Amazon, the world’s biggest online retailer, has invested ₹ 590 crore in its digital payments arm Amazon Pay (India) Private Limited. The Seattle-based company is eyeing India’s booming digital payments market and planning to take on rivals such as Flipkart’s PhonePe, Paytm and Google’s mobile payment service Google Pay [Tez].
The funding came from Singapore-based Amazon Corporate Holdings Pvt. Ltd. and Mauritius-based entity Amazon.com.incs Ltd according to the regulatory documents filed by Amazon, which were sourced from business intelligence platform Paper.vc. Amazon Pay got the capital infusion on September 19 this year under the “Rights Issue ” by offering 59 crore equity shares.
Eyeing to tap the upcoming festive season, last month, Amazon Pay unveiled card-less EMIs for selected customers. Amazon Pay EMI provides instant financing options to customers who may not yet have access to credit for purchasing high-value products, up to ₹ 60,000 by splitting their purchases into instalments at low-interest rates.
“We are on a mission to enable credit access for every Amazon customer,” Vikas Bansal, director, emerging payments, Amazon Pay, had said in a statement. “After the recent expansion of EMI on debit cards, we are very excited to bring this facility ahead of festive season.”
In August this year, Amazon India also unveiled ‘bill payments facility’ that allows customers to pay electricity, landline, broadband, gas and postpaid charges. Customers can access these categories via the Amazon Pay dashboard and the Amazon homepage on the mobile app and website. The service enables bill payments through most of the major billers across various cities in India.
“We shall continue to innovate on behalf of customers as we simplify the payments experience in India,” Shariq Plasticwala, director, payments, Amazon, had said in a statement.
Last week One97 Communications Limited, the parent firm of digital payments company Paytm, raised $300 million from billionaire investor Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. One97 raised the investment through allotment of 17,02,713 fully paid equity shares from BH International Holdings through private placement basis on September 27, 2018.
