Ratan Tata invests in mobile phone marketing platform Paytm
13 Mar 2015
Mobile-based market place Paytm has received an undisclosed amount of funding from Ratan Tata, chairman emeritus of the Tata Group. The funding, Paytm said, is in Ratan Tata's private capability.
Following the funding, Tata will join the company as advisor, the mobile phone-based marketing site stated in a press release.
This is the second investment secured by the Noida-based company within a month.
''I am very happy that Mr Tata has put faith and trust in our values and mission. There is no better advisor for Paytm on building India's most trusted mobile payment and commerce platform,'' said Vijay Shekhar Sharma, founder and CEO of Paytm.
Although the amounts involved are relatively small, Tata has been making private investments in homegrown e-commerce gamers like Snapdeal and Urban Ladder (See: After Snapdeal, Bluestone, Ratan Tata invests in Urban Ladder), and these are significant as investors are looking at the burgeoning e-commerce market in India. ( Ratan Tata invests in CarDekho parent GirnarSoft)
The funding by Tata in Paytm comes after the world's largest e-commerce agency Alibaba said last that it will purchase 25 per cent stake in One97 Communications, Paytm's mum or dad agency.
Paytm aims to expand its cellular wallets to a 100 million by year-end from 25 million lively wallets at present.
''Our common pockets stability is Rs150 and we do 1 million transactions a day throughout Paytm app and different retailers (like Uber, Bookmyshow and so forth),'' Paytm stated.
Paytm pockets permits shoppers to buy cellular recharges, tickets, offers and store throughout 18,000 retailers. It is on the market throughout cellular apps like Uber, Bookmyshow, MakeMyTrip and Foodpanda.
Paytm has now introduced money transfer facility on mobile valets into any bank accounts. The company also plans to open about 50,000 retail outlets where over 25 million Paytm users will be able to load cash in their mobile wallets, Paytm said in a statement.
In order to avail the wallet to bank account transfer facility, a user has to be mobile or email verified and must be registered on the system for over 45 days, it said.
The balance in the Paytm wallet must be a minimum of Rs2,000 and the transaction amount must exceed Rs1,000. The daily upper limit for wallet to bank account transactions is Rs5,000 and the monthly limit is Rs25,000, it said.