Payment aggregators Razorpay and Cashfree also intend to end all third-party collaborations and integrations with payment orchestration systems like Juspay in response to PhonePe’s lawsuit. Cashfree intends to stop using third-party routers and orchestrators for integrations. According to a statement from a Cashfree Payments representative, the brand can expedite feature release and provide better support and merchant experience by providing direct integration. According to a statement from Razorpay, it will stop integrating with any third-party payment orchestration systems and instead provide its clients with payment gateway services via direct integrations. Razorpay will halt all integrations via third-party routing services going ahead. Through its own direct integrations, the business will provide payment gateway services to our clients. According to a Razorpay representative, the company feels that direct integrations are the only way to guarantee that its most recent innovations quickly reach its clients and improve their operations and experiences.
Pine Lab Continuing with the Collaborations
Pine Labs, a provider of digital payment solutions, seems to have remained loyal to Juspay and stated that it will keep collaborating with other orchestration service providers. Collaboration and open architecture are crucial in the technology industry. Amrish Rau, the founder and CEO of Pine Labs, told a media outlet that the company will keep promoting this and that its online platform will keep collaborating with other orchestration platforms to give customers and merchants the greatest possible experience. Online retailers may handle several bank agreements using a single payment gateway thanks to payment orchestration solutions. In short, based on their greater success rate at the moment, these systems enable a merchant to route transactions to the appropriate payment aggregator. Sheetal Lalwani, the chief operating officer (COO) and cofounder of Juspay, informed a well-known media site that the two platforms’ exit will not affect the company’s operations. He claimed that merchants are the source of the company’s income and that some payment aggregators are depriving their clients of options.
The construction of a full-stack payment system by Juspay to handle payments for the Open Credit Enablement Network (OCEN) and other commercial payment use cases was covered by a media outlet on December 14, 2023. Sheetal Lalwani, a co-founder of Juspay, had previously stated that he would not go up against other payment aggregators directly.
Why Payment Aggregators Are Shifting Business Operations?
A month prior, the digital payments juggernaut PhonePe allegedly ended all third-party integrations and agreements with payment aggregators, including Juspay. The move, according to PhonePe at the time, would allow it to control the whole value chain and reduce reliance on external parties. Although they are still in the early phases, Razorpay and Cashfree have also developed their own orchestration platforms, Optimiser and FlowWise, respectively. Vimal Kumar and Ramanathan RV founded Juspay in 2012, and Lalwani joined them later. Juspay is a technological platform that integrates payment gateways to give merchants an enterprise-grade, end-to-end, secure, and dependable payment stack.
In this hour of need, startups have again risen to the occasion to help India cope with the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. From providing free vaccinations to imparting mental health sessions, Indian startups hasn’t left any stone unturned to help the country fight the Covid 19 pandemic. StartupTalky reached out to various startups to know how they are fighting the second wave of Covid 19 pandemic. Have a look!
Look at How these startups are helping the country to fight Covid-19:
Alserv – a tech start-up focused on non-real-estate-based assisted living services for the elderly has now launched “Alserv Care” for COVID-19 positive elderly individuals. This entails delivery of meals, grocery and medicine, facilitating services of nurses and caretakers, providing oxygen support and other medical equipment to the elderly (upon request).
Enabling quality care at home, Alserv provides these services starting at ₹300/month. The elderly can choose home cooked meals to be delivered at their residences from the variety of choices available. Alserv is delivering home-cooked meals through verified service providers who maintain the highest quality and hygiene standards.
For elderly who are living alone, Alserv is facilitating the services of nurses and caretakers who can stay at home with the elderly and take care of their needs. Speaking about the launch of Alserv Care, Jagadish Ramamoorthy, Co-founder & Director, Alserv, said – “Currently in our country, the hospitals do not have the sufficient number of beds to take care of COVID positive individuals. Also, we believe for the elderly, home care is critical in ensuring complete recovery from COVID. We are already receiving positive feedback regarding Alserv Care from our customers.”
To avail this new service from Alserv, users can download the Alserv app from PlayStore/AppStore or reach out to the helpline: +91-044-4666 4888.
