Mobile payments provider Mswipe expected to raise $21m
Mobile payments provider Mswipe Technologies is expected to raise up to $21m from its existing investor pool, which includes Falcon Edge Capital, Axis Bank. and DSG Consumer Partners, as well as a new investor, venture capital firm Fosun. Closed is slated for next month. The start-up last raised $25m in 2015.
Mobile payments service provider Mswipe Technologies, which provides mobile point-of-sale (mPoS) devices, is likely to raise up to $21 million from existing investors Falcon Edge Capital and DSG Consumer Partners, along with a new investor, Chinese VC firm Fosun.

The fintech start-up had last raised $25 million in 2015 from Falcon Edge Capital, Matrix Partners India, Axis Bank and DSG Consumer Partners.

According to sources, the deal might get closed next month. Queries sent to Mswipe founder and CEO Manish Patel did not elicit any response. DSG Consumer and Falcon also did not reply to queries.

The Mumbai-based firm provides mPoS devices that work with smartphones, tablets and computers, and links to bank accounts.

The company has witnessed a huge growth in the sales of these devices post demonetisation, with card transactions growing rapidly, said sources.

They said the fresh funds will be used to fuel expansion into smaller cities and towns, where ATMs are still scarce and connectivity is a major issue for wallets to run.

In such a scenario, mPoS works well as it can run on low internet bandwidth as well, sources added.

Mswipe’s fund-raising plans come at a time when several other PoS providers, such as ItzCash, MobiSwipe and Ezetap, are also aggressively expanding their services.

ItzCash plans to deploy 1 lakh PoS units this year to enable small merchants and shopkeepers to accept payments digitally, making it convenient for customers in semi-urban and rural areas, according to Ravi Singh, its Chief Business Officer.

Similarly, MobiSwipe is planning to deploy about 50,000 devices in the next nine months, according to a company statement.

Meanwhile, AP Hota, Managing Director and CEO, National Payments Corporation of India, had recently told reporters at a press conference here that the Corporation is targeting to nearly treble the number of PoS machines at merchant outlets to 5.5 million over the next six months, from 2.4 million now.

All the new POS machines will be Aadhaar- and Bharat QR-based, he added.