Paytm announces expansion in education space, wants to offer test preparation content, academic loans and more

Indian digital payments giant Paytm on Tuesday said that it is looking to significantly expand the education services category on its platform.

At present, the company claims to be working with private and government educational institutions to offer admission forms, exam results, applications for government jobs, coaching, test preparations, scholarships, study abroad, skill development, certification programmes, and convenience to buy uniforms, books and stationery on its platform.

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Later this year, the company will also offer financial services like educational insurance, loans and co-branded smart cards to students.

With ambitions to operate across categories of payments, commerce, financial and academic services for the education space, the company says it will do this through a mix of partnerships and in-house teams. 

Through this expansion, Paytm is also targeting to on-board 3.5 crore users across 20,000 private schools, 1,000 higher educational institutes and 1,000 coaching institutes while achieving higher GMV with its large bouquet of services.

It has already started partnering with thousands of private and government institutions to bolster this category.

Speaking on the expansion plans, Vineet Kaul, Senior Vice President, Paytm said,

“We want to enable the student and parent community at every step. Right from providing details on 25,000 colleges, schools, courses and exams, our bouquet of services will include – payments (in-app and in educational centres), commerce (coaching, scholarships, test preparation, admission forms etc.) and financial services (student insurance, educational loans (easy EMI and banking).”

At present, Paytm already offers fee payment services at more than 10,000 educational institutions across the country. In FY20, it plans to cross Rs 20,000 crore GMV through the education business alone

The payments behemoth has already entered into a partnership with prestigious institutions like Railway Recruitment Board, Maharashtra Public Service Commission, National Testing Agency, Indian Navy, Amity, VIT, Manipal, AKTU, Army Public Schools, Delhi Public Schools, Delhi University, IITs, IIMs, NITs, Aligarh Muslim University, AIMA, ICAI, Narayana Group, Career Launcher, Made Easy, Career360, and several others.

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