Fintech firm Infibeam Avenues on Monday said that it has achieved a milestone of having one million agents, including grocery shops and pharmacies across India and is eying five million agents by 2025.
Infibeam Avenues Ltd, India's first listed fintech company that owns and operates BillAvenue, an online bill payment platform, has crossed the milestone of one million agents comprising of kirana shop, grocery shop, pan shop, small pharmacy stores and the likes across India, a statement said.
Vishal Mehta, Managing Director, Infibeam Avenues, said in the statement, "By 2025, we expect to scale enormously and add near to 5 million agents." BillAvenue has received an amazing response from agents, which is the catalyst behind the milestone (of million agents across India) that we have achieved, he stated.
He said, "Major growth catalysts were the Tier-3 and Tier-4 towns and cities, followed by Tier-2 & Tier-1 cities. This is a clear corroboration of growing digitalisation and its adaption in the hinterlands of the country." BillAvenue is a unified inter-operable online bill payments platform built on the Bharat BillPay (BBPS) infrastructure developed by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).
It offers 'anytime, anywhere' bill payment facility to customers across India through a network of agents via multiple payment modes with instant confirmation through receipt of payment.
"It is the trust that agents have in us; has encouraged us to innovate further on their behalf. With growing digitalisation, the trust factor will play a crucial role in the growth of bill payments, as people would like to use more trustworthy digital payment routes via agents in smaller towns and cities," said Vishwas Patel, Executive Director, Infibeam Avenues, in the statement.
Market share
BillAvenue continues to dominate 90 per cent biller market share within BBPS, and it generates over 40 per cent gross profit margin.
BillAvenue currently processes bills at a run rate of over 100 million bills annually. On an annualised basis, BillAvenue is processing bills worth ₹12,000 crore.
BillAvenue services telecom, broadband companies, cable TV, DTH players, electricity distribution companies, LPG & gas distribution companies, FASTAG, health insurance, life insurance, NBFCs, and municipalities, apart from others, as its clients.
Infibeam Avenues Ltd recently received a perpetual licence from RBI to function as a Bharat Bill Payment Operating Unit (BBPOU) to onboard agent institutions and billers on the BBPS platform.
The perpetual licence aided company in offering safe, secure and uninterrupted services to our 18,000-plus billers, agent institutions and a network of one million agents spread across 2,000 cities and towns in India.