Nium to acquire Indian remittance, prepaid card services provider

Singapore-based payments platform Nium has inked an agreement to acquire Wirecard Forex India for an undisclosed amount.

Photo credit: Vertex Growth

Wirecard Forex India, part of Germany-based Wirecard AG, provides foreign currency exchange, remittance, and prepaid card services to retail and corporate customers in the South Asian country. The company’s team of 190 people will all join Nium as part of the acquisition.

The deal will also see Nium acquire Wirecard India’s authorized category II money exchange dealer license from the Reserve Bank of India. With this license, the remittance major can directly engage in a variety of payment service activities, including currency conversion, money transfer, and prepaid card issuance.

“This acquisition broadens our licensing portfolio, extends the suite of digital payments services we can offer in India, and provides us with a physical footprint to provide more support in metro areas,” said Nium co-founder and CEO Prajit Nanu.

According to Nium, it currently holds the broadest licensing portfolio of any independent payments fintech firm. It issues roughly 30 million physical and virtual cards today and is licensed in 11 jurisdictions, the company said in a statement.

See Also: Remittance startup Nium shaves losses, more than doubles revenue in 2020

The acquisition comes at a time when India’s prepaid card market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 40.5% between 2021 to 2026. It also comes after Nium signed an agreement to acquire travel payments firm Ixaris by the third quarter of this year.