The stablecoin merchant platform
Every counter,
on-chain. Nothing to scan,
nothing to wait for.
PAYA replaces the QR code, the card machine and the soundbox with one system: a device that takes payment from whoever is standing in front of it, software that runs the shop behind it, and stablecoin settlement that clears in seconds instead of days. No bank account, no percentage of every sale, no two-day wait for money that already moved.
Proximity link · secured
Working prototype
The opportunity
Stablecoins' last
mile is a counter.
Digital dollars now move across the world in seconds for almost nothing. They still can't buy a cup of tea. A merchant who wants to accept them needs a smartphone, an app, a wallet address and a customer patient enough to scan it — which is why almost none of them do.
Acceptance is a hardware problem, not an app problem. India proved what actually changes merchant behaviour: it wasn't the QR code, it was the box that said the amount out loud. We're building that object for stablecoins.
Merchant enters the amount.
Customer stands at the counter. Phone stays in the pocket.
The device finds them. Nothing scanned, nothing typed.
Customer confirms the amount. One tap, or one palm.
It settles in seconds, and the device says so out loud.
Why now
Three things became true at once.
Digital dollars got boring
Stablecoins stopped being a trading instrument and became a settlement rail. Once money moves reliably and cheaply, the only thing between it and everyday commerce is the object on the counter.
The playbook is proven
Speaking payment devices reached millions of counters in under five years. The distribution model, the price point and the merchant behaviour are all established. Nobody has pointed any of it at what comes next.
The economics finally work
A counter device that would once have needed a Series A to prototype now costs less than a week's takings for the merchant using it. Cheap enough to place for free, and still profitable.
Hardware
Three devices, one counter.
Built for a sweet shop in July and a fuel pump in monsoon. Every device works standalone, and works better together.
PAYA One
The counter terminal
A merchant computer that happens to take payments, rather than a card reader with a screen bolted on. Everything the shop runs on lives here.
- Full touchscreen with a merchant interface designed for one hand and a busy counter
- Every payment method — proximity, palm, tap, card and QR fallback in one device
- Speaks confirmations aloud in the merchant's own language, audible across the shop
- Built-in receipt printing, plus digital receipts by message or email
- Works offline, queueing transactions and reconciling automatically when the network returns
- Always connected over mobile data or Wi-Fi, with automatic failover between them
- Multi-operator — staff sign in individually, so every sale is attributable
- Updates itself overnight, without anyone touching the device
PAYA Box
The speaking receiver
For counters that don't need a screen — the stall, the fuel pump, the second till. It takes payment on its own and tells the whole shop it happened.
- Announces every payment aloud, with the amount, in the language the merchant chose
- Accepts proximity payments without a terminal or a smartphone anywhere in the setup
- Multi-day battery, so it keeps working through outages and long market days
- Pairs to PAYA One as a second speaker, or runs entirely standalone
- Loud enough for a street, with volume that adapts to ambient noise
- Instant fraud check — merchants hear a failed or duplicate payment immediately
- Daily spoken summary of the day's takings at closing time
- Mounts anywhere — wall, counter, pole or pocket
PAYA Palm
The standalone reader
For queues that can't stop moving. Enrol once, then pay with an open hand — no phone, no card, nothing to lose.
- Pay with an open hand, in well under a second from present to authorised
- Nothing stored that can be stolen — the credential never leaves the device in a readable form
- Can't be copied from a photograph, unlike a face or a fingerprint left on a glass
- One-time enrolment at the counter, taking under a minute
- Built for volume — canteens, transit gates, campuses, festivals and temple queues
- Works with spending limits, so a hand alone can't authorise a large amount
- Opt-in and revocable — a customer can delete their enrolment at any time
- Pairs with PAYA One or runs as its own lane
Ways to pay
Five ways in. The customer picks.
Every PAYA device accepts all of them, so the merchant never has to turn a sale away because someone brought the wrong thing.
Proximity
Stand at the counter and confirm. The phone stays in the pocket — no camera, no aiming, no app to find. The fastest path, and the one we designed everything else around.
Palm
An open hand over the reader. Nothing to carry and nothing to remember, for regulars and for queues where seconds compound.
Bump
Two phones knocked together move money directly between people. No number, no address, no QR — useful for splitting a bill or paying a person rather than a shop.
Tap
Cards and phone wallets work exactly as they do today, because a merchant can't afford to refuse them while everything else catches up.
Scan
A QR code is still on the screen for anyone who wants it. We think it's the worst option on this list, and we'd rather offer it than lose the sale.
Link
Send a payment request by message for phone orders, deliveries and invoices. Same rail, same settlement, no device needed at the other end.
Merchant software
The shop, not just the sale.
Payment is the reason a merchant lets a device onto the counter. Running the business is the reason it stays there. All of this is included, on the device and on the web.
Inventory
Stock counts that move with every sale, low-stock alerts before anything runs out, and purchase suggestions based on what actually sold last month.
Catalogue & pricing
Items, variants, combos and taxes in one place. Change a price once and every device and lane updates immediately.
Analytics
Daily and hourly revenue, best and worst sellers, peak hours, and how this week compares to the last one — in plain language, not a spreadsheet.
Assistant
Ask questions about the business the way you'd ask a manager. What sold best on Sundays, whether to order more, what tomorrow is likely to look like.
Staff & payroll
Individual sign-ins, shift tracking, per-person sales attribution, and payouts to staff without a separate system.
CRM & loyalty
Recognise regulars automatically, run points or discounts without a plastic card, and reach customers who haven't been in for a while.
Invoicing
Raise, send and chase invoices from the counter, with payment links attached and status tracked against the ledger.
