Fintech startup TranServ hires former MasterCard, MobiKwik executives

Mumbai-based digital payments company TranServ Pvt Ltd has strengthened its top deck with two senior-level appointments. The company has appointed Salil Mody as senior vice president of corporate strategy and Ushpinder Singh as senior vice president and head of its merchant business.

Mody, who most recently worked at MasterCard, will focus on driving corporate strategy, inorganic growth and initiatives such as micro-credits at TranServ.

In his last job, Mody was responsible for market development for South Asia. He has eight years of experience in the payments segment at PayPal. He holds an MBA from Kellogg School of Management and a postgraduate degree in computer engineering from the University of California.

Singh will be responsible for sales of the Udio product suite and digital payment solutions at TranServ. Prior to TranServ, he was heading partnership and strategic alliances at MobiKwik.

The appointments come weeks after the company raised $15 million (Rs 100 crore) in its Series C round of investment led by venture capital fund IDFC SPICE and handset maker Micromax Informatics Ltd. Existing investors Nirvana Venture Advisors and Faering Capital India Evolving Fund also participated in this round.

It also partnered with Micromax and Visa to establish a cross-channel, digital-led, online-to-offline payments ecosystem. In November last year, the company brought in former OnMobile global digital marketing head Asutosh Upadhyay as chief product and marketing officer. TranServ has also appointed Kaushik Mitra as senior vice president of product and Amit Kumar Gupta as SVP and head of engineering.

In July 2014, TranServ raised an undisclosed amount in Series B funding led by PE fund Faering Capital's India Evolving Fund, with participation from Nirvana Venture Advisors.

The digital payments segment is dominated by heavily funded players such as Alibaba-backed Paytm and Snapdeal's Freecharge. Other players include MobiKwik, Oxigen Wallet and PayU Money.

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