Mobile Payment to Become the Next Big Thing in India

Jun 18, 2015

mCommerce market in India is in nascent stage, m-payment and m-banking segments have shown significant growth over the last few years. As smartphone sales continue their journey by 51% every three months, the mobile commerce (m-comm) market may grow by 55% from its present size of $2 billion to $19 billion by 2019.

Now a days online recharge has become very exceptional choice for most of the people as they have the benefit to recharge instantly at anytime. In simple words, the recharge market is gradually growing as people don’t have to go to any shop for bill recharge.

Meanwhile, some websites are also providing to pay electrical power invoice, gas bill and Land line costs. The modes of payment can be achieved by many means like internet banking or Debit Card or bank card. Few of the websites these days have also integrated eCommerce in to it to grow in the industry and make name for them.

These websites also offer Recharge Coupons for reductions,cashbacks and plenty of offers for the customers. There are more than a few mobile Recharge sites that gives to recharge safely at any time. Below are the the top 3 recharge web pages in India.

• Paytm

What do you think of when you think of quick recharge? Well, as per me I think it would be Paytm. It’s Paytm because; currently it is the most popular mobile recharge site in India. Paytm stands for Pay Through Money. It is a Noida-based startup founded in the year 2009 by Vijay Shekar Sharma and became well known in a very short period. You can say, it has become a synonym for Mobile Recharge. Currently It has 80 million wallet users according to Mary Meeker’s 2015 Internet Trends Report .

It offers Online Mobile Recharge, DTH Recharge, Electricity Bills, Data cards, Landline Bills, Gas Bills, Add Money to Paytm Wallet, Send Money to Friends, Bus Tickets, Coupons and eCommerce.

The Paytm’s mobile application has also been into existence which is supported on Android, IOS and Windows Operating System Mobiles. The app makes it convenient for everyone to avail the above services on the go.

• Freecharge

Freecharge is a Mumbai-based start-up that was founded in 2010 by Kunal Shah. On 8th April 2015 Snapdeal acquired the company. It started as an online platform for recharge and bill payments, but soon adopted a mobile first strategy with its app for Android, iOS and Windows smartphones. Its concept was to provide an easy platform to recharge mobiles prepaid postpaid, data cards and DTH while giving out discount coupons for online shopping, restaurants and more, to make the overall recharge, free.

It has a freecharge credits wallet where users can add cash and use it for fastest recharge experience. It also provides turbo recharge where it remembers your numbers which you have recharged and allows an easy reference for the next time for quick recharge. It gives coupons for every online recharge from different sites like Dominos, Pizzahut, McDonalds, Cafe Coffee Day, Snapdeal.

• MobiKwik

Mobikwik is currently ranked 3rd in the list of top 10 recharges sites in India, according to the KPCB report. Founded in 2009 by Bipin Preet Singh, this website also provides an easy solution to Mobile Recharge. Its slogan goes “Mobile Wallet for Every Indian. Easiest way to Pay”.  Where it differentiates from the other two is that it started as a wallet and then moved into a recharge portal.

Mobikwik allows you to add money from your Debit Card, Credit Card Internet Banking and also through Cash Pay, a door step cash collection service. It is a semi closed wallet authorized by Reserve Bank of India. They have tied up with various online websites like eBay, Bookmyshow, Dominos, Shopclues etc. Currently, Mobikwik is has around 17 million users and its app is available on Android, iOS and Windows Smartphones.

Indian players in this domain with their positions:

Here are few points of comparison between these three giant startups:

 

	Paytm	Freecharge	Mobikwik
Customer Base	80 million	15 million	17 million (wallet users)
App installs	624,140	376,271	255,375
Employee Base	2000-5000	51-200	51-200
Total Fund Raise	$610 million	$120 million	$30.3 million
Daily Unique Visitors	3,742,656	1,549,438	940,838
Monthly Unique Visitors	113,914,659	47,160,012	28,636,145
Alexa India Rank	27	320	310
Bounce Rate	21.40%	59.20%	23%
Daily Revenue	$24,140	$9,994	$6,068
Monthly Revenue	$734,750	$304,182	$184,703

 

Recent activities by above startups:

Paytm

• Earlier in May this year, through its marketplace Ali Express, Alibaba entered into a strategic tie-up with Indian mobile wallet company Paytm. The Chinese eCommerce giant listed 100 Mn stock-keeping-units (SKU) on Paytm for the next month.
• Paytm claimed that it has clocked a whopping $1.5 Bn GMV run rate by targeting its 80 Mn wallet users and currently has over 10 million products and 40,000 merchants listed on its online marketplace.

Freecharge

• Online marketplace Snapdeal acquired Freecharge for an undisclosed amount. However, rumors of Snapdeal acquiring Freecharge for over $450 Mn through a mix of cash and equity sufficed in media.
• Freecharge Launched Cheatz, A Coupon Aggregator App in February this year. Cheatz is a coupon aggregator app designed by team Freecharge. It list down all the offers available on various e-commerce websites, making it easy for the users to sort out their requirements and choose accordingly.

Mobikwik

• Earlier in March, Mobikwik entered into a partnership with India’s leading retail chain of coffee cafés, Café Coffee Day (CCD) to enable its customers make payments through the MobiKwik wallet across all its outlets in India.

The future of eCommerce is mCommerce. It will redefine the way consumers find, shop and pay. As per a PwC report, the eCommerce sector in India is expected to grow by 34% to $22 Bn in 2015 as compared to last year. A major contribution would be coming in through mobile.

Source：iamwire