Tax & compliance
Tax applied correctly at the point of sale and filings prepared from real transaction data, so the year-end isn't a reconstruction exercise.
Subscriptions
Recurring billing for anyone selling a membership, a tiffin service or a monthly plan, with retries and reminders handled automatically.
Dashboard
Every counter,
on one screen.
For anyone running more than one till. Live sales across every location, staff performance side by side, stock that needs attention, and exports for whoever does the books.
- Live view of every location and device, including which ones are offline
- Comparisons across sites, by hour, day, item and operator
- Role-based access so a manager sees their store and only their store
- Scheduled reports delivered to an inbox without anyone logging in
- Exports to whatever accounting software already runs the business
Customer app
A wallet that
expects nothing.
No branch, no paperwork, no minimum balance. Useful for anyone a bank has decided is too small, too new or too far away to serve.
- Set up in under a minute, with keys the customer actually controls
- Hold and spend in local currency, with conversion handled invisibly
- Send to anyone, anywhere, at the same cost as paying the shop next door
- Every receipt in one place, searchable, with the merchant and amount attached
- Spending controls and per-method limits the customer sets themselves
Settlement
Money that lands before
the customer leaves.
Card rails take a percentage because four intermediaries each need paying, and they take two days because that's how long the handoffs take. Stablecoin settlement has neither problem. This is the part merchants never see and feel the most.
Instant settlement
Funds are final in seconds, not at the end of a two-day cycle. Working capital stops being something a merchant borrows against their own sales.
Flat, not proportional
A fee that reflects the cost of moving money rather than a percentage of what was sold — which is what makes a small ticket worth accepting at all.
No bank account required
A merchant can accept, hold and spend without an account, a branch visit or a credit history. Payouts to a bank remain available for anyone who wants them.
Cross-border by default
A payment from another country is just a payment over a longer distance. No correspondent banks, no multi-day wait, no slice taken on the way through.
Reconciliation that's already done
Every transaction carries its own record, so the ledger matches the bank by construction instead of by somebody checking it each night.
Rules that run themselves
Split a sale between partners, hold funds in escrow until delivery, or release a supplier payment on a schedule — without an accounts team in the middle.
Trust
The boring parts we take seriously.
A payment device only works if a merchant is willing to walk away from the counter and leave it there.
Encrypted end to end
Payment data is protected in transit and at rest, and authorisation happens on the device rather than somewhere it can be intercepted.
Biometrics stay on the device
A palm credential is stored in a form that can't be reversed into an image, never leaves the hardware readable, and can be deleted on request.
Distance is the boundary
A proximity payment only reaches the counter it's meant for. Standing somewhere else isn't close enough, which is the point.
An audit trail nobody edits
Every transaction is independently verifiable after the fact — by the merchant, by their accountant, and by a regulator asking questions.
Fails safely
Lost network, dead battery or a device that walks off the counter — none of them put funds at risk or lose a completed sale.
Built to be licensed
Identity checks, transaction monitoring and reporting are designed in rather than retrofitted, because payments is a regulated business and we intend to be a regulated company.
Platform
Open at the edges.
Hardware gets us onto the counter. What it earns is the right to build everything around it — and to let other people build there too.
- Payments API for anyone who wants to accept through their own product
- Device SDK so a business can put its own workflow on the terminal screen
- Webhooks for sales, settlements, refunds and inventory events
- Integrations with the accounting, e-commerce and delivery tools merchants already run
- Extension marketplace for industry-specific tools we were never going to build ourselves
- Working capital offered against real, verifiable sales history rather than collateral
Where we are
What's working, and what's next.
We'd rather show progress than describe a product that doesn't exist yet. This page updates as things get built.
Proximity payment working end to end — customer to counter, with nothing scanned.
WorkingSpoken payment confirmation in English, Hindi and Kannada.
WorkingSettlement wired to the device, and the first production-shaped build of PAYA Box.
In progressTen devices on real counters in Bengaluru. The only number we care about is repeat merchant use.
PlannedPAYA One terminal, the merchant software suite, and the web dashboard.
PlannedPalm authentication, the developer platform, and merchants outside India.
PlannedPalm authentication and settlement of regulated local-currency payments each require regulatory clearance and banking partners before they reach a real shop. We treat them as roadmap rather than launch features, and we'd rather say so here than in the small print.
Questions
The things people ask first.
Can I use this today?
Not yet. We're placing the first devices with a small group of merchants in Bengaluru, and the waitlist is how we choose who gets them. Everything marked "planned" on the roadmap is exactly that.
Does my customer need a special app?
For proximity payments, they need the PAYA app once — after that the phone stays in the pocket. For tap, card and QR, they need nothing at all. We expect most counters to run a mix for a long time.
What happens when the internet goes down?
The device keeps accepting payments and reconciles automatically when the connection returns. A shop that stops selling during an outage isn't a shop we've helped.
Do I need a bank account?
No. You can accept, hold and spend without one. If you want money in a bank account, payouts are available — it's an option rather than a requirement.
Is palm data safe?
The credential is stored in a form that can't be turned back into an image of your hand, it doesn't leave the device in readable form, and you can delete it whenever you want. Enrolment is always opt-in.
How much will it cost?
We haven't set pricing yet, and we'd rather say that than invent a number. The design goal is a flat fee per transaction instead of a percentage of the sale, and hardware cheap enough to place without charging for it.
Which countries?
India first, because it has the world's most demanding small-merchant payment market and the highest bar for what "fast enough" means. Everything after that follows from what we learn here.
Get involved
Merchant, partner, or early believer.
If you run a counter and want a device early, or you're building in payments and this sounds like your kind of problem, we'd like to hear from you.