Cross-Border Payments: Building an Independent Sector Thesis

Yajur developed a sector thesis on cross-border payments and outward remittances in India as part of his research work at Warmup Ventures. The starting point was a thematic research brief on the segment, but the conviction he built went beyond what the brief required.

He began by mapping the incumbent landscape. Outward remittances in India were dominated by banks and money transfer operators charging layered, opaque fees with no transparent fixed-fee model. Consumer experience reviews for these players were consistently negative, particularly around refund policies and failed transaction handling.

To identify the most actionable white space, Yajur segmented the market across B2B, B2C, and P2P use cases. He concluded that the highest-conviction opportunity was in the SME and freelancer segment, a market that had grown structurally because of the post-COVID shift toward remote work and cross-border employment. This segment had high transaction frequency, strong need for transparent pricing, and was being systematically underserved by incumbent players.

His thesis was that a new-age player offering a fixed-fee model would have strong adoption potential with this segment. He reached out to senior industry executives to pressure-test his views on where the real growth sub-segments within cross-border payments lay.

The consensus view in the VC community at the time was skeptical of fintech players without full regulatory approval. Yajur's view was that the right player, with the right model and a clear path to licensing, would find strong product-market fit once operational. One specific player he had focused on faced significant funding challenges at the time but later secured the requisite licenses, demonstrated strong growth, and became one of the more prominent startups in the space.