Bengaluru- based PhonePe, a company owned by the world’s largest retail company Walmart, has acquired INR 4.27 billion (appr. $60 million) in capital from its Singapore-headquartered parent firm – as confirmed by the Registrar of Companies filings and several media reports.
According to documents sourced from Paper.vc, the company has allocated more than a million shares each at INR 10. PhonePe reported a net loss of INR 19.04 billion ($265 million) for the 2018-19 financial year (FY).
The company’s management said that the latest capital injection would help it compete for market share with Amazon Pay, Google Pay and Paytm.
Sameer Nigam, CEO and founder at PhonePe, stated:
“We are going to focus on digital marketing in a significant way this year, considering the massive consumption of content online. We believe it will be a good way to target the next 100-200 million customers.”
PhonePe secured INR 5.8 billion (appr. $82.5 million) in funding from its Singapore-headquartered parent firm (previously known as Flipkart Payments Pvt Ltd) in December of last year.
Nigam noted:
“From small villages to busy metros, Indians are striving to progress and prosper. We see our platform as a trusted partner to those billion aspirations, bridging the digital divide and empowering Indians to transact conveniently and securely and aspire to do more and move ahead in life, one transaction at a time.”
The PhonePe mobile payments app reportedly has more than 185 million registered users. The app may be used to make instant payments by using a mobile phone number. PhonePe’s management confirmed that it will spend INR 8 billion on marketing its products.
The company has introduced a chat feature on its app that allows users to talk as they request payments or confirm that they have received funds from another user.