Worldline, one of India’s leading payment companies – providing payment services to over 1.5 million merchant touchpoints across the country – is uniquely positioned to serve as a one-stop shop payment solutions provider in India and will continue to invest in the market, said Ramesh Narasimhan, CEO, Worldline India, in an exclusive conversation with Economic Times.com.

“As one of the leaders in providing 360-degree payment solutions to our merchants, I think the important thing is that we are not only growing, but we are also growing profitably, and in the long run, India We are committed to. Our ability to invest and offer new solutions comes from the fact that we are profitable, we can reinvest it in the business and that is something we will continue to do. We continue to grow Will keep, and continue to offer new and unique innovative technologies like SoftPOS and others for the Indian market and Indian traders,” Narasimhan said.

Over the past few years, India has made remarkable strides in the digital payments ecosystem, with digital-wallet transactions expected to surpass cash as India’s leading point-of-sale by 2023. In 2020, India saw the highest number of online in real time. Worldwide transactions. This new wave of digitization and online payments has spread across the country, coming amid a focus on fintech innovations and building a digital economy.

As India accelerates efforts to create a digitally empowered economy, Worldline India – which provides a wide range of payment solutions for its customers – in-store, online and omnichannel – will enable a trust-based less efficient uniquely positioned to play an important role in Cash Society in India, Narasimhan said.

Narasimhan also shared his views on the emerging trends in the Indian digital payments ecosystem in India and highlighted the Indian market opportunities for the payments company.

Here are edited excerpts from the interview:

Question: As one of the leading global digital payments companies, Worldline provides a trusted platform that is used by millions of people around the world. In India, what role is Worldline playing in empowering India’s quest for a low-cash, trust-based digital economy? How do you view your market in India, especially in terms of customers and the solutions you provide?

Answer: The transition to digital payments in India accelerated during the time of the pandemic as people were able to use UPI to pay for everything from medicines, milk, food, or groceries to eggs and bread. It was a huge transition for Indian society in general, which used to be an entirely cash-based payment society, what I call a less-cash-based digital payments society. Worldline’s role in this is that we see ourselves as a one-stop shop with 360-degree payment solutions that we can offer to our merchants or customers. There are three – four of these suits of payment.

the first is ‘
in storeWhere we set up POS machines with our merchants, and work with banks. We provide to merchants owned by banks and we either hold hardware POS machines or QR codes or soft POS. The second part of this is called issuance which are credit card issuance. We also provide ETC, Toll Tag solution to some of our banks where we do everything on the backend for them and they issue FASTag and their customers renew it. The third part is our online payment where we provide
Next Gen Payment Gateway service to all our customers. We offer subscription payments, cross border payments and LinkPay (*LinkPay is an SMS link that is shared with the policyholder to assist in online renewal of their policy). These are all types of services that we provide to our clients, however for our enterprise clients we also provide a payment orchestration platform.

Additionally, when there is a customer or merchant who needs both an in-store and online solution, we are able to provide them with a consolidated view and this is what I call ‘Omni-Channel View’. We provide a solution that caters to in-store payments both using POS machines as well as online. Hence, our journey has been about being able to offer a suite of 360-degree payment solutions to our customers.

Question: So when it comes to a low-cash, trust-based economy, online is basically playing a vital role in powering India’s dream. I would say that there is a lot of emphasis on the faith based economy as well; How does online take care of what customers want to trust in you?

Answer: The trust you are talking about is essentially based on the entire technology and process that we used to establish it. When you are in a store and swiping your card at a hardware POS terminal, you are there. The merchant may check your antecedents and ask you for identification, they may not choose it, but your card will have your signature on the back and some of it will be something they can identify you with. OTP also has to be entered for the POS machine to work. However, when you are doing it online it becomes a bit tricky when no one knows who is using the card, whether it is actually you or someone else. So, the trust that gets established in the process is a combination of technology as well as process and if you ask me one thing that we do very well in India, and is essentially driven by regulators, is OTP full concept. Two-factor authentication really makes it more secure for us to work in India.

