How Paytm founder transformed India as the global digital payments leader with his passion for QR

Digital payments was an alien concept in India a decade ago when cash was the most preferred mode of transactions for citizens. Cut to the present, and India’s digital payments revolution has become an inspiration for the world.

The country has established itself as a global market leader with an ACI report indicating that 48.6 billion real-time payments were recorded in India last year, making up 40% of the world’s share. Today, digital payments make up for more than billions of transactions daily and have become an inseparable part of life for most people.

Who would’ve thought that the country would go on to become the largest market globally for digital payments in such a short span of time? Well, there is one man who had envisioned this revolution long before anyone in the country, and his passion for digital payments solutions like QR is the reason why Indians can conveniently pay anywhere by just scanning a code through their smartphones.

The man in question here is none other than Paytm founder and CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma, who played a vital role in guiding his company to become the pioneer of QR and mobile payments in India. Sharma, a big believer in the power of technology, was fixated on driving deeper financial inclusion in India with digital payments, and this led to the birth of the revolutionary Paytm QR in 2015.

Shama’s company had already given Indians a taste of digital payments with the Paytm Wallet in 2014, but it was the Paytm QR that introduced citizens to a whole new ecosystem of online transactions, at scale. With this, Indians were able to make secure and fast payments by simply scanning a QR on their smartphones through the Paytm app for the first time ever; it instantly became a country-wide sensation.

Just a year after it was launched, the adoption of QR surged rapidly across the country and remains synonymous with digital payments till date. This is because the company has never stopped enhancing its QR solution after introducing it in the country. With solutions like the All-in-one QR, Dynamic QR, Photo QR and more, Sharma’s company is now giving shape to the future of digital payments as well.

Today, the revolutionary QR has become the lifeblood of almost all digital payments in the country and is widely used by merchants to accept payments, be it in neighborhood kirana stores, the local sabziwala or bigger retail chains and enterprises. For citizens, too, scanning the QR has literally become a habit for all kinds of daily payments, leading to the birth of the popular slogan ‘Paytm Karo’.

Speaking at a recent event, Sharma said the Paytm QR has significantly helped Indian businesses in accepting contactless and error-free payments from consumers.

The resounding success and journey of the Paytm QR under Sharma reflects his determination to build a digital payments ecosystem in India, a country where cash was considered the ‘king of all transactions’ for decades. “The main challenge was to change the culture of India, where once the internet and smartphones were both unaffordable. But when people think of Paytm today, it is the pioneer of digital payments,” he said.

Sharma, however, was unperturbed by the challenge as he was focused on achieving his goal of solving problems for the smallest of shopkeepers and consumers in the country. “I didn’t want to just create for others, but wanted to build something that our country would be proud of. It is our responsibility and role as a fintech to spread digital literacy and provide knowledge on financial services to the people of India.”

The Paytm founder also gave a small anecdote to highlight the company’s proficiency in delivering QR solutions. “When the opportunity came to build something for Japan, we built PayPay in 3 months for a country that didn’t understand our language. QR was invented by a Japanese person and today, I can proudly say that we are teaching QR to the country that invented it,” he said.

Vijay Shekhar Sharma’s passion for the QR has not only empowered India to become a global digital payments leader, but also inspired a generation of young entrepreneurs to utilise this revolutionary technology in areas beyond the digital payments landscape.

 

-Consumer connect initiative-