US ecommerce giant Amazon has infused Rs 600 crore (approximately $72 million) into Amazon Pay India, strengthening its position in the competitive fintech sector against Paytm, PhonePe, and Google Pay. This latest investment brings Amazon’s total capital infusion in the Indian payments platform to Rs 950 crore for this year, as per filings with the Registrar of Companies (RoC), which also revealed a Rs 350 crore investment in February.
In addition to the payments business, Amazon has invested nearly Rs 2,500 crore in Amazon Seller Services, which operates its ecommerce marketplace in India.
This capital injection comes amidst significant developments in the Indian payments market, including regulatory actions by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) against Paytm Payments Bank in January, which affected several Paytm services like prepaid wallets and FASTags.
Amazon Pay India, which competes with Paytm, PhonePe, and Google Pay, offers services such as bill payments, unified payments interface (UPI) payments, and other financial offerings including wealth management, ticket booking, and insurance premium payments. It has partnerships with platforms like Bookmyshow, Makemytrip, Redbus, IRCTC, and Kuvera for movie and travel ticketing, and wealth management services.
In February, Amazon Pay India received a payment aggregator (PA) licence from the RBI, enabling it to enhance its merchant payments business—a significant opportunity given its substantial online shopping presence in India. This followed an earlier prepaid payments instrument (PPI) or wallet licence.
RBI data as of May 31 shows Amazon Pay India had 67.5 million prepaid wallets, facilitating 623 million transactions worth over Rs 211 crore during the month. Despite this, the platform trails behind competitors like PhonePe, Paytm, and Google Pay in both wallet usage and UPI payments. National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) data ranks Amazon Pay as the fifth-largest UPI player by transaction volume in May, with less than 1% market share.
For the fiscal year ending March 2023, Amazon Pay reported operational revenue of Rs 2,093 crore, remaining flat year-over-year, while net loss narrowed to Rs 1,499 crore from Rs 1,740 crore the previous year. FY24 earnings have yet to be filed. Amazon India did not respond to ET’s emailed queries.
