[Funding alert] Fintech startup Zerone raises $1.3M in Pre-Series A round led by IAN

Delhi-based fintech startup Zerone Microsystems Private Limited on Tuesday announced that it has raised $1.3 million in its Pre-Series A funding round. The round was led by IAN with participation from IAN Fund and TCA. Prominent angel investors like Sanjiv Bajaj, Raman Roy, Sanjay Rishi, and Mahesh Ramachandran led the round.

According to a company statement, the latest round of funding will be used by the platform to launch segment-specific SoftPOS services along with additional features such as accounting to improve user stickiness.

Started in 2018 by Jaijit Bhattacharya, Zerone has developed a cloud-based, ultra-low-cost SoftPOS solution called Bharat ZupPOS.

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Built on its proprietary technology, ZupPOS converts any smartphone into a payment terminal and allows merchants to accept payment from credit cards, debit cards, and UPI apps such as BHIM without any additional hardware, using only their smartphones.

Bharat ZupPOS is currently available on Google Playstore and on Indus App Bazaar.

Commenting on the latest development, Jaijit Bhattacharya, Founder and CEO, Zerone Microsystems Private Limited said, “In India, a total of 80 million people require digital payment acceptance terminal but only 4 million merchants have the hardware POS machine. So, there is a sizable unmet market demand existing. This is where ZupPOS plays an integral role. We are delighted to have IAN and TCA on board as investors and will leverage the capital infusion to strengthen our platform in providing enhanced services to our users.”

The platform claims to have over 30,000 merchants using it, that includes professionals such as doctors, architects and others.

Commenting on the investment, Padmaja Ruparel, Co-founder, IAN, said, “Zerone brings an extremely innovative technology to bring a large number of our citizens into the digital payment ambit, effectively leveraging India’s UPI platform. We are really excited with the excellent team of Zerone, led by Jaijit Bhattacharya and do look forward to helping make this another successful company from the IAN stable.”