calls India's stand "worn-out narrative" The newer entrants have grown their collective share to around 4% in March 2025, up from 2.3% in October 2024 and negligible a year earlier, according to data released by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), which runs the UPI network. Even so, PhonePe and Google Pay continue their domination, holding on to a combined market share of 82%—47% and 35%, respectively—in the last two months, the data showed. 'The newer apps are not offering pure-play payments; they are going beyond that with credit, ecommerce, and bill payments,' said Rohan Lakhaiyar, partner at Grant Thornton Bharat. 'UPI is their customer acquisition hook, and it seems to be working,' he said. Navi is focused on consumer lending, Cred is expanding unsecured loans and bill payments through Bharat Connect, and is binding itself into Flipkart's ecommerce ecosystem. These firms are offering cashbacks and other incentives to move consumers away from their preferred apps at a time when the growth rate of UPI has slowed down. The payment network grew about 36% in 2023 and 2024, down from around 54% growth in 2022, albeit on a larger base, ET reported on April 7. Currently UPI is estimated to have more than 200 million active users. While is offering up to 5% cashback on every UPI transaction, Navi is positioning UPI payments as a 'rewarding' experience, bundling features such as buy-now-pay-later through Navi Trezo. Cred had until recently promoted cashbacks for every Cred UPI transaction.
Time of India
29-04-2025
- Business
- Time of India
In fierce UPI fight, new players Flipkart-backed Super.Money, Navi, Cred start to gain ground
Live Events Newer Unified Payments Interface (UPI) apps such as Flipkart-backed Navi , Bhim, and Cred are increasing their share in the payment market amid a spike in UPI transactions, luring consumers with cashback offers and other newer entrants have grown their collective share to around 4% in March 2025 up from 2.3% in October 2024 and negligible a year earlier, according to data released by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), which runs the UPI so, PhonePe and Google Pay continue their domination, holding on to a combined market share of 82%.PhonePe and Google Pay had 47% and 35% of the market, respectively, in the last two months, the data showed.'The newer apps are not offering pure-play payments; they are going beyond that with credit, ecommerce, and bill payments,' said Rohan Lakhaiyar, partner at Grant Thornton Bharat. 'UPI is their customer acquisition hook, and it seems to be working,' he is focused on consumer lending, Cred is expanding unsecured loans and bill payments through Bharat Connect, and is binding itself into Flipkart's ecommerce firms are offering cashbacks and other incentives to move consumers away from their preferred apps at a time when the growth rate of UPI has slowed down. The payment network grew about 36% in 2023 and 2024, down from around 54% growth in 2022, albeit on a larger base, ET reported on April UPI is estimated to have more than 200 million active is offering up to 5% cashback on every UPI transaction, Navi is positioning UPI payments as a 'rewarding' experience, bundling features such as buy-now-pay-later through Navi Trezo. Cred had until recently promoted cashbacks for every Cred UPI Bhim has also earmarked a separate budget to incentivise users through cashbacks, targeting the next 100-150 million UPI users, ET reported in August 2024 While these players are backed by large corporations or deep-pocketed venture capital firms, it remains to be seen how long they can sustain heavy incentive-driven the government recently slashing the subsidy budget on UPI payments to Rs 1,500 crore and restricting it only to 'small merchants', industry executives remain sceptical about generating sufficient revenue from this business.'Payments on UPI do not generate direct revenue. Fintechs are onboarding users to cross-sell revenue-generating services, which is the only way to justify their investment,' Lakhaiyar though, has been nudging smaller apps to scale and challenge the dominance of Walmart-backed PhonePe and Google transactions have risen sharply in the past two months to around 550-600 million daily in March and April. March recorded 18.3 billion UPI transactions, while April is expected to surpass 17.5 billion, according to NPCI data. Monthly volumes in the previous six months hovered between 15.5 billion and 16.5 of this spike can be attributed to the rise of the new apps, industry insiders said.A senior banker at a private sector lender said gaming and betting transactions have increased during the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL), with new UPI apps benefiting from this Paytm--whose associate entity Paytm Payments Bank suffered a series of setbacks including RBI restrictions last year--has held on to its 6.5-7% market share in consumer-facing UPI transactions in March and April, NPCI data shows.'As a listed company, Paytm has limited flexibility to spend heavily on cashbacks,' founder of a payments startup said, requesting anonymity. 'It needs to focus on profitability and has shifted its emphasis to the more lucrative merchant payments space,' the person the new entrants are making early gains, industry watchers believe Google Pay and PhonePe will ramp up their marketing efforts if their market dominance comes under is already focusing on building a larger financial services play beyond payments, with offerings across insurance, credit and now, the door is open. But whether the newcomers can sustain their momentum--and high burn rates--in an intensely competitive market remains to be seen.
Time of India
22-04-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Fintechs must build collection muscle to scale lending business: Cred founder Kunal Shah
Cred founder Kunal Shah said fintech startups focusing on small-ticket lending must invest in collection capabilities to ensure repayments from defaulters and build sustainable businesses. Speaking at the Bharat Inclusion Summit hosted by IIMA Ventures, Shah said many companies had misdiagnosed the problem. 'When it comes to mass-market lending, the issue is not demand but collections. If you're offering loans to people below a certain income level, there's unlimited potential to disburse. But the real challenge lies in getting the money back,' he said. 'Digital companies must focus more on collections than demand—India is credit-hungry, so the problem isn't disbursal but recovery,' he added. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like They were so beautiful before; look at them now; number 10 will Surprise you Today's NYC Undo Shah stressed that fintech founders are essentially in the business of trust, irrespective of the category. 'If you're building in fintech, you're building trust. That's the foundation for anything to work efficiently.' Bengaluru-based Cred, which began as a credit card bill payments platform, has since expanded into unsecured lending , insurance distribution, and secured credit products. Last month, it launched loans against mutual funds—one of its first secured lending offerings. ET had reported in June 2024 about the company's plans to enter this space. Live Events In an interview in February , Shah told us that such products deepen trust with users and help unlock more revenue opportunities. Discover the stories of your interest Blockchain 5 Stories Cyber-safety 7 Stories Fintech 9 Stories E-comm 9 Stories ML 8 Stories Edtech 6 Stories ET reported on April 14 that Cred has held talks to mop up $100–200 million, largely from its existing investors, at a reduced valuation of $4 billion, a cut of more than 30% from 2022 when it last raised funding. The Peak XV Partners-backed startup has also invested in NewTap Technologies, which owns a stake in NewTap Finance, a non-banking finance company (NBFC) promoted by Shah.
Yahoo
28-01-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Fintech firm Cred joins Indian central bank's digital currency project
MUMBAI (Reuters) - Tiger Global and Peak XV backed Indian firm Cred has become the first fintech platform to roll out access to India's central bank digital currency, the company said on Tuesday. The Reserve Bank of India had started a pilot for the e-rupee, which is a digital alternative to the physical currency, in December 2022. Initially, the central bank had permitted only banks to offer access to the digital currency but in April 2024 said it will allow payment firms to offer e-rupee transactions. Alphabet's GooglePay, Walmart-backed PhonePe, AmazonPay and MobiKwik were among the payment firms seeking to join the digital currency pilot, Reuters reported in August 2024. Cred will roll out access for its e-rupee wallet to a select set of users and the issuance of e-rupee tokens into the wallets will be facilitated by YES Bank, the company said in a statement. "Our goal is to make e-rupee transactions frictionless and drive its adoption among the most creditworthy Indians,' Kunal Shah, the founder of Cred, said. While e-rupee transactions had surged initially, they have since declined, reflecting the struggle central banks face globally in popularizing digital currencies.
