Real-time, account-to-account payments platform Zepto has today announced that it is the first non-bank to be accredited as both a New Payments Platform (NPP) Connected Institution and an Accredited Data Recipient (ADR) under the ACCC’s Consumer Data Right (CDR) in line with the company’s rapidly growing presence in the payments space.
Zepto has grown rapidly and is now processing $3 billion per month in payment volumes since its evolution from Byron Bay upstart, Split Payments. The new accreditations, which demand the highest standards of governance and financial compliance, place the company to provide market-leading services to a variety of mid to enterprise-level companies. In addition, Zepto has also been accepted as a member of the Tech Council of Australia.
By becoming a Connected Institution to Australia’s NPP infrastructure, Zepto will be directly connected to the NPP payment rails. This will deliver meaningful benefits to merchants through speed of delivery and innovation with Zepto’s groundbreaking payment tools. Notably, it will enable Zepto to deliver its clients direct access to the NPP’s PayTo service with fewer links in the chain and less friction when it comes online in mid-2022.
Since its inception in 2018, companies including Binance Australia, Bluestone, Superhero, MoneyMe, OurProperty, AusPost have trusted Zepto’s API-embedded infrastructure, which was originally developed to solve payments problems for the team behind Australia’s hottest skydiving conglomerate.
Fast forward to 2021 and Zepto has evolved into an enterprise-ready platform that sits at the crossroads of Open Banking and real-time B2B payments, powering more than 100 per cent revenue growth for its customers.
Zepto itself has also seen consistent revenue growth of around 72 per cent across FY21 QoQ, tripling its revenue in that financial year and boosting headcount by 160 per cent in that same time.
CEO of NPP Australia, Adrian Lovney, said: “NPP Australia is delighted to welcome Zepto as the first non-ADI and accredited CDR data recipient approved to connect directly to the NPP as a ‘Connected Institution’. This enables Zepto to start the steps required for technical certification.
“The NPP is designed to be open access and our goal is to encourage broad participation while maintaining safeguards required for a real-time payments system and the ongoing protection of consumers.
“We look forward to seeing Zepto continue to bring payments innovation to life via the NPP when our third-party payment initiation service - PayTo - commences rolling out next year,” he said.
Commenting on the accreditations Zepto CEO, Chris Jewell said they demonstrated Zepto’s incredibly high standards of operation, security, testing, and governance:
“Zepto is now the first non-bank to receive this level of infrastructure-level accreditation, and represents a massive investment into our future. In securing the Connected Institution and ADR accreditations, Zepto has reached a significant new milestone in our ability to bring a new generation of faster, smarter payments to market. We set out with an intention to level the paying field, and these accreditations prove that you don’t need to be a traditional bank to bring enterprise-grade compliant and reliable instant payments solutions to Australian businesses.
“These certifications speak to our maturity as a business in that our security, policies, and processes meet world-class levels of scrutiny. Not only is it an incredible achievement for Zepto as a business, but it’s also a win for our clients. We now have unique opportunities to develop products and services that differentiate us in the market, and can be delivered at our own pace.
“We’ve already proven that our technology is more than capable of supporting explosive growth for our clients. Today’s announcement means Zepto is now set up for serious scale, and in the spirit of our approach to payments, we plan to execute at speed,” he said.