India’s 30 million-plus MSMEs (micro, small and medium enterprises) now have access to an all-inclusive digital payment hub, minimizing the effect of poor infrastructure on merchants’ digital payment adoption.
PayNearby, the leading banking and digital payments network in the country, announced on Monday (Aug. 16) that it has teamed up with Visa and RBL Bank to launch SoftPoS and mPOS for PayNearby’s network of over 1.5+ million retailers, simplifying digital payments for its retail partners and their consumers, who remain largely underserved.
The lack of development in digital infrastructure in India has slowed down merchants’ adoption of digital payments, and the country’s population density — of over 350 per POS terminal — is extremely high compared to that of countries like China and Brazil, with POS of 20 and 10, respectively.
The situation has been further exacerbated by the pandemic, which has accelerated the increase in demand for contactless payments to reduce the risk of virus transmission.
That has motivated the three companies to partner to launch the new solutions, with a goal to offer “high-end technology for the bottom of the pyramid, so that benefits of digital payments and digital banking can reach the masses,” according to PayNearby’s Founder, MD and CEO Anand Kumar Bajaj, who also thanked RBL Bank and Visa for lending “credence and proficiency to the offering.”
PayNearby’s 2-in-1 Micro ATM + MPOS machine will serve retailers at the last mile, adding debit and credit card acceptance to the SoftPoS solution that allows contactless payments of up to INR 5000 (about $67).
For customers, the company will be leaning on its partnership with processing partner PayNext and SoftPoS solution partner Uvik to ensure that individuals can easily make debit, credit or contactless payments using any physical card or mobile with tokenization.
With the addition of card payments through mPOS and contactless payment through cards and mobile tokenization on SoftPoS, PayNearby has become “the first company to launch an all-inclusive digital package for retailers that is form-factor agnostic and provides a wide choice to end consumers,” the company said in the announcement. Prior to the deal, PayNearby’s digital payment supported QR code payments, Aadhaar Pay, UPI and Online Payment Gateway.
Read more: PayNearby, Centrum Microcredit Team On Unsecured SMB Loans In India
This is not the first time the India-based firm has shown commitment to driving business growth among its retail partners. In May of this year, the company expanded into retail financing via a partnership with Centrum Microcredit Limited. Through the deal, merchants can gain access to unsecured micro-enterprise loans at affordable interest rates, benefiting from a loan turnaround time of about 24 hours.
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