Elias Ghanem - Ceo & Co-founder Telr.com
Telr is the new kid on the crowded payment industry block offering payment gateway services. As the industry has its fair share of big boys (i.e. PayPal), young upstarts (i.e. Stripe) and many more, why would another rival matter? Or why would someone want to be yet another competitor?
The answer is simple, there are still huge gaps yet to be addressed. Payment gateways on a whole are not able to address, just to briefly go through, 3 problems: currencies, languages, fund processing.
Currency: Most payment gateways work in USD or convert to/from USD. With 85% of currency transactions across the world being in the US dollar, it is a global denominator that benefits those who are holding on to that currency. This disadvantages many other currencies that are weaker – which last i check, is all but a handful.
Languages: The world’s most spoken language is not English, it is Mandarin Chinese (882 million). In fact, English is not even second, that spot belongs to Spanish (325 million). English is only the third most spoken language in the world (312 million). So it is a wonder that most major payment gateways are still English focused.
Fund processing: eCommerce is the evolution of regular brick and mortar retail – to save on fixed costs like rental and focus on speed. Therefore, the modus operandi of having to get paid for your products by going through a local bank delays turnover inventory, hence creating cash flow problems.
Besides just making a sweeping statement about the scene, specifically, lets take a look at PayPal. It is undoubtedly the market leader (18% of eCommerce market) with a brand name that is synonymous with payments around the world. However, look closely – things aren’t all that rosy. Paypal is not likely to be in every market – for example in the Middle East, . Also, PayPal is a closed loop consumer wallet, which means you need to have a PayPal account to pay with PayPal. This impedes signups and puts off shoppers.
Hence, these reasons created the opportunity for Telr to come in. Telr is co-founded by 2 senior management alumni of PayPal so they are acutely aware of PayPal’s shortcomings. The problems plaguing the industry are harder to resolve but we believe by chipping at the problem (instead of ignoring it) will eventually lead to an industry standard solution.
For existing currency issues, Telr will be a multi-currency payment gateway – pay and receive in the currency of your choice. Next up, language, Telr will be multi-lingual for ease-of-use by anybody. Hence, Telr created the slogan, “Your Language. Your Currency.” to fulfill the needs of users around the world.
Also, on top of just processing the transactions, Telr will provide unified logistics with strategic delivery partner. Aramex. Finally, even cash management options are offered to receive funds faster than ever to improve your cash flow. So it will be even less hassle to receive and send goods or payment.
We believe that Telr will be a fresh breath of air that many have been yearning for. Only being announced in March’ 14, it is in private beta and the product will be ready by the end of the year. The buzz generated in the press and on the ground is testament of the demand in eCommerce for something different/better.
Telr, while headquartered in Singapore, will be first launched in Dubai and it’ll quickly expand across all emerging market across Middle East, Africa and Southeast Asia. Combined with its presence across the 2 biggest eCommerce regional hubs (Singapore and Dubai), Telr is primed for rapid growth and expansion.
