ShopClues acquires mobile payments firm Momoe

Online shopping platform ShopClues.com, controlled by Clues Network Pvt Ltd, today said it has acquired mobile payments firm Momoe Technologies to add a payment service to its platform. The size of the deal was not disclosed.

''The development is a successful culmination of ShopClues' plans of bringing innovative digital payments for its merchants and customers on its platform. Thanks to this acquisition, the portal will now use Momoe's technology to boost its payment network for merchants and will look to tie this in its hyperlocal commerce business,'' the company said in a statement.

As a mobile payments app, Momoe allows users to pay offline merchants like restaurants, grocery stores, electronics, pharmacies, spas and salons. Using the app, customers can pay for products and services using credit cards, debit cards, net banking and mobile wallets.

Founded by Utkarsh Biradar, Karthik Vaidyanathan, Ganesh Balakrishnan, Neelesh Bam and Aiman Ashraf, the venture had raised $1.2 million in seed funding in December 2014 from IDG Ventures, Jungle Ventures and India Quotient.

ShopClues, which in September launched a chat feature ShopClues Connect for consumers to directly interact with sellers, will also use Momoe's technology to further strengthen the platform and ease transactions.

''In Momoe's team, we found the right technological and ideological match to take us much closer to our vision of making our consumer payments frictionless and providing our merchants with mobile banking solutions to digitize their businesses,'' said Sanjay Sethi, chief executive officer and co-founder, ShopClues.

''We see natural synergies since ShopClues is a pure marketplace model with a strong focus on merchants and consumer segments that significantly overlap with Momoe. We will continue our focus on innovative merchant solutions, extending our payments proposition to a broader array of merchant services for online and offline commerce,'' said Utkarsh Biradar, chief executive officer, Momoe.

ShopClues raised close to $100 million in January, largely from sovereign wealth fund GIC Pte Ltd of Singapore. It claims to have 190 million monthly visitors on its website. It has over five crore listed products and over 500,000 merchants on its platform. Other investors backing the company include Tiger Global Management Llc, Nexus Venture Partners and Helion Ventures.