Shippay: startup offers standardization in retail payments, from Pix to cryptocurrencies

Created in 2019, the shipy was born to help shopkeepers with a new form of payment that appeared on the market: the QR Code. Offered by digital wallets such as Mercado Pago, PicPay and AME, the different systems of each caused payment problems for companies and the new startup’s mission was to simplify these payments.

The choice for this service came after a lot of market research and study of technology and new models of fintechs. The Shipay platform began to take shape in September 2019, at the hands of the founders Luiz Coimbra, Charles Hagler, Paulo Loureiro and Fabio Ikeno – all of whom have worked in technology and finance companies.

Early on, the founders mapped three “pains” of shopkeepers with payments through QR Codes. digital wallets:

• Fraud risk with QR Code cards for each of the digital wallets;
• Lack of clarity with the execution of the payment, without an immediate confirmation for the shopkeeper;
• Failures in the daily closing of the cashier due to the need to consult each of the digital wallets.

With that, the shipy platform set out to address each of these problems and bring a simplified solution into a single application.

“We got a flexible solution that works for small neighborhood stores as well as large companies. With API technology, we connect each of the digital wallets to the store account and through our platform, the merchant has payment confirmation and also offers a secure QR Code for the customer”, he explains. Fábio IkenoCTO of Shipay.

Everything was going well, until the Central Bank’s instant payment solution came along, the pix. When the launch took place, the BC warned that banks would have to implement a single, standardized integration.

“We thought our business was going to end, because Pix was much more successful than QR Codes and with a standardized bank system, Shipay’s business model was losing value. Until we realized that the standardized solution did not happen and each bank had its own system. Then, Pix was our turning point”, says the CTO.

Pix changes Shipay’s business

The arrival of Pix in November 2020 allowed fintech to reach large corporations and increase penetration in small retailers as well. At the beginning of 2021, the transaction volume on the Shipay platform had grown 10 times year-on-year.

With the success of instant payments made by Pix, more companies rushed to offer the service and, consequently, needed a solution to unify the system internally.

Also at the beginning of last year, Shipay underwent a seed investment round that helped the startup grow. The founders do not reveal the value, but indicate the names of the investors: Laércio Cosentino, founder of Totvs (TOTS3), and João Augusto Valente, advertising partner and founder of Grupo ABC.

through funds family offices and as individuals, not on behalf of their companies, the entrepreneurs contributed values ​​to the startup that allowed them to hire more employees and expand services, with investment in more technology.

Currently, Shipay has more than 50 employees and is connected to about 300 platforms, which make implementations with companies for the automation of payment services. Fintech has clients in all states of Brazil, from Rio Grande do Sul to Amapá.

In addition to connecting to digital wallets (which remains) and with Pix, the startup also offers solutions for cryptocurrencies in partnership with CoinPayments, and works to implement payment options loyalty programs and other more niche products.

“Our goal is to add more and more services that can be useful to high-end customers. As in the beginning, our mission was to simplify the shopkeeper’s life. That purpose still remains,” says Ikeno.

Strong partnership with AWS

In order to be able to expand services quickly and maintain the quality and speed of the platform, Shipay counts with the partnership of Amazon Web Services (AWS). The startup’s technology director explains that he already knew the provider for a long time, which is why they chose the AWS services from the beginning.

through the program AWS Activatewhich offers $100,000 in credits for startups to take advantage of the company’s cloud benefits, Shipay began operations with the Amazon provider and has stayed with it ever since.

For Ikeno, acceleration programs for startups and benefits like Activate – offered by AWS – are very important for starting new companies.

“Both the acceleration programs that help to better understand the business world, and the credits offered by AWS helped a lot to shipy at the beginning of our operation. They were decisive in getting our product up and running”, says the CTO.

Source: Suno