Temasek-backed Nium to acquire travel payments company Ixaris for potentially £15m

CROSS-BORDER payments platform Nium has signed a definitive agreement to fully acquire London-based travel payments player Ixaris. The cash consideration for the deal is £15 million (S$28 million), regulatory filings show. The transaction is expected to close in Q3 this year.

Ixaris provides funding and payment methods that help airlines and online travel agents (OTAs) reduce surcharges, earn rebates, flatten foreign exchange fees and streamline reconciliation.

Its platform allows companies to more efficiently handle payments with leisure hospitality and travel providers in different countries.

Ixaris was Singapore-based Nium's customer for three years. Prajit Nanu, co-founder and chief executive of Nium, told The Business Times that Nium wants to tap the significant pent-up demand for travel triggered by the pandemic.

"The whole travel industry has not been doing much because they've been constantly observing how Covid-19 plays out. This is such an incredible time to start creating innovative solutions for them to either reduce cost or increase revenue. And that's what Ixaris is at the forefront of," he said.

The acquisition will strengthen Nium's business-to-business offering that it has been beefing up as it pursues an initial public offering in the US, Mr Nanu added. Nium's payments infrastructure lets companies collect and disburse funds in local currencies to over 100 countries, using a single application programming interface. It also offers card issuance.

With Ixaris' integration into the infrastructure, travel players could manage their cross-border payments more efficiently. For instance, a travel agent in Mexico could send money locally to a bank account in peso, and Ixaris immediately issues a virtual card that the agent can use to make payments to an overseas hotel operator. In contrast, a typical crossborder bank transfer can take two to three days.

Ixaris introduced Europe's first virtual prepaid card in 2003. Today, it offers cards in 24 currencies and issued more than 10 million virtual cards in 2019.

Since its inception, it has processed 24 million transactions for over 200 customers in more than 40 countries, for a total payment volume of £5 billion. It shares some of its income from card fees with travel agents.

Ixaris was impacted by pandemic-induced border closures, but its business was on an upward trajectory prior to that, said chairman Spