Former Google Pay execs raise $13.2M to build neo-banking platform for millennials in India

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<span>Former Google Pay execs raise $13.2M to build neo-banking
platform for millennials in India<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>Two co-founders of Google Pay in India are building
a neo-banking platform in the country — and they have quickly secured backing
from three top VC funds.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>Sujith Narayanan, a veteran payments executive who
co-founded Google Pay in India (formerly known as Google Tez), said on Monday
that his startup, epiFi, has raised $13.2 million in its Seed financial round
led by Sequoia India and Ribbit Capital.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>David Velez, the founder of Brazil-based
neo-banking giant Nubank, Kunal Shah, who is building his second payments
startup CRED in India, and VC fund Hillhouse Capital also participated in the
round.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>The eight-month-old startup is working on a
neo-banking platform that will focus on serving millennials in India, said Narayanan,
in an interview with TechCrunch.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>“When we were building Google Tez, we realized that
a consumer’s financial journey extends beyond digital payments. They want
insurance, lending, investment opportunities and multiple products,” he
explained.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>The idea, in part, is to also help users better
understand how they are spending money, and guide them to make better
investments and increase their savings, he said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>At this moment, it is unclear what the convergence
of all of these features would look like. But Narayanan said epiFi will release
an app in a few months.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>Working with Narayanan on epiFi is Sumit Gwalani,
who serves as the startup’s co-founder and chief product and technology
officer. Gwalani previously worked as a director of product management at
Google India and helped conceptualize Google Tez. In a joint interview, Gwalani
said the startup currently has about two-dozen employees, some of whom who have
joined from Netflix, Flipkart, and PayPal.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>Shailesh Lakhani, Managing Director of Sequoia Capital
India, said some of the fundamental consumer banking products such as savings
accounts haven’t seen true innovation in many years. “Their vision to reimagine
consumer banking, by providing a modern banking product with EpiFi, has the
potential to bring a step function change in experience for digitally savvy
consumers,” he said.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>Cash still dominates much of the transaction in
India today. But New Delhi’s move to invalidate most paper bills in circulation
in late 2016 pushed tens of millions of Indians to explore payments app for the
first time.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>In recent years, scores of startups have emerged to
help Indians pay digitally, and secure a range of financial services. And all
signs suggest that enough people in India are now comfortable with mobile
payments: More than 100 million users together made over 1 billion digital
payments transaction in October last year — a milestone the nation has
sustained in the months since.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span>A handful of startups are also attempting to
address some of the challenges that small and medium sized businesses face.
Bangalore-based&nbsp;Open, NiYo, and RazorPay offer a range of features such as
corporate credit cards,&nbsp;a single dashboard to manage transactions&nbsp;and
the ability to automate recurring payouts that traditional banks don’t currently
offer. These platforms are also known as neo-bank or challenger banks or
alternative banks.&nbsp;Interestingly, most neo-banking platforms in South Asia
today serve startups and businesses — and not individuals.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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