Tea break chats result in fintech startup

Chennai: What happens when two Chennai lads working away from home discuss life goals over tea breaks? Madhusudanan R and Muthukumar A, who worked at payments major Visa in Mumbai, decided to turn entrepreneurs over one such meeting, and quit their cushy jobs.
Joined by another friend Prabhu Rangarajan, who worked at Cognizant, the trio launched M2P Fintech in 2014, a startup that builds financial infrastructure for banks and financial institutions. M2P provides API infrastructure — a software intermediary that allows two applications to talk to one another — to help businesses incorporate fintech products in their platform.
“Fintech wasn’t even a word back then. We saw it as a way to transform the finance world with tech and, more importantly, a way to build our life in our hometown,” says Madhusudanan.
Thanks to the strong product, customer traction, and conservative operations, the startup bootstrapped for the first five years and was also profitable. “In the first six weeks of incorporation, we had a revenue paying customer thanks to network effects from our previous jobs,” says Madhusudanan.
A deal win in 2019 competing with marquee fintech players convinced them that they had the potential to go global, and made them look towards external funding. Since then, the startup has closed five funding rounds raising more than $110 million.
This has translated to activating almost 15 new global markets in the last two years, and achieving almost 5x customer growth with many big banks noticing them. Today, they serve more than 500 fintechs and 20+ banks with their API infrastructure. Among their clients are Yes Bank, IndusInd Bank and Slice.
While this has forced the co-founders out of their shell, it hasn’t made them cocky. “We have always had a strong bias towards execution, because there is respect in the market for it. Our focus is on keeping our heads down and pursuing our global expansion plans,” says Rangarajan.
Their modesty is shared by the team. The company has made it a point to find talent hidden in the deeper parts of Tamil Nadu with more than half the staff hailing from the south. “Employee referral has worked wonders for us. Such members also value relationships more than money,” says Rangarajan.
Hailing from the middle class, it’s not surprising their decision to launch M2P back in 2014 was met with scepticism from friends. But the founders count their families as the biggest support system.
“The role of family is rarely acknowledged in the startup world. Their sacrifices are unmatched,” says Muthukumar, the product whiz at M2P, who told his family he was let go by his company to get their blessings for his entrepreneurship journey.