ICICI Venture invests $22.4M in Bangalore-based BTI Payments for significant stake

ICICI Venture, the alternative asset management arm of ICICI Bank, has bought a 'significant stake' in Bangalore-based payment gateway services provider BTI Payments Pvt Ltd for Rs 140-crore ($22.4 million). The investment will help BTI enter the White Label ATMs (WLAs) segment in India, the company said in an official statement. Last year, the company had received RBI's approval to deploy WLAs in India. WLAs are automated teller machines set up by non-bank entities; they can be used by customers of all banks.

It could not be immediately ascertained how much stake ICICI Venture has bought from BTI. However, last month, there were reports that BTI would sell around 30 per cent stake to ICICI Venture. The company has also appointed K Srinivas, former president (consumer business) at Bharti Airtel, as its CEO. The new development was first reported by The Times of India.

BTI, a subsidiary of Sydney-based BankTech Group, came to India in 2006. It provides ATM and point of sales (POS) networks and managed services to various banks in the country. The company claims that it currently owns and operates more than 6,500 POS terminals and over 500 ATMs for several domestic banks in the country.

ICICI Venture is a specialist alternative assets manager which provides growth capital to companies operating in sectors like IT, life sciences & healthcare, media & entertainment, banking & financial services, infrastructure, retail, aviation, auto components, construction services, real estate, biotechnology, textiles, fine chemicals, consumer products and logistics. So far, it has invested in more than 500 companies.

Early this week, Japanese multinational engineering and electronics major Hitachi acquired Chennai-based payment solutions firm Prizm Payments for an undisclosed amount to accelerate its global development of IT services businesses targeting financial institutions.

(Edited by Joby Puthuparampil Johnson)