How Razorpay Built India's Payments Infrastructure: A Founder Story

When Harshil Mathur and Shashank Kumar started Razorpay in 2014, India's digital payments infrastructure was fragmented and unreliable. A decade later, they process over $100 billion in annual payments for 10 million businesses.

The Early Days

"We got rejected from Y Combinator in our first attempt," Harshil recalls. "They said the market was too crowded. That rejection pushed us to think deeper about what made us different."

The founders identified a critical gap: while payment gateways existed, none offered a complete stack that worked reliably for Indian businesses. They decided to build everything from scratch.

Key Decisions That Shaped Razorpay

1. Building for Developers First

Unlike competitors who focused on enterprise sales, Razorpay targeted developers. They created clean APIs, extensive documentation, and a sandbox environment that let developers test for free.

"When developers love your product, they become your salesforce," says Harshil. "They recommend you at every company they join."

2. Saying No to Quick Revenue

In 2016, a major bank offered Razorpay a lucrative exclusive partnership. Taking it would have meant 3x revenue. They declined.

"Exclusivity would have limited our ability to innovate. We wanted to work with every bank, every payment method. That decision cost us in the short term but built our moat."

3. Expanding Beyond Payments

Razorpay launched RazorpayX (business banking) and Razorpay Capital (lending) to create a complete financial operating system for businesses.

The $7.5 Billion Valuation

By 2021, Razorpay had raised $375 million and achieved a $7.5 billion valuation, becoming India's most valuable payments company. But Harshil insists the journey is just beginning.

"We've digitized payments. Now we're digitizing the entire financial stack for businesses."