Aspora, the Sequoia-backed fintech serving India's diaspora, just rolled out direct bill payments - letting non-resident Indians pay utility bills and mobile recharges back home without the usual transfer hassles. The feature connects to India's Bharat Bill Payment System, covering over 22,000 billers from electricity to broadband providers, as the startup pushes beyond simple remittances toward becoming a comprehensive financial platform for overseas Indians.
Aspora is rewriting the playbook for how India's massive diaspora manages money back home. The Sequoia Capital-backed fintech just launched direct bill payments, letting non-resident Indians skip the transfer-and-pray routine that's plagued expatriate families for decades. Instead of wiring money to relatives or wrestling with foreign cards that fail at Indian payment gateways, users can now pay electricity bills, mobile recharges, and loan installments with a tap. The startup has plugged directly into India's Bharat Bill Payment System through Yes Bank's domestic infrastructure, instantly accessing over 22,000 billers from major electricity providers like BSES and BESCOM to telecom giants Jio and Airtel. "For millions of Indians living overseas, paying bills in India has always been unnecessarily complex – involving transfers, delays, and double fees," Aspora founder and CEO Parth Garg told TechCrunch. The timing couldn't be sharper. India received nearly $100 billion in remittances last year, with the U.S. alone accounting for 28% of inflows according to the Reserve Bank of India. But those massive flows have traditionally been blunt instruments - lump sum transfers that families then had to redistribute for specific needs. Aspora is betting on granular control. The company isn't charging fees for bill payments and offers direct foreign currency conversion at competitive rates. It's a bold move that might cannibalize traditional remittance volumes - Garg estimates bill payments could reduce transfers by 4-5% - but the strategic calculus is about stickiness, not transaction size. "Today, the goal for any neobank is to try to get more and more transactions on your app," Garg explained during the interview. "With remittances, people used to use the app once or twice a month. This new feature increases velocity on our platform and has our users visit more frequently." The early data backs up that thesis. After testing with several thousand users over recent weeks, mobile recharges emerged as a breakout use case. Since India's BBPS system doesn't support mobile top-ups or credit card payments from foreign accounts, Aspora partnered with international mobile recharge specialist to fill those gaps. The feature launches first in the UK, where Aspora is based, with U.S. and UAE rollouts planned soon. That sequencing makes sense given Aspora's funding trajectory. The company raised at a $500 million valuation in June, led by Sequoia with participation from Greylock, Hummingbird, Quantum Light Ventures, and Y Combinator. The startup has now raised over $99 million total and expanded to the crucial U.S. market in July. The numbers tell a compelling growth story. Aspora has reached 800,000 customers who've processed $4 billion in transactions while saving $25 million in transfer fees compared to traditional services. But the real ambition extends far beyond bill payments. The company plans to launch NRE (Non-Resident External) accounts for managing foreign income and NRO (Non-Resident Ordinary) accounts for India-sourced earnings next year. That would position Aspora as a full-service neobank for the Indian diaspora, not just a remittance app with extra features. The Indian diaspora banking market has massive incumbents like and , but they've largely treated overseas Indians as extensions of domestic banking rather than a distinct customer segment with unique needs. Aspora is building the opposite way - diaspora-first product design that happens to connect back to India. The bill payment launch represents a crucial test of that thesis, measuring whether convenience and user experience can overcome the inertia of established financial relationships.
