Paytm, HDFC Bank Announce Strategic Partnership For Delivering Financial Solutions To End Consumers And Merchants Across India

* To launch innovative products across Digital Payments, Lending and POS solutions  

* Combining HDFC Bank’s retail products/network with Paytm’s technology platform to drive financial inclusion 

India’s leading digital ecosystem for consumers and merchants (1), Paytm and India’s largest private sector bank, HDFC Bank announced that they have entered into a strategic partnership. 

This brings together two market leaders who will drive innovative digital solutions for financial transformation in the country by combining their strengths in the banking, lending, and digital payments space. 

The fusion of HDFC Bank’s network, products and credit appraisal capabilities and Patym’s technological platform will accelerate digital transformation in semi-urban and rural India while bringing more people into formal banking channels. Paytm is India’s largest payments platform* with 333 million users and 21 million merchants onboard (1).  

With over 50 million card customers (both credit and debit cards) HDFC Bank is a strong player in the payments ecosystem with leadership in both credit card issuing and acquiring businesses. It has a footprint of over two million merchant acceptance points and 48 per cent business  market share on  merchant acquiring volume. It remains the number one credit card issuer in the country with a spend share of over 27 per cent.  

Through this partnership, Paytm & HDFC Bank will build comprehensive solutions across Payment Gateway, POS Machines and Credit Products including Paytm Postpaid which is Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) solution, Eazy EMI and Flexi Pay, and more. 

The first leg of the partnership will include Payment Gateway and POS Solutions for Indian merchant partners. 

The partnership between Paytm and HDFC Bank will aim to empower the new businesses, which have recently ventured online, and enable them to scale up further.  

Paytm and HDFC Bank are coming together for two broad POS offerings: 

* HDFC Bank will drive merchant partnerships across India, to whom Paytm will offer its existing range of Android POS devices. Through the partnership, HDFC Bank's salespersons will start selling Paytm’s payment solutions in the market. HDFC Bank will be the payment partner, while Paytm will be the distribution and software partner. 

* Paytm and HDFC Bank will jointly launch a co-branded POS product in the retail segment, which Paytm will have the option to offer it to its own customer base. 

Talking about the partnership, Bhavesh Gupta, CEO, Paytm Lending said, “We are extremely delighted to partner with HDFC Bank, which has been one of the leaders in the retail lending space in our country for the last two decades. Together we aim to provide innovative digital lending & payment solutions for consumers and merchants alike. This partnership will further strengthen financial services ecosystem by bringing together our technology and digital solutions and HDFC Bank’s retail and credit prowess.” 

Renu Satti, COO, Offline Payments, commenting on the partnership said, “Paytm’s reach in the offline & online merchant space and HDFC Bank’s retail influence, will aim for dynamic growth in the payments space. Paytm has a history of launching innovative products that have made way for the adoption of retail payments among various merchant partners. This partnership aims to bring innovative products focusing on affordability.” 

Parag Rao, Group Head – Payments, Consumer Finance, Digital Banking & IT, HDFC Bank said, “As India’s largest issuing and acquiring bank, we have always endeavoured to personalise our offerings to customers-consumers, businesses and corporate houses. Through this partnership, we will also be jointly delivering enhanced SmartHub solutions to the market.  We believe that this is the start of a great partnership and the cumulative strength of both HDFC Bank and Paytm will help us strengthen our respective leadership positions”. 

HDFC Bank SmartHub solutions is an integrated platform offering merchants a one-stop solution shop for all their business needs-payments, banking, lending and segment-specific business solutions.