Flipkart veteran Anil Goteti launches Gen Z and Millenial-focussed fintech startup called Scapia

By siliconindia  |  Thursday, 15 June 2023, 09:55 IST

Flipkart veteran Anil Goteti launches Gen Z and Millenial-focussed fintech startup called Scapia
Anil Goteti, Flipkart’s former senior vice president, has launched a new travel credit card startup called Scapia in partnership with Federal Bank that specifically targets the GenZ and Millenial population. “Travelling is a passion for me and I was thinking of what to do next and I realised there are a lot of problems that today’s younger generation face when it comes to travelling abroad freely, especially in the payments side. This Scapia card will definitely be a game-changer,” said Goteti, founder of Scapia.
Scapia which basically means the spirit of escape and adventure, is founded to make spending on travelling better. The app, in fact, has also gamified the platform to push customers to earn rewards on the go. “Our target segment is 25-40 year olds and if you look at millennials and Gen Zs we have found out that they want to live in the moment and are ready to spend on travel experience. We have also found out that they are looking for cards like this that have the best integration for the entire travel experience,” Goteti added.
The Bengaluru-headquartered Scapia was in stealth mode over the last year and was launched on Thursday. It offers a co-branded credit card and an app for customers to turn their daily expenses into rewards. These rewards turn into Scapia coins which can be utilised to book hotels, and flights online.
The card is presently accepted in India and over 150 countries and is powered by the global card firm Visa. “The onboarding is completely paperless and a customer will be able to get the card virtually within 10 minutes and the physical card will be delivered. The KYC (Know-your-customer) is also done instantly online,” Goteti said.
Scapia offers 20 percent reward on every hotel stay and flight booked from within the app. Scapia coins are convertible with 5 Scapia Coins equalling 1 rupee. It is also promising that there will be no joining fee, zero forex markup on international spends and a no-cost EMI option under the offering Travel Now, Pay Later. “Scapia is more than a credit card. It is a commitment to making travel accessible for everyone who dreams of seeing the world. It’s a new way to reward young Indian travellers,” he added.
Scapia’s revenue model is two-fold: the firm will be earning a percentage of commission from hotels and airlines’ when booked through Scapia’s app and will be earning a commission from the co-partnered bank for getting more customers. Federal Bank will be responsitble for the credit and underwriting. the firm has also raised a funding round from Matrix Partners and other top venture capital firms as per data source.
India is a credit-starved market and there is a huge opportunity, Goteti said. Recent data from the Reserve Bank of India shows that credit card transactions have gone up significantly.  With 25 crore card transactions for merchant payments in April this year, credit cards have overtaken debit cards. In terms of the value of transactions, credit cards stood at Rs 1.3 lakh crore against Rs 53,000 crore for debit cards.
And experts believe that there will be a lot of co-branded credit cards that will be coming up in the coming days. In fact, Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corp Ltd (IRCTC) and HDFC Bank, announced the launch of a co-branded travel credit card known as the IRCTC HDFC Bank Credit Card. “There is only 5 percent market penetration by all players put together. The  addressable market is huge and we will be able to bite a large pie of that market,” Goteti said.
The firm presently has employed around 40 people and is planning to hire more in the coming days. “We are hiring across teams, we are looking for employees who can add more value in terms of product development and engineering and finance,” Goteti said.

CURRENT ISSUE

BEST STARTUPS TO WORK FOR

siliconindia