Harshil Mathur and Shashank Kumar

Simplifying online payments

Many Fintech start-ups came to life in the past decade in India, but Razorpay stands out for its focus on providing solutions to address the payment woes of small- and mid-sized businesses. The partner of choice for 8 million businesses, Razorpay allows businesses to accept, process and disburse payments with its product suite.

Shashank Kumar and Harshil Mathur gave up their flourishing careers to found the company in 2014. The duo, IIT Roorkee alumni, were initially toying with the idea of building a social crowdfunding platform where people could post a public campaign and raise funds in case of a medical emergency. That’s when they realized that another problem needed to be solved first – the challenges faced by the Indian start-ups to make digital payments.

Razorpay’s initial years were full of ups and downs. Shashank and Harshil jumped hurdles, scaled walls and crossed rivers to convince bankers to help their cause. Almost 100 bankers rejected them before one backed the company.

Over the years, Razorpay has transformed from being an online payment gateway company to a full-stack financial services company, offering everything from working capital loans, payroll products, current accounts, corporate credit cards and insurance. The duo has developed the country’s first point of sale app, launched UPI for businesses and offered online payment solutions to SMEs. The company now offers corporate cards with higher credit limits for SMEs and has launched a platform for SMEs to offer health insurance for their employees during the pandemic.

With new ideas, products and experiences at its core, Razorpay is today one of India’s largest fintech players.

Financial success aside, Razorpay has been adding accolades to its awards bouquet. In 2018, the company was added to the LinkedIn Top Startups List. At the India FinTech Awards (IFTA) in 2019, RazorpayX, its neo-banking product, was awarded the ‘Most Innovative Payment Start-up’ and ‘Most Innovative Fintech Product.’ Harshil was honored with the ‘Fintech Leader of the Year’ award at the same event.