10 Things you Didn’t Know About Amrish Rau
Amrish Rau is the CEO of one of India’s largest digital payment platforms and can hold its own when compared with other international firms. He has an outstanding CV, managing and running some of the largest companies and corporations in India, and played a great role in impacting most of these companies. Here are ten things you might not have known about Amrish Rau.
1. He has a degree in Engineering
According to Mint Lounge, Amrish Rau graduated with a degree in Engineering from the Shah And Anchor Kutchhi Engineering College.
2. He began as a sales manager
Amrish Rau held the first job as the sales manager for Siemens Nixdorf, and he held the position for one year and six months, from June 1996 to November 1997. After leaving the sales manager job at Siemens, he joined the NCR Corporation as the Regional Manager in charge of Sales. He stayed at the position for two years and three months, from November 1997 to January 2000.
3. He was the general manager at Teradata
Teradata is one of the largest providers of analytics and database-related software, services, and products. It is also a leading provider of CRM, as well as data warehouse solutions. Teradata India was conceptualized in 2000, and Amrish Rau was its first general manager. Teradata, then, was a division of NCR but eventually went public. He worked there from January 2000 to January 2005, a period of five years.
4. He was the General Manager of NCR corporation for the ASEAN Region
NCR is the leading provider for hardware, software, and services concerning digital banking and enterprise Point of Sale systems. It is also the market leader in providing payment solutions and is the lead provider for cheque truncation projects in ASEAN; then, Amrish Rau was the region’s general manager from January 2005 to November 2005.
5. He worked for First Data Corporation
In December 2005, Amrish joined the First Data Corporation in the capacity of Vice President and country manager for India. First Data Corporation is and has been for some time, one of the largest electronic payment services corporations in India. The FDC India’s business portfolio includes mobile, internet, physical payment, issuing of cards, and electronic switching for small-payment transactions. Amrish worked as the VC and country manager at FDC for seven years and seven months.
6. He was promoted to CEO
In June 2013, Amrish was promoted from Vice President and country manager OF India to CEO of First Data Marchant Solutions, India. First Data Marchant Solutions, India, is responsible for the growth of the retail electronic payment services in the greater Asia region, with its key products being Acquiring, payment processing, and Internet E-commerce. He left the organization after a year and a half in June 2013.
7. He was a founder of a startup
With the backing of significant investors, such as Sequoia Capital and Econtext Japan, Amrish started Citrus Payment Solutions Pvt. Ltd, and took up the role of Managing Director. Citrus Payment Solutions is a customer payment company whose raison d’etre is to simplify taking and making payments on an online platform between merchants and customers. Since its conceptualization, the company has aimed at using innovative technology to ensure that online merchants can effectively and efficiently sell their products. The startup was very successful, and, in one of the biggest moves in the Indian digital payment market, which was nascent, the company was acquired by Naspers’ PayU, a deal that is believed to be around 150 million dollars in 2016. Amrish, without a doubt, had a lot of influence on the company’s success.
8. Working with Naspers Limited
Once Naspers acquired his startup, it hired Amrish to work as the CEO of Naspers’ PayU India. PayU is, and at the time was, the leading online payment company in India and covered the online payment market. The company has its headquarters in Singapore, and Amrish worked there from October 2106 to March 2019 for two years and six months. Additionally, from January 2019 to January 2020, Amrish was part of Fintech Investments and Partnerships, which visa part of Naspers’ Limited. He was in charge of ensuring that the Fintech Portfolio for the company PayU grew through investing, of course, a job that he did to almost perfection. Eventually, though, after a year, he left the company.
9. He is currently the CEO of Pine Labs
Pine Labs is an Indian platform that provides both last-mile retail transaction technology and financing by providing software for POS systems. It was founded in 1998 and has thus been around for some time, and during that time, it has become the leading merchant commerce platform in India and Asia. In 2018, the company had a valuation of over one billion, making it a unicorn. Like his startup, Citrus Payment Solution, Sequoia Capital’s investment funded the company and other companies such as PayPal, Temasek, Actis, and Mastercard. It is no surprise then, with the amount of experience that he came with and previous dealings with Sequoia Capital and all the other investors, that in March 2020, Amrish was appointed as the CEO of Pine Labs. Since taking over this role, the company has had a lot of success; in May 2021, the company completes a first close of 285 million dollars funding after being valued at 3 billion dollars. The company has over 150,000 merchants that use its services, ranging all over Asia and the Middle East.
10. Amrish’s source of Inspiration
Amrish Rau has stated that he is inspired heavily by Aditya Puri, the former chairman of HDFC, who he says is easily the most inspiring leader in India. He attributed some of the traits he has developed over the years, from team building to work-life balance and institution building, he has learned from Aditya Puri.
