Paytm Eyes Developed Markets In 2019

Paytm, the digital payments company, could expand into one or two more developed markets this year.

According to a report in Deal Street Asia, during a presentation Wednesday (Jan. 24) at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Paytm Chief Financial Officer Madhur Deora said the company has found developed markets to present an opportunity, pointing to its expansion in Canada and Japan. He said several verticals for the company had begun to earn revenue and profits. “We have found the developed markets to be very interesting,” Deora said. The CFO didn’t provide a timeline for when Paytm would enter new markets or to commit definitively to the idea, noting the company is also in the process of building a scalable business.

In October, Paytm, along with SoftBank and Yahoo! Japan launched PayPay, a digital payment service in Japan. It enables customers to put money from a bank into the PayPay digital wallet. The payment app is aimed at getting people in Japan to adopt cashless payments and eschew using cash. In Japan about 20 percent of all transactions are cashless; the Japanese government wants that to increase to 40 percent by 2025.

In late November Paytm Founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma said at the TiE Global Summit that the company is setting its focus on the U.S. “So [expansion to] Southeast Asia could happen, but that’s not my personal ambition,” Sharma said. “My personal ambition will be to make America great again.”

Paytm, India’s largest payment company, as of October represents the biggest contribution to UPI (Unified Payments Interface), with Alibaba and Paytm saying Paytm has registered as many as 137 million transactions across UPI. That gives Paytm market share of 33 percent. The company said in October that Paytm BHIM UPI has become a preferred method of payment for millions of people. That has made it the leader in UPI payments.