IPO-bound PhonePe on Friday announced that it would now allow UPI-based payments for the users of feature phones.
Towards this end, the fintech major has purchased GSPay technology stack from conversational engagement platform Gupshup, it said in a statement. However, it did not mention the value of the purchase.
GSPay is a mobile application built on top of UPI 123PAY, the UPI payment solution for feature phones. It is developed by National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).
PhonePe said it will customise and extend GSPay IP and launch its own feature-phone based UPI payment mobile app on new feature phones, over the next few quarters.
The new app would offer basic UPI features, such as Peer-to Peer (P2P) transfers and offline QR payments. Through this app users can also receive money from other UPI customers to their mobile numbers or self-QRs, thus helping create full payment interoperability between feature phones and smartphones.
“This (feature phones) segment of users has been historically underserved by the digital financial industry and the broader startup ecosystem. We hope we can enable crores of these feature phone customers to participate in India’s burgeoning digital payments market,” said Sameer Nigam, cofounder and chief executive of PhonePe.
The company has been gearing up for its IPO and had converted itself into a public company from a private entity in April 2025.
It has also appointed former chief executive officer of Standard Chartered Bank Zarin Daruwala to its board recently.
PhonePe’s board of directors include Teamlease founder Manish Sabharwal, former Blackrock executive Rohit Bhagat, former IAS officer Tarun Chugh, Walmart executives John David Rainey, Donna Morris, Leigh Hopkins as well as PhonePe founders Sameer Nigam and Rahul Chari.
In FY24, the Walmart-backed company narrowed its net loss by 29% to Rs 1,996 crore from Rs 2,795 crore in FY23. The improved financial performance was backed by a 74% growth in its operating revenue to Rs 5,064 crore in FY24, from Rs 2,914 crore a year ago.
The company had posted an adjusted net profit of Rs 197 crore in the last financial year, excluding costs towards ESOPs, highlighting that its core operational business has started to turn profitable.