Online e-commerce marketplace Flipkart on Friday announced that it has acquired PhonePe, a Bengaluru based mobile payments company co-founded by ex-Flipkart employees Sameer Nigam and Rahul Chari, for an undisclosed amount. PhonePe is building India’s first Unified Payments Interface (UPI) based product.
This is Flipkart’s third major acquisition in the payment space. It had bought majority stake in fintech startups FX Mart in 2015 and NGPay in 2014.
Commenting on this acquisition, Binny Bansal, CEO, Flipkart, said, “Payments has been one of the biggest hurdles for mass adoption of online shopping in India. UPI has the potential of transforming the entire payments ecosystem in the country. The acquisition of PhonePe is in-line with Flipkart’s focus on driving innovation on the payments front. I am delighted that two Flipkart veterans – Sameer and Rahul are at the helm of this initiative.”