The pandemic has increased the emphasis on the ‘human connect’ aspect of the HR function. Startups always run in a super dynamic and fast paced environment, and this element is even more prominent now for those operating in the healthcare sector. At StanPlus, we handhold our employees if they or anyone in their families are affected by Covid. Quarantine facilities and emergency services are provided at no cost. We ensure that our people on ground have sufficient supply of PPE kits and sanitizers always. Considering the industry StanPlus operates in, we realize the pressure and secondary trauma our people go through. Therefore we have taken away the concept of sick leaves. The employees have the liberty to take leaves whenever they feel overwhelmed. We are tackling these uncertain times as a family.
Spokesperson: Sudipta Sengupta, Founder & CEO, THIP Media
While there are a lot of efforts going into managing the pandemic, we are fighting the infodemic (fake news around COVID 19). Infodemic is a major problem even recognized by WHO. From falsifying treatments to creating Vaccine hesitancy – health misinformation and disinformation has major effects at multiple levels. We, as an IFCN certified Fact Checking organization, we weed out such messages from social media, fact check them along with doctors and medical professionals and publish in 7 different languages.
Rite KnowledgeLabs – Startups support during Covid 19
Mumbai-based startup Rite KnowledgeLabs has sanctioned an additional two days as vaccination leaves to all their employees, helping them to cope with the side effects of vaccinations, if any. The startup has provided a ‘no questions’ asked vaccination allowance to its employees, including their family members. The prolonging of the pandemic with a severe second wave has brought with it unique challenges.
At Rite KnowledgeLabs, we have always been proactive in our approach in enforcing the government regulatory directives from the onset of the pandemic and empowering employees to adapt to the ‘New normal’ way of working with a complete #wfh model. It has led to a series of infrastructural changes/support and social adjustments in the way we function.
Zaggle learnt about the challenges faced by Founders to access credit and especially in this pandemic where starts ups are shutting down or in a financial need, to meet their business expenses. This led the Foundation to ZikZuk a Financial Technology company that solves financial pain points of SMEs and Startups. It is a SME Neo Open Banking Platform with FoundersCard as its 1st Product. We want to create a platform for businesses to easily access financial services from different financial service providers. To avoid the hassle of different accounts, having cheque signed by authorities, going through RTGS, we thought this process should be automated through a platform to quickly flake in and move the funds to ensure that the cheque gets cleared without having to go through the process manually.
FoundersCard is a Corporate Credit Card targeted at Business Owners and Founders. It solves the credit problems, and provides an excellent customer experience by leveraging technology and providing easy access to capital. FoundersCard is a Single payment instrument which can be used to Optimize Working capital and Digitally manage all the expenses of a SME/Startup. The card will be available in different form factors such as virtual card, physical card, e-card, on mobile etc. that will be issued to Founders. The credit card will be available in the form of domestic pre-paid, forex pre-paid and corporate credit and various other benefits that really matter to the Founders of start-up companies. Other than that we have helped in distributing ample of Mask, PPE kits to Indian Police, Daily necessities in village around Hyderabad.
Founded in 2017 by Aneesh Nair, Divya Laroyia and Shyatto Rana, MyHealthcare is a digital healthcare platform launched to improve access to healthcare services by connecting hospitals, doctors, and patients online. It works in partnership with hospitals such as Fortis, BLK, and Nanavati for online doctor consultations.
Shyatto, CEO & Co-founder of MyHealthcare, said, “Our partner hospital and clinic doctors have used our digital EMR and virtual consult platform to connect with patients. This convenience has seen a great acceptance from patients, especially during the last few months.
To support patients and hospitals amid the second wave of covid which resulted in the acute shortage of hospital beds and other resources, we launched our speciality healthcare service called MyHealthcare@Home. It is for patients who are under home isolation. Connected with a hospital team that keeps track of the patient’s health and wellness, the command center of the platform allows the medical staff to track vitals, read patient notes, view medical history, prescribe medicines, alert hospitals among other services, all in real time.
The system offers the already overloaded medical professionals a convenience that saves time and equips them with data to provide quick assistance. Moreover, in an effort to further offer primary specialty care, MyHealthcare is providing air and ground medevac for emergencies. This service entails safely transporting a patient from their location to another city hospital, post the confirmation of admission.”
