HiWiPay, a cross-border payments platform has raised $2 million in a seed funding round led by Unicorn India Ventures.
The round also saw participation from Dewang Neralla’s family office and Jupiter Metaverse LLP along with other angel investors including Ritesh Malik, Mitesh Shah, and Nilesh Doshi.
The funds raised will be used to expand and enhance the trade remittance business, as well as to scale up operations in the education remittances sector.
Dewang Neralla, Co-founder HiWiPay, said, “Securing this funding is a significant milestone for HiWiPay as we continue our mission to revolutionize cross-border payments. This investment fuels our commitment to innovation, enabling us to enhance our platform, expand our reach, and deliver a frictionless experience for students and businesses globally. We are grateful for the trust our investors have placed in us and look forward to driving the next phase of growth.”
Anil Joshi, Managing Partner, Unicorn India Ventures, said, “There are major complexities of cross-border transactions and HiWiPay is tapping into this potential to make the process much easier. We have witnessed significant growth and believe HiWiPay’s highly innovative business model is ripe for disruption because of changing customer demands, emerging market growth, and financial inclusion. HiWiPay has been working tirelessly in that direction to meet the growing demand and the funding will help the company scale its services to a more advanced stage.”
Founded in 2022 by Dewang Neralla, Geeta Chauhan and Ujwal Tamminedi, HiWiPay is a cross-border payments platform that offers a seamless digital experience, eliminating paperwork hassles and ensuring secure, compliant transactions.
The platform claims to provide competitive exchange rates and real-time tracking, making global payments effortless.
In the last 12 months, the company’s education portal for study abroad consultants has seen significant transaction activity, with over 500 consultants onboarded and actively facilitating student remittances.
The Company is also introducing HiWiPay student app in the UK with an aim to build their presence in key hubs across Europe. The company has partnered with multiple banks and NBFCs to help individuals secure education loans, making studying abroad more accessible and achievable.
HiWiPay also plans to enter the SME trade remittance space, expanding beyond student payments and is slated to launch co-branded forex cards and other financial services to cater to students.
The company has also developed a portal that enables exporters to seamlessly collect payments with all necessary documentation in place.
In the next 12 – 18 months, HiWiPay plans to onboard 5,000 international students on the HiWiPay Student App. The company expects its transaction volume to be $100 million in remittances and double the network of education consultants to 1,000. HiWiPay also plans to support 1,000 SME exporters with trade remittance solutions and strengthen banking partnerships to improve FX rates and payment efficiency.