Apart from this, any payment method whether it is cash or digital, there are some basic things you need to take care of – never reveal OTP, never give out your number, and never give sensitive information. There is also continuing education around these points which is an important part of building this belief in these systems.

The way systems have evolved in India with two-factor authentication do not exist outside India. There just get the card number and CVV and be done with it, but in India there is two-factor authentication. With this two-factor authentication at every step, everything you do is controlled when you provide an OTP, such as when you login to your bank account. The trust is systematically built with technology and process by all players including you and me taking necessary precautions as participants in the payment ecosystem and thus becoming a more secure and more convenient way.

Frankly, today you can step out of your house and make any purchases you need without a wallet, just using your phone, UPI or your card. You can transact any amount and in fact, it is very simple. Also, as I said, the Trust is organically enabled by the combined effort of all players across the ecosystem, not just users but technology providers like us, banks and regulators – everyone gets together to provide and Systematically build trust in this whole process across the entire ecosystem.

Question: Tell us about the customers you serve and the unique solutions and services Worldline India provides.

Answer: We have been in the Indian market for over 20 years and have built leadership positions over this long period of time working with many different types of clients. On the in-store side, we have banks, (mainly public and private sector banks) and NBFCs as our customers. We have recently signed up with Bajaj Finance and now we provide them complete services from acquisition perspective for these private and public sector banks which I call ‘Transaction Facilitation Services’.

We also provide them with QR Code and Soft POS and other solutions. Also, from the issuance point of view we do credit card issuance and electronic toll tax, we issue this for many of our banks. From an online business perspective, our customers are essentially large e-commerce merchants, insurance companies, utility payment goods, educational institutions and large enterprises as well as a variety of merchants in SMEs. We have more than 7 lakh merchants online and we provide many services to them. Overall, with Worldline India combined we provide payment services to over 1.5 million merchant touchpoints across the country, we are present everywhere and this really gives us our legacy of over 20 years in business.

Question: You also do a lot of programs with the government. Can you tell us more about these initiatives with the government?

Answer: This is where I see tremendous progress by the government, especially when it comes to the G2C (government to citizen) initiative, where the government is really supporting digitization on a large scale and collecting digital payments and eliminating or reducing it. The amount of cash that is for the system. I will mention two examples here – we have deployed our Android POS terminals in J&K Police and Madhya Pradesh Police, traffic offenders can now pay their fines using their cards, right at the same place, you can pay fines Pay and you move on. Now, we all have a habit of paying cash as fine, but this is another example from G2C point of view where you are able to pay fine online.

The other is Panvel Municipal Corporation, where we have provided a value added solution on our Android POS machine, now you can pay all your taxes by swiping your card. This is something where if you go to the municipal office, you can actually pay by swiping. Be it your property tax, or any other tax, all those things can be paid just by swiping your card whether it is credit or debit card at POS machines.

The Android POS machines that we launched a few months back in the Indian market allow you to have a more software-based solution. Using the value added service on Android POS machine, the government is now able to provide services and collect money digitally. This is one area where you will see more and more digitization as the government is very clear that it wants to move towards digital payments. Today even in temples you can do everything digitally, you don’t really need to put money in hundi, government is saying pay digitally which means a lot. You will soon see more and more applications in this regard on our Android POS machines as well as on our SoftPos machines.

Question: We are talking about Worldline India and the progress you have seen in the country in the last 20 years. Tell us what lies ahead for the company in the Indian market in terms of your growth plans?

Answer: As one of the leaders in providing 360-degree payment solutions to our merchants, I think the important thing is that we are not only growing, but we are also growing profitably and for the long term. are committed to. Our ability to invest and offer new solutions comes from the fact that we are profitable, and we are able to reinvest it in the business and that is something that we will continue to do. We are committed to this market for the long term. We have been here for over 20 years, we are a serious and systematic player in India on the payments side of financial services and we will continue to be. We will and will continue to offer new and unique innovative technologies like SoftPOS and others for the Indian market and Indian merchants at large.

CTA – Worldline India is a one-stop shop for all payment needs offering – in-store payments, online payments, omnichannel payments, and issuance and receiving solutions.
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To watch the full interview with Worldline India CEO Ramesh Narasimhan,
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