Juspay Secures $60 Mn To Boost Payments Infra With AI

Fintech startup Juspay has secured $60 Mn (around INR 514 Cr) in a Series D funding round led by Kedaara Capital, along with participation from existing investors SoftBank and Accel.

The round was a mix of primary and secondary investments.

The startup plans to deploy the fresh capital to fuel its AI capabilities and drive innovations to boost workforce productivity and merchant experience.

“Today, as we expand our global footprint and push the boundaries of AI, we remain committed to building truly open source and interoperable payment systems that embrace the growing diversity in the payments landscape,” said Sheetal Lalwani, cofounder and chief operating officer (COO) of Juspay. 

Founded by Lalwani, Vimal Kumar and Ramanathan RV and Nishant Sameer, Juspay offers payment solutions to companies across sectors such as financial services, ecommerce, BFSI, quick commerce and travel among others.

In January, Moneycontrol reported that Juspay was eyeing a fresh funding of $150 Mn from Kedaara Capital, WestBridge and SoftBank at a valuation of $1 Bn.

Inc42 has reached out to Juspay for comments on the development. The story will be updated based on the response.

The startup last raised $60 Mn in its Series C funding round in 2021 from SoftBank, Vision Fund and others. 

On the financial front, Juspay trimmed its net loss by 7.7% to INR 97.54 Cr in the financial year ending March 2024 (FY24) from INR 105.75 Cr in the previous fiscal. Operating revenue zoomed 49% to INR 319.32 Cr in the period under review from INR 213.39 Cr in FY23. 

Why Are Fintechs Snapping Ties With Juspay?

It has been a few months since payment gateways have started snapping ties with Juspay after the payment orchestrator received its payment aggregator licence from the Reserve Bank of India last year.

Notably, payment orchestrators connect merchants with payment gateways. They provide a unified layer for merchants to connect them with the PGs for smooth payment processing.

After securing the licence from the RBI, Juspay launched its payment aggregator service, HyperPG, leaving many fintechs apprehensive that Juspay could poach their customers. 

Now in the most recent development, Paytm also reportedly discontinued all integrations with Juspay from April 1 after PhonePe, Razorpay and Cashfree. 

Fintech platforms started maintaining distance from Juspay as many reportedly alleged that Juspay’s routing engine was not transparent enough. 

However, Lalwani told Inc42 that the company’s routing engine, which is a core component of the orchestration platform, has two major workflows – rule-based ordering and dynamic gateway ordering. It said over 95% of merchants use rule-based ordering, giving them “full control” over routing traffic by defining rules via Juspay’s routing software based on their business priorities