Paytm eyes acceleration in O2O vertical, to buy Little, Nearbuy

Paytm is acquiring daily deal platforms Nearbuy and Little in a distress sale. The Noida-based company has been engaged in acquisition talks with both companies for months. Paytm sees Little and Nearbuy as platforms that would help it accelerate its O2O vertical (mobile commerce and transactions).

Little had raised over $50 million from Paytm and Singapore-based GIC while Nearbuy (formerly Groupon) secured $20 million from Sequoia Capital. According to an ET report, Paytm will shell out $30 million to acquire both companies. The acquisitions said to be a mix of cash and stock and slated to be completed soon.

Little and Nearbuy provide real-time hyperlocal deals to customers across services like restaurants, movies, hotels, salons, gyms and spas among others. For merchants, they act as the sales platform to gain intelligence about customers in the vicinity, send timely notifications and offer relevant deals.

Flush with whopping $1.4 billion round by Softbank, Paytm has been eyeing multiple acquisition and strategic investments.

Vijay Shekhar Sharma-led company along with Alibaba is close to pump-in $200 million for a significant stake in country’s largest online grocery platform Bigbasket. It acquired a majority stake in Mumbai-based online ticketing platform, Insider.in in June this year.

Paytm also invested an undisclosed amount in mobile loyalty and data analytics firm MobiQuest Mobile Technologies. It was also in talks to acquire travel booking site Via.com.

Over the past two years, deal discovery space is stagnant and both Little and Nearbuy have been struggling in driving transactions. The upside of deal platforms is limited as they aren’t growing. However, they make sense to Paytm as it’s eyeing representation in various verticals and wants to have a broader use case for its payment platform.