Integration Wizard Solutions extend its health, safety and security solutions to hospitals, retail stores, warehouses, ATMs, etc. Their client relations are built across continents with AWS, Microsoft, Xerox, Godrej, Heineken, Johnson Controls, Tata, etc. They encourage less human contact, better social distancing, and accurate monitoring of patients/ workers/ people/ businesses.
In the last few weeks, we have witnessed the entire country come together, pool in resources and fight the battle against COVID-19. At Cashfree, we wanted to use our technical know-how and existing infrastructure to create a product that will help those who are helping others. Through the release of ‘Payment Links for Donation’, we intend to make the process of collecting donations easier for those who do not have the technical infrastructure.
The pandemic is impacting everyone around the world and every aspect of our daily lives: our social interactions, our family lives, our communities, and, of course, how all of us work. It’s times like these that remind us that each of us has something to contribute and the importance of coming together as a community. We want our employees to know that we are prioritizing the health and safety of them as well as their families first and foremost. To help them weather the second wave of the coronavirus safely, we have announced initiatives to help the, cope with this struggle. This is why we have directed our efforts to not only help our employees, but also their family members so that they can recover well.
The Covid-19 pandemic has been emotionally challenging for many people, changing the day-to-day life of everyone involved in unprecedented ways. As the second wave of the pandemic continues throughout the country, companies are tasked with balancing the health and safety of their employees while continuing to keep them motivated. During this second wave, Furlenco has taken many steps to help its employees in managing through these tough times.
In continuous efforts to tackle pandemic challenges, Ajith Karimpana, Founder & CEO, Furlenco says, “As India struggles with the latest, brutal wave of COVID-19, we at Furlenco are committed to supporting employees, partners, customers, and friends in their efforts to stay safe. We recognize the importance of our delivery staff as Front Liners and are doing everything to ensure their safety, and that of the customers interacting with them.”
Acknowledging their role as front liners during the pandemic, Furlenco has further enhanced Product Sanitization and Packaging Processes to ensure the complete safety of their delivery executives, while caring more for the safety of both our customers and our delivery champs alike. From effective sanitization of furniture and appliances to thorough clean-up after every installation, Furlenco makes sure that safety measures including ensuring social distancing in warehouses, distribution of masks and sanitation of all warehouses are being thoroughly followed to ensure the safety of all.
During this second wave and lockdown, the Furlenco delivery champions are the heroes making sure that products are reaching customers directly in the safety of their homes. Furlenco’s primary focus has been on Vaccinating their Delivery Executives serving as the front line of the business, with the vaccination costs of all employees being 100% borne by the company. This is a major step for the organization in supporting the needs of their delivery partners, benefitting both these providers of essential services and society as a whole with a safer delivery network.
For those employees who have tested positive for the virus, Furlenco has established a Covid Task Force dedicated to closely helping them and their families with any assistance required be it need of medical assistance, medicines, plasma, oxygen cylinders, oximeters and tele-consultation. In the same spirit, their Buddy Programme ensures that each and every employee has a fellow Furlenco team member identified for support and assistance. From its front line delivery staff to company CEO and founder, Ajith Karimpana, every Furlenco employee is equally involved in the programme and has a part to play in supporting the team.
Additionally, advancements in technology and social media present many opportunities to keep people safe, informed, and connected during the second wave of Covid-19. Furlenco has leveraged its Social Media platforms and Internal Communications channels to create awareness for those in need and to broadcast messages regarding Covid-19 help and support.
The safety of everyone around us and their family is of utmost importance. At challenging times such as these it helps to remember that we all want the same thing: for the people we care about to stay healthy, the virus’ impact to diminish, for treatments to be developed and for life to return to normal. That shared sense of hope and purpose can encourage each of us during this difficult time and help us rally to meet the challenges we face. We thank every person at Furlenco for all they are doing to help not just Furlenco, but also the partners and customers who count on us and the communities that we call home. Together, we know we can meet these challenges.
We are trying to encourage startup founders and innovators in the community to contribute towards Covid relief-related initiatives. Our mentor network has stepped up to provide one-on-one strategic mentoring sessions to startup founders in the ecosystem who are contributing to Covid-relief causes. Donations pooled for covid-relief efforts will go a long way toward mobilizing funds and resources for obtaining necessary supplies and coordinating logistics. Any growth stage startup founder or early stage entrepreneur who provides valid proof of such donation is eligible for a venture development mentoring call with an industry expert on their startup company!
