Paytm, the online payments company run by One97 Communications has set up yet another entity — this time as an investment arm. The company has announced Paytm Money which will offer investment as well as wealth management products.
The company will be investing around Rs. 63.5 crore ($10 million) in other entities. Vijay Shekhar Sharma, co-founder and CEO of Paytm, said that Paytm Money will be available as a separate mobile application. He further added that they could also end up creating a money market fund in the long term just like Ant Financial in China. He said:
We started as a payments platform and expanded customer offerings to deposits with Paytm Payments Bank. Today, with Paytm Money, we have taken the next logical step in the direction of wealth management. We aim to increase the size of wealth management customer base and bring simple and easy-to-understand wealth products to our consumers.
This marks the fourth entity from Paytm which previously operated Paytm Wallet, Paytm Payments Bank and Paytm Mall. Paytm Money seems like an attempt by the company to find more ways of keeping user money with Paytm and build customer loyalty for the long term.
Currently, Paytm Money is in the process of seeking approval from the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) to act as an investment advisor. To start with, it may offer mutual fund products to its users.
The entity will be headed by Pravin Jadhav as Senior Vice President. Prior to Paytm, Pravin Jadhav worked with Servify, a personal device assistant, and Rediff, a news, information, entertainment and shopping portal.
It currently has a 40-member team working out of Bengaluru and is looking to add another 150-plus people over the next 12-18 months. The service will be launched in the first quarter of 2018 after receiving required regulatory approvals.