Exclusive: EbixCash's Bhavik Vasa resigns as chief growth officer

Bhavik Vasa, the chief growth officer of financial services firm EbixCash (formerly ItzCash), has quit the company after a seven-year stint.

Vasa is leaving the firm to take a paternity break, after which he intends to launch another startup, he told TechCircle.

In 2009, he co-founded a payments company Radical Payments Solutions, which was acqui-hired by ItzCash in August 2011, he said.

In his most recent role at Ebix Inc., Vasa led the financial services segment. He had been with ItzCash since 2011.

Prior to ItzCash, he was the head of business development for India and South Asia at Global Prepaid Exchange, a London-based digital payments firm.

He is a graduate in international business and management from Northwood University, Michigan and has also done a course on entrepreneurship from Stanford University.

In an email to his colleagues, which TechCircle has reviewed, Vasa said, “Post the M&A last year, the plan was to integrate, further consolidate and establish the brand and its leadership which has been well achieved.”

In May last year, software firm Ebix Inc. had acquired a majority stake in ItzCash Card Ltd. for $120 million (Rs 778 crore). 

ItzCash

Part of media baron Subhash Chandra’s Essel Group, ItzCash was founded in 2006 and counts Matrix Partners, Intel Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners as its investors. In July 2009, it raised $10.3 million from Matrix, Intel Capital and Lightspeed. In 2007, it had raised $9.3 million from Intel Capital and Matrix, according to VCCEdge, the data research arm of VCCircle.

ItzCash offered services in three verticals—digital payments, remittance and corporate business. The company provides prepaid cards, money transfer and wallet services to retail consumers and offers cash management services, an online payment gateway and gifting solutions to corporate houses.

ItzCash claimed, at the time of the sellout, that it used to process about 600,000 transactions a day and $2 billion in annual payment volume.

Ebix’s acquisitions in India

In the past few months, the software firm has been on an acquisition spree in the country.

Last month, it acquired Pune-headquartered lending software solutions company Indus Software Technologies Pvt. Ltd for $29 million.

In April, the firm said it would acquire 60% stake in Indian e-learning company Smartclass for $8 million (Rs 52 crore).

In the same month, it invested in Centrum Direct Ltd, the foreign exchange services arm of Centrum Capital Ltd, which it bought for about $175 million (Rs 1,140 crore).

In January, it had acquired money transfer firm Transcorp International Ltd for $7.4 million (Rs 47.15 crore).

(With inputs from Anand J)