Fintech unicorn BharatPe has received an in-principle approval from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to operate as an online payment aggregator.

The in-principle authorisation was given to Resilient Payments Pvt Ltd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Resilient Innovations Pvt Ltd (BharatPe).

"This in-principle approval will help catapult our expansion plans and enable us to reach out to millions of merchants, provide digital payment acceptance solutions,” said BharatPe interim CEO Nalin Negi.

The final authorisation, however, is subject to fulfilment of certain conditions. BharatPe said it will start working on those criteria within the prescribed timeline.

Fintech firms such as Razorpay, PineLabs, Stripe, 1Pay, Innoviti Payments, MSwipe and Infibeam Avenues have received in-principle approvals from the central bank to operate as payment aggregators.

Founded in 2018, BharatPe serves more than 1 crore merchants across over 400 cities. It launched UPI interoperable QR code, the first zero MDR payment acceptance service. In 2020, post-Covid, BharatPe also launched a card acceptance terminal – BharatSwipe. 

Payment aggregators facilitate e-commerce sites and merchants to accept payment instruments from customers. They facilitate merchants to connect with acquirers.