Udit Agarwal
Kishore Biyani‘s Future Enterprises has agreed to acquire a majority stake in Mumbai-based LivQuik Technology, the startup that operates QuikWallet.
According to a regulatory filing by Future Enterprises, it has signed a pact to acquire 54.98% of stake in LivQuik. It has agreed to pay ₹20 crores for the stake and an additional ₹5 crores, if required. The acquisition is expected to be completed in the next two years.
LivQuik was founded by Mohit Lalwani, along with Yudhajit Nag Sen, Vinay Pinto and Suma Bhattacharya in 2012. It operates QuikWallet, an RBI-approved semi-closed payment wallet, enabling consumers to store money and to pay across online and offline merchants. It also provides payments solutions for merchants to enable card and digital wallet payments for both online and offline business, provide a complete solution.
This acquisition could help QuikWallet to leverage Future Enterprises’ vast network of merchants and customers to grow their business. LivQuik last raised $1.6 million in funding from Snow Leopard Technology Ventures in July 2015.
Other players in the digital payments domain competing with QuikWallet include, Paytm, PayU, MobiKwik, and Citruspay, among others.
Future Group is the second largest brick and mortar retailer in India, behind Mukesh Ambani‘s Reliance Retail. It operates hypermart chain under the brand Big Bazaar and supermart chain under Food Bazaar, among many others.
The company has been expanding its online presence in the past couple of years. Earlier last month, it was reported that Future Group is looking to invest ₹800 crores over the next four years, in order to strengthen its food supply chain network.
In January 2018, it acquired end-to-end supply chain logistics startup Vulcan Express. Earlier in April 2016, Future Group acquired the online furniture retailer FabFurnish in an all-cash deal, marking one of its first acquisitions in the Indian e-commerce domain.
