PayPal Buying Binge Supports Marketplace Payments with Hyperwallet Acquisition
PayPal is still on a buying binge, with two more companies added to its slate of acquisitions last week.
The first was Hyperwallet, which the company said improves its ability to serve ecommerce platforms and marketplaces, a global market it called a “tremendous opportunity.”
PayPal has been beefing up its capabilities on multiple fronts this year. It previously announced it was purchasing Stockholm-based iZettle, building on its global omnichannel presence with that company’s in-store footprint in Europe and Latin America.
With the Hyperwallet announcement, the company cited Internet Retailer data saying that sales from marketplaces accounted for more than half of online sales worldwide last year.
“By acquiring Hyperwallet, we will be able to provide PayPal and Braintree merchants with access to a comprehensive payments solution, including Hyperwallet’s localized, multi-currency payment distribution capabilities in more than 200 markets with numerous disbursement options, including prepaid card, bank account, debit card, cash pickup, check and PayPal,” PayPal COO Bill Ready said in a blog post.
PayPal is already behind some of the world’s best-known marketplaces, including Uber, Airbnb and eBay, it said.
According to Ready, marketplaces have unique requirements for their payment providers.
“Marketplaces are complicated to run because they require serving all sides of the market simultaneously, including consumers who want to use particular payment methods and sellers who need to get paid, regardless of how the consumer wants to pay,” Ready said.
“Additionally, merchants and service providers who use ecommerce platforms and online marketplaces want quick, efficient, flexible and secure access to their earnings, whenever and wherever they need them.”
Following the Hyperwallet announcement, PayPal also said it was acquiring fraud prevention and risk management company Simility.
In that announcement, Ready said that like the Swift Financial, iZettle, Jetlore and Hyperwallet acquisitions before it, the Simility acquisition “is part of a concerted effort to strengthen the suite of services we can provide to merchants in order to become the one-stop solution for global commerce.”
Simility provides PayPal with machine learning-powered fraud tools that give merchants more control, with the ability to customize rules based on the unique needs of their businesses, Ready said.
The Simility purchase also gives PayPal an office in Hyderabad, India. The company launched its domestic payment service in India in November.