Vantage Fit
Startup
Vantage Fit
Founders
Anjan Pathak, Partha Neog
Founded
2011
Headquarters
New Delhi
Industry
Software
Spokesperson: Anjan Pathak, Co-founder & CTO, Vantage Fit
Vantage Fit – Startup helps during covid pandemic
Vantage Fit, an AI-Powered Corporate wellness solution, is devoted to creating awareness about employee health, but at the same time is also dedicated to helping employers, encouraging a healthy lifestyle amongst their employees, which is an integral part of tackling the Covid-19 related health and mental well-being. Vantage Fit, a flagship corporate wellness product of Vantage Circle, was created with the vision of bringing work and wellness together for a sustainable future.
Spokesperson: Amit Nigam, COO & Executive Director of BANKIT
Bankit – Startups support during Covid
Amidst the catastrophic second wave of the pandemic ravaging the country, India’s ongoing vaccination drive is now open for the 18-44 age group, albeit with the government mandating that there will be no walk-in vaccinations for this age group, and everyone must register on the CoWin app to book a slot. However, a large chunk of India’s population resides in the hinterlands, in remote areas with little to no access to technology. Besides, many may not be tech-savvy either, thereby needing a certain degree of handholding to complete the self-registration process and book a slot.
Against this backdrop, BANKIT, a Noida-based FinTech startup, through its DigiMitra outlets, is assisting India’s rural population in registering for getting inoculated faster through its portal. With the link of the CoWin self-registration portal in the BANKIT agent app and portal, BANKIT is committed to doing their bit to ensure that every citizen in the country get the vaccine at the earliest. People who are not digitally equipped or informed can go to the nearest BANKIT outlet and have them registered through the BANKIT app and portal. BANKIT has 60,000+ agent outlets spread across 8800 pin codes PAN India. Through this initiative, BANKIT aims to handhold over 2.2 million citizens across the country for COVID-19 vaccine registration from their outlets.
There is a huge digital divide between rural and urban India. Despite significant growth overall in terms of technology adoption, rural India is still not well equipped or skilled to use available digital sources. BANKIT has always been committed to bringing digital services to rural areas and helping the people utilize the same. Through this initiative, BANKIT will be including the vaccination link in its app and portal where our correspondents can help those in India’s hinterlands register them for booking appointments for getting inoculated. We hope the country soon recovers from the pandemic and bounces back to normalcy.
BANKIT agent outlets witness over 2 crore customers walking in each month to avail its wide range of banking and financial services.
Spokesperson: Nithya J Rao, Co-founder, Heart It Out
Heart It Out helps during covid 19
Heart It out is a mental health organisation. The pandemic has deeply affected the mental health of people. Heart It Out launched ‘Brief Relief’- a 24×7 Free chat service which provides an individual with immediate emotional support in a safe and non-judgemental environment. The helpline aims at de-stigmatising mental health and providing accessibility in eleven Indian languages.
Enduring these unprecedented times gets a lot easier when we connect, share and seek support from those walking the same path. Heart It Out has thus been conducting ‘Pandemic Peer Support Sessions’ to enable listening authentically to peers sharing their everyday experiences so we extend and receive support from one another. These sessions are open to all front line workers in various sectors like medicine, security and food delivery. Aside from these we also offer regular one-on-one psychotherapy, workshops and light hearted, fun events. We have served over 8000 people over the last year in various capacities.
With the second coronavirus wave disrupting the startup environment, AAIENA has been trying to help the retail vendors by harnessing technology. AAIENA, an Artificial Intelligence and Augmented Reality based body measurement sizing software, came up with virtual shops to provide retailers with a platform to carry on their business online. This helped them earn by creating their visibility amongst the target audience. Here, AAIENA also devised an alternative feature, trial and earn initiative, to help vendors earn even when they are unable to sell the product. The vendors are entitled to get 70% of revenue for getting the per trials which is safe & secure.
Lifelong India
Startup
Lifelong India
Headquarters
Gurgaon, Haryana
Industry
Consumer Durables, Home Appliances
Spokesperson: Bharat Kalia, Co-founder & CEO, Lifelong India.
