Giv To Pick Up 50% Stake In Epos Services

Global Internet Ventures (GIV), a US $150 million fund promoted by William Melton, founder of Verifone and CyberCash, has invested Rs 30 crore to pick up 50 per cent in ePOS Services Pvt Ltd, a joint venture between the Venture Infotek Group and Worldwide Smart Net (WWS) to facilitate electronic point of sale financial transactions.

ePOS will set up point of sale (POS) or multi application terminals that will facilitate faster, smoother and secure transactions at the time of sale in a merchant estalishment. ePOS will initially target 10,000 merchant sites in Mumbai, Delhi, Calcutta, and Hyderabad to set up the POS Terminals.

 

Of these, 500 are already up in Mumbai. The company aims to set up 30,000 terminals and expects market revenues of more than Rs 60 crore in the next three years in India.

Consumers can make payments via credit cards, debit cards or smart cards for purchases doing away with the need for cash. The electronic POS terminals through storage, management and analysis of consumer transaction data will enable a merchant to provide service, win new customers, and reward long-lasting relationships, it added. It can also be used by the merchant for placing order with suppliers.

The ePOS launch is expected to extend the reach of automated card acceptance to mid-range markets from high end hotels, airlines, restaurants where the really large volumes of transactions happen.

"You don't have to carry cash or write a cheque anymore, you don't have to wait in an agonizingly slow line for low volume transaction," said Giri Khatod, chairman, ePOS services and managing director, Worldwide Smart Net. GIV has expressed interest in comapnies offering web solutions, providing wireless applications, and software hosting. It has already invested in the Nadathur S Raghavan Centre for entrepreneurial learning at the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore to set up an incubation centre there.

The Venture Infotek Group is focussed on e-infrastructure of transactions, relationships, and knowledge management. Worldwide Smart Net is a transaction automation company.