The prepaid card market in India has observed steady growth over the last four to six quarters. This growth in the Indian prepaid card market is due to the rising demand for mobile payments, vibrant e-commerce industry, higher adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) and Internet of Things (IoT), and a high number of unbanked and underbanked populations in the country. Many fintech companies are trying to explore the segment and reap benefits in an emerging country like India.
Eroute Technologies, a card-based payment company in India has showcased its first product, OmniCard in July 2021. Omnichannel prepaid card is a prepaid card that will allow to spend via different shopping methods by phone, physical shop or online. The Noida-based company has received authorization from the Reserve Bank of India to issue and operate Prepaid Instruments in the country. The company targeted the young generation and brought this omnichannel prepaid card and a mobile app into the market. This will help the young generation to use the prepaid card independently, thus abolishing the need to ask for cash or debit/credit cards from their parents.
With the 230 million millennials from the age group of 15-24 years in India, the company is targeting to capture the emerging Indian payments market. The younger generation is the digital natives, who have access to the Internet, prefer independence, and are completely grown-up consumers and influencers to family’s new age consumerism. The OmniCard provides financial independence to the millennials who are otherwise neither given financial freedom by the apps and banks nor by their parents.
Together with this, the company has developed in-house technology that enables payments based on biometric features such as face recognition, thumb impressions, etc. The OmniCard offers the feature of control and visibility, which allows the parents or users to set up spending limits and track spending using the OmniCard app.
The company has launched the OmniCard on the network of RuPay cards, thereby allowing the company to access a larger network of customers. Rupay has a large number of younger customers, which goes without saying will give a boost to higher adoption of OmniCard.
With this innovative prepaid card and mobile app, the company is trying to address the problem of cashless convenience among young customers. In emerging economies like India, which has a large population, the company is providing financial convenience to the young generation, so it is pretty evident that it will capture a significant place in the digital space. The company being the first mover in such a segment in the Indian prepaid market will definitely reap benefits in the long run.
