SBI-Backed Cashfree Acquires Zecpe For $10 Mn To Enhance D2C Checkout Capabilities

Marking its second acquisition, payments solutions firm Cashfree has acquired one-click checkout company Zecpe. Although Cashfree hasn’t disclosed the financials involved in the deal, sources told Inc42 that the deal may have valued Zecpe at $10 Mn – $12 Mn.

As part of the deal, the founder of Zecpe, Hriday Agarwal, will join the Cashfree Payments team as the head of ecommerce checkout. The employees of Zecpe will also join Cashfree Payments to help scale the product.

Cashfree, which competes with Razorpay, has recently received an in-principle approval from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to operate as a payment aggregator.

Last month, SBI-backed Cashfree reportedly laid off 13% of its workforce, or around 80 employees. However, the fintech firm said that it had downsized 6-8% of its employee base as part of its retrenchment plan.

Zecpe enables ecommerce businesses to improve checkout conversion by making the process quick and seamless for customers. Zecpe will now operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Cashfree Payments, according to a statement issued by the company.

The CEO and cofounder of Cashfree Payments, Akash Sinha, said that Zecpe’s acquisition will be an addition to the company’s D2C Payments Suite enabled for ecommerce businesses.

“We are certain that this acquisition will strengthen our D2C one-click checkout capabilities and elevate our leadership position in the SMB space,” Sinha said.

Faster checkouts have increasingly become a strong proposition for payment solutions firms to offer to their enterprise customers. Razorpay, for instance, has Flash checkout, which increases conversion rates for customers.

Last year, Tiger Global, too, made a seed investment in ecommerce enabler Shopflo to tap into the growing market.

Meanwhile, Cashfree said that the acquisition will further enhance its D2C checkout capabilities and give its merchants an elevated end-to-end checkout and payment experience.

Zecpe helps merchants increase conversion rates, supporting incremental monetisation and scaling. This acquisition will also enable Cashfree Payments to offer additional value-added services like Return to Origin (RTO) reduction, fraud detection, and address pre-filling, among others.

“D2C space is exploding in India and presents a fantastic opportunity to help ecommerce players increase their conversion rates and reduce COD fraud and returns. Since we have one of the largest networks of prominent brands working with us, we know this space very well. Businesses across different industries use our solutions today,” Agarwal said in a statement.

Founded in 2015 by Akash Sinha and Reeju Datta, Cashfree Payments operates a full-stack digital payments solution platform that enables businesses to collect payments and offers API banking solutions.

In 2021, Cashfree raised funding from SBI at a post-money valuation of $200 Mn and acquired UAE-based payment solution provider Telr.