Lifelong India fights Covid 19
In these unprecedented times, we have witnessed how the nation hascome together to bravely battle the pandemic. As a brand, we knew our efforts had to be two-fold, so we could help and ease the worries of both, our customers and our employees. We understood the importance of certain kitchen appliances, like gas stoves and mixer grinders, and how crucial they are for everyday use. When our customers requested support or service for these products, and we were unable to provide it due to strict lockdown restrictions within their district, we replaced the product for them through no-contact delivery. We ensured that our customers’ grievances were adequately and timely addressed. For our employees and their families, we opened up our call centre lines to verify any leads and availability of beds, injections, medicine and oxygen. When someone tested positive, they could focus on getting better without worrying about tracking leads. We supported our team further, by providing health insurance that included covid coverage.
Spokesperson: Bharti Singh, Sr Manager – People, Leverage Edu
Leverage Edu – Startups Fighting Covid 19
As things started to get bad last week, Akshay asked us to set up a small team to help internally. That very quickly scaled into we helping patients and their families across the country, bulking up the team, and being able to help more than 300 people already. Alongside, Akshay also recently announced free vaccines for all of our 200 employees & their families, & at the moment we are also working towards setting the logistics of it. It’s empowering to work in a missionary company, where the focus is on always doing the good, all else later.
Conclusion
These startups have proved that nothing is impossible! Even in this pandemic situation, individuals and groups are coming forward to help the humanity survive. It is this dedication, commitment and positivity that will help the country to fight the Covid. If you’re a startup that has joined the fight towards Covid 19, do contact us to get featured in the list.
Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verifiedinformation ondifferent startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by the organization it is based on.
Gone are the days when one had to rely on word of mouth to find a good doctor, or when one had to stand in queues to book an appointment with the doctor. Thanks to the online appointment booking platforms, finding the best doctors is now easier than never before. Through these platforms, one can find doctors specific to one’s health problem and book appointment in clicks.
One such platform that is simplifying the process of booking an appointment with the doctor and diagnostic centers isDocttocare. Moving a step forward this Bangalore based startup even arranges for transportation of the patient to the clinic if required, thus making good quality health care services more accessible.
StartupTalky interviewed Docttocare founder Sugandha to learn further about this startup.
Docttocare is an online healthcare service provider. Docttocare provides its users information about the best doctors, clinics, hospitals and diagnostic centers. The platform also offers virtual walkthroughs of the ambiance to showcase hospitality and their facilities. It makes booking appointments super easy and assures the confirmation of online appointment through call, SMS or email. Docttocare launched its services in 2018 at NASSCOM Bangalore.
Docttocare is one of the leading healthcare online portals that enable users from non-metro cities to access and book an appointment with doctors and hospitals located in major cities. Docttocare app handholds the users through the entire process of identifying the right doctors/hospitals and scheduling appointments on the desired date. Docttocare covers everything from dentist, gynecologist, dermatologist, ENT, ayurvedic and homeopathy.
Docttocare is making lives easy for doctors too. Docttocare helps the doctors increase the visibility of the services provided by them, and also provides facilities such as seamless integration with online payment. It also lets the doctors view patient records from anywhere, remind the patients about the appointment and manage the clinic through Docttocare dashboard.
Global Appointment Scheduling Software Market
The global appointment scheduling market was valued at 160 million USD in 2017 and is expected to surpass 360 million USD by the end of 2023. Again, the doctor’s appointment booking software market alone is expected to grow at a rate of 16.56% for the next five years, i.e. till 2023.
Sugandha Agarwal is the founder and CEO of Docttocare
Founder & CEO of Docttocare
Docttocare is a single female founder company. Sugandha Agarwal is the founder and CEO of Docttocare. An electrical, electronics & communication engineer by qualification, Sugandha worked with reputed organizations like Infosys, Oracle and Google Maps before starting Docttocare.
I do everything except writing codes. Jokes apart, driving partnerships with hospital brands, building end-user acquisition strategies, spending time with product positioning, etc are key responsibilities, says Sugandha Agarwal.
Docttocare has 15 members of team right now and looking for expanding in a couple of months.
Docttocare – Name and Logo
The name Docttocare has been derived from ‘Doctor to care’.
