PayU initiates credit product 'LazyCard' amid growing competition in BNPL space

By siliconindia  |  Tuesday, 11 January 2022, 02:13:33 PM IST

PayU initiates credit product 'LazyCard' amid growing competition in BNPL space
Payment service provider, PayU is diversifying its India play, as the company proclaimed the launch of its new credit and prepaid payment instrument, LazyCard. PayU’s ‘buy now pay later’ (BNPL) solution, LazyPay has partnered with SBM Bank India for the prepaid instrument, as the company looks to up the ante against card-based BNPL providers Uni and Slice, among others.
LazyCard will be riding on the Visa payment network.
The BNPL space continues to be attracting investor interest for the past few months, as demand for online shopping grows. In December last year, BNPL card provider, Uni raised one of the largest Series A rounds in the Indian fintech space, cornering $70 million led by General Catalyst.
Recently, credit and payments card provider, Slice became the 41st Indian unicorn of 2021, after raising $220 million led by Tiger Global, at a valuation of $1 billion.
While Slice has ramped up its credit card issuances to 200,000 by October last year, Uni is focussing on scaling its credit disbursements to Rs1,500 crore by September this year. Last year, even ZestMoney raised $50 million to tap on international merchants, and increase the scope of its credit use case.
In October 2021, fintech unicorn BharatPe also took a plunge into the BNPL space with the launch of 'PostPe'.
In a statement on Tuesday, LazyPay said that the LazyCard will be available to its 62 million pre-approved users. Further, the credit and payment instrument will have a credit limit of up to Rs 5 lakh. It will also link rewards and cashbacks to the offering.
“As per various industry reports, today only 3 in every 100 Indians owns a credit card, creating a massive credit gap in our economy. We are excited to launch ‘LazyCard’, to empower and elevate the underserved, by giving them means to carry out financial transactions without worrying about their bank account balance. Backed by our proprietary credit underwriting capabilities and data science muscle, the card boasts the largest pre-approval base of 62 million customers,” said Prashanth Ranganathan, CEO, PayU Finance.
Last year, Prosus-owned PayU India made one of the most expensive acquisitions in the fintech landscape by acquiring Indian payment gateway service provider, BillDesk for $4.7 billion. While the deal was subject to approvals from the Indian market watchdog, CCI, PayU India had plans to co-create newer solutions with BillDesk.

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