Targeted at retailers, Ezetap’s plug and play device is creating a universal payment solution to adapt to any existing or newer payment methods that may arise in the market.

Imagine this. Today, in a move to make India a cashless economy, on one hand, players like MasterCard and Visa, and wallet brands are selling their products to customers (many brands selling to one customer), and on the other, every customer who purchases at a retail outlet is paying through multiple modes of payment such as wallet, card and UPI. While customers have enough brands traversing them away from a cash economy, merchants are left to grapple with multiple modes of payment, many not integrated to the main systems. Herein, Ezetap, the Bengaluru-based fintech startup has identified a solution to bring in a universal payment solution, which can adapt to any existing or newer payment methods that may arise in the market. “India is going through two revolutions now; one is digitization of the economy and two is merchants now moving away from terminals and leaning towards app-based payments. The need of the hour is not just payment acceptance but integrated payment acceptance. That’s what we do,” explains Abhijit Bose, its CEO and co-founder.

India is going through two revolutions now; one is digitization of the economy and two is merchants now moving away from terminals and leaning towards app-based payments. The need of the hour is not just payment acceptance but integrated payment acceptance. That’s what we do

Founded in 2011 by Shripati Acharya, Abhijit Bose, Bhaktha Keshavachar, Bala Parthasarathy and Sanjay Swamy, Ezetap, which officially launched its product in the market in 2013, has deployed 1,30,000 devices in the market, and is recording five million transactions a month.

The Addressable Market

“We look for sectors where we are unique instead of throwing a terminal in the hands of merchants,” opines Bose. The target for Ezetap is clearly laid out; one, the enterprise customers such as Airtel and Amazon, which transact every day in large numbers and find multiple payment modes challenging. Secondly, instead of reaching merchants directly, it sells its device to banks like SBI and HDFC, which in turn offer it to their customers. “In the former, we happen to be the first player to introduce SDK (Software Development Kit) on mobile. We are also the pioneers in building an SaaS-based payments model for customers,” claims he.

Unlike most players that expect the merchant or the client to set up the infrastructure to initiate digital payments on their platform, Ezetap has developed its own hardware, primarily to compete on price points that a U.S. or Europe cannot match. “For example, we sell our hardware at US $50 instead of at US $150, and instead of taking a transaction fee (which these countries can afford because their margins are high), we charge them for the software,” notes Bose.

Ezetap being a player which offers plug and play devices to its customers; its main challenge doesn’t lie in the lack of adequate infrastructure but in taking vigilant steps while scaling in a market as huge.

The Larger Vision

Having already touched a GMV of US $120 million a month, with monthly transactions growing at 20 per cent, Ezetap tap has set a market pace to digitize India’s cash economy with an eye on being in the business for the long haul. “We want to be the OS of commerce in this country. Our goal is to ensure that every Indian transacts with us at least once a week, and that might happen soon,” he claims on a concluding note.

Snapshot – Ezetap

Year: 2011

City: Bengaluru

Founders: Acharya, Abhijit Bose, Bhaktha Keshavachar, Bala Parthasarathy and Sanjay Swamy

Investors: Social+Capital, Helion Advisors, Berggruen Holdings, Horizon Ventures, Capricon Investment Group, Peter Thiel, American Express, AngelPrime (Prime Ventures)

Impact: Deployed 1,30,000 devices in the market, recording 5 million transactions a month

Monthly GMV: US $120 million