With competition heating up the Fintech sector in the country, it is witnessing a plethora of development and innovation lately. By embracing the latest technological innovations, Fintech start-ups have been able to provide users with a degree of convenience that banks and similar institutions are yet to match.
While most of the fintech companies are committed to offering convenience to the consumers, the company which has the right strategy to make the money flow easily between consumers will be able to lead the fintech space.
It will be interesting to see how 2018 plays out for each of the fintech giants. These are the five fintech companies to watch out for in the year to come.
Paytm: Started with online mobile recharge and bill payment services, Paytm has diversified in payments, bank and credit offerings too. With demonetization bringing it in the limelight, Paytm has been raking in money from investors like never before. Over the course of the year, Paytm has come out with a lot of additional features and is also looking to expand its footprint to include lending services and credit cards for customers.
PayU: PayU is poised to be a fintech hub through its foray into lending and remittances. Recently, the company was in news for its investment in a digital remittances company, Remitly. In September 2016, PayU India bought Mumbai-based start-up CitrusPay for $130 million in what was then the largest acquisition in the fast-growing digital payments market. Earlier this year PayU forayed into consumer offering segment, LazyPay - a unique deferred payment product received an overwhelming response. With company's core business set to be profitable in 2018, the company has the right growth strategy in terms of expansion of investing in the right partners.
NPCI: National Payments Council of India, an initiative of Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and Indian Banks' Association (IBA), was created to help build a strong payment infrastructure in a nation. UPI is the brainchild of NPCI and BHIM app is also run by this organization. It is exciting to see the progress that both BHIM and UPI have made in the past year. The payments market is constantly evolving and NPCI's role is hugely influential in India's ongoing push to expand digital payments. With government planning phase-2 of digital payment push from January 2018, these are exciting times for the organization.
PayPal : The American Fintech giant had already launched its cross-border operations in India and has recently opened up its domestic services as well. Cross-border payments allow consumers and merchants to transact overseas with ease. This company has been catching the attention of several Indian startups who want to expand their business overseas. Their recent collaboration with MakeMyTrip, BookMyShow and Yatra.com is a stepping stone to getting more Indian and foreign merchants on the same global payments and transactions platform.
Zebpay: Cryptocurrency trading is catching on in India with bitcoins gaining popularity as remittances and financial assets. Zebpay is India's first bitcoin company to launch the simplest mobile bitcoin wallet app that enables bitcoin transactions. The future looks promising Zebpay with over a million downloads, and the ease of making investments through bitcoins has lured in more buyers.
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