Instant online ambulance booking – This feature allows the users to book an ambulance online instantly. Once booked, the user can track the live status of the fleet, the arrival time of the ambulance the expected time it will take to travel.
Blood Bank Facility – Lets users track the availability of bold groups with the hospital.
Manages health reports – Docttocare lets the users search, compare, evaluate and also share health record and prescription with doctors, thus making the platform user-friendly.
Simplifies the process of shortlisting a doctor or medical center – Docttocare allows the users to choose the best of doctors and clinics or hospitals based on ratings and helps the users in making an informed decision. It also provides a virtual 3D panoramic tour of the hospital thus making the users get a fair idea of the hospital or clinic even before visiting the place.
Docttocare also offers free cancellation and re-scheduling of appointments.
Docttocare has a simple commission – based revenue model. While the services are free for the patients, it charges a 10% commission from the hospitals.
Docttocare – Funding and Investors
Docttocare raised seed funding worth INR 4 Crore in May 2019.
Funding Date
Funding Stage
Funding Amount
Investor
May 2019
Seed
INR 4 Crore
Krishna Kumar Devnally
Docttocare – User Acquisition
Getting the initial set of customers required great effort. The Docttocare team roamed around Bangalore and enrolled the small clinics.
“We used to visit at least 20 clinics per day. After some time when we started getting revenue from appointments then we realized Tier 2 cities people are more keen to get treated by reputed doctors, and they need transport as well, which we tried to solve”, recalls Sugandha.
Currently, Docttocare is focusing on tier 2 and tier 3 cities to provide access to prime hospitals and connecting them with ambulance service and proving stay also.
Docttocare – Startup Challenges
Docttocare | Team Hustle
“Startup journeys are full of challenges, which to be honest, I didn’t realize before taking the plunge. Thanks to the media, who always show the shiny side of it. Keeping professional and personal life separate & fulfilling is one of the biggest challenges and I had to let one of them go for a few years.” said Sugandha.
Building the team, acquiring an initial set of customers/partners, honing her selling skills were part of the early days’ challenges for Sugandha. Besides, though she had a brief coding background and was able to keep up with the engineering/product team but being in sync with them fully took her some time.
Challenges like customer acquisition, revenue were there since day one, but Docttocare now has a qualified team to take care of these aspects. Another major problem was raising funds.
“Raising funds was the other (good) problem we solved. While starting up, I did not realize that I’d have the inherent disadvantage of being a solo female founder. I got my reality check, when one of the prominent angel investors with a massive following on social media, mentioned this fact bluntly to me. They didn’t even delve into business and rejected the deal outright. But being a female founder gives you additional strength (in terms of team management and creativity), which not many investors realize. Incidentally, I met with our investor/mentor a year ago and he decided to support us” narrates Sugandha.
Along with being the investor of Docttocare, Krishnakumar also plays the role of a mentor for the company. He is the Director of M-Power Solutions.
Docttocare – Growth
Through its excellent services, Docttocare has been successful to slowly gain trust from doctors and patients alike.
The company has enrolled all the major hospitals like Apollo, Manipal, Medanta and many more.
Docttocare is now getting around 300 + appointments per day.
4000+ medical tests have been done through Docttocare.
500+ clinics, 100+ hospitals and 2000+ doctors are registered with it.
Docttocare – Future Plans
Docttocare is planning to bring many positive changes in the healthcare scenario of India.
Emphasizing on Docttocare’s future plans, Sugandha said “I want to take healthcare in India to a much higher level. We have a dearth of doctors in this country and the patient count is undoubtedly increasing. People often ignore their minor health-issues, either due to lack of healthcare service or because of effort/cost that may go into addressing it.”
Awareness of health issues would be their next goal. How can they help you to be healthy without investing much? Something as simple as cutting refined sugar & unhealthy fat from the diet, eating your dinner early in the day, etc can go a long way in improving the fitness standard.
Making quality healthcare accessible to masses has been the company’s dream and they are very early in solving it. Currently, they have to move people to let them enjoy the benefits of high-quality services, but the eventual goal would be to send services wherever they are. Training local people on healthcare services, equipping them with the right tools and making them work under the supervision of qualified practitioners is the way forward.
Nitin Konde
