The product lead of Whatsapp Payments for India thrives on the challenging and exciting environment of the payments space. Her decisions have led to a 13x growth in user base within a year
Ria Mirchandani thinks the main competition is cash, and not other payment platforms
Image: Mexy Xavier
Styling: Juilee Borse And Nidhi Agrawal
Ria Mirchandani, 28
Product lead, WhatsApp Payments
The payments business in India is a tricky one to operate in. The lure of the vast and rapidly expanding market has seen Google Pay, Walmart-owned PhonePe, Alibaba-backed Paytm, Amazon Pay and Facebook’s WhatsApp Payments working to grab a share of the large pie.
However, since it is UPI-based (the banking system for transferring money on mobile payment apps), the earnings fee on each transaction is miniscule. Ask Paytm, which has been forced to move towards ecommerce and lending, to survive. A majority will need to accept the reality of huge cash burns to survive and grow in India. You mix all this and you get a challenging-but-exciting environment to be in. And that’s exactly what Ria Mirchandani thrives on, as she leads the WhatsApp Payment’s business in India—Meta Platforms’ (formerly Facebook) largest market.
(This story appears in the 11 February, 2022 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)