Y Combinator backed Aspire finds a strong footing with Indian startups

India’s mature fintech ecosystem is no stranger to cross-border payments, with the country being counted as one of the fastest-growing cross-border e-commerce markets in the world. Singapore-headquartered cross-border payment solutions company Aspire, which launched in India in April this year, already had around 10% of its US customer base coming from India-based founders. In an interview with Fortune India, CEO and co-founder Andrea Baronchelli said, “That's why we set up a new go-to-market motion in India, focusing on these types of companies in particular. We focus a lot on technology-sector entrepreneurs that are expanding into markets such as the United States, targeting new opportunities there.”

Aspire targets India’s global startups

Baronchelli, who launched Aspire as part of Y Combinator’s 2018 cohort, says the company looks at itself as a category creator, serving as a one-stop integrated cross-border business payments solution. The Y Combinator, Tencent and PayPal-backed fintech has raised over $300 million and handles transaction volumes of nearly $25 billion. Its India-US clientele consists of both stealth and early-stage companies, backed by venture firms such as Accel, Lightspeed, Antler and Z47, according to the company.

With UPI infrastructure making significant inroads into countries such as Singapore, the UAE and Qatar, and India-based startups like Razorpay, Cashfree and Payoneer offering solutions in the segment, challenges such as regulatory compliance, high costs and payment delays persist.

At a time when AI is bringing disruptive innovation, Baronchelli says that companies in the digital technology sector are not only leveraging AI to become more global, but that Indian companies targeting global clients are also increasing significantly year over year. “What we do is enable these entrepreneurs in key apps in India to set up their presence outside very quickly. The US is usually a big market for AI, right,” he said. “Consumers, clients and also corporates are becoming more and more acquainted with these solutions, so people want to sell there. Also, willingness to pay is relatively higher.”

Aspire weighs IPO path as global expansion grows

To its customer base, which includes small and medium-sized businesses and larger companies with multi-million-dollar revenue, Aspire charges per transaction, while also offering its finance software on a subscription basis, which forms a small percentage of its revenue.

Even as the company made a formal foray into the US market earlier this year, Baronchelli says the company will look at understanding the IPO path.

“The US is definitely an interesting market from a technology company perspective, but we are not seeing it in the immediate future. So, we don't have an immediate plan, but we definitely have the ambition to get there,” he said.