Razorpay, Airtel Payments Bank Roll Out ‘UPI Switch’ To Enable 10K Transactions Per Second

Fintech unicorn Razorpay announced the launch of its own Unified Payment Interface (UPI) with ‘UPI Switch’ in partnership with Airtel Payments Bank.

Razorpay said in a statement that its ‘UPI Switch’ is designed to handle up to 10,000 transactions per second (TPS) at any given time.

Explaining the way Razorpay UPI Switch works, the fintech major said that the success of UPI transactions has a significant dependency on the UPI infrastructure deployed at the banks that connect with the existing UPI infrastructure to facilitate seamless communication between core banking systems and UPI technology while processing a UPI transaction. 

This infrastructure is called a UPI switch, which is powered by Technology Service Providers (TSPs) for banks. 

Though it holds the power to process UPI transactions at scale and enable new UPI innovations, currently, the existing infrastructure lacks customisation features for businesses, believes Razorpay. As a result, there are scalability issues, technical declines, and downtimes that impact the overall customer experience. Besides, legacy TSPs are struggling to remain compliant, which also hinders their ability to innovate and meet the demands of new-age businesses, the company said. 

“Addressing these challenges, Razorpay’s ‘UPI Switch’ readies India for the future and provides a holistic infrastructure that solves all the above challenges and enhances the experience of businesses with its range of features. It excels in dispute resolution, resolving issues 7X faster, within 24 hours than the industry average of seven days,” Razorpay said.

The company also claims that its switch offering can process refunds instantly compared to the industry standard of up to three days, ensuring a more seamless customer experience. Its UPI Switch would be the foundational platform for all future UPI innovations while also powering its current UPI innovations such as Turbo UPI, and TPAP solutions, said the company.

Commenting on the new launch, Khilan Haria, head of payments product at Razorpay said that Razorpay’s UPI Switch is designed with a vision to provide scalability and the best performance to businesses. 

“This venture into UPI Infrastructure marks a strategic move to manage the end-to-end merchant experience and provide the industry’s leading stack. With latency below 100 milliseconds, a 4-5% increase in success rates, and features customized to suit business needs, our switch is crafted to enrich the payment experience and ensure that businesses can now manage the surge in UPI transactions on any sale or non-sale day,” Haria added.

It is pertinent to note that amid the increasing adoption of digital payments, the total UPI transaction in the country stood at 13.44 Bn in March this year, registering a 55% surge from 8.7 Bn in the same period last year.

Founded in 2014 by Shashank Kumar and Harshil Mathur, Razorpay started its UPI innovation in 2017, starting with enabling payment acceptance, introducing the UPI Autopay feature, and other offerings.

Last year, Razorpay also launched ‘Turbo UPI’, which is a one-step payment solution for the UPI network.

Meanwhile, with a focus to grow its overall offering, earlier this year, the company launched an AI chatbot for payments and payroll management named RAY.  The fintech major also forayed into the marketing and growth solutions space with the launch of a full-stack intelligent marketing growth suite, Engage. 

Razorpay reported a consolidated operating revenue of INR 2,279.3 Cr in FY23, up 54% year-on-year while its net profit lowered marginally to INR 7.3 Cr in FY23 from INR 7.4 Cr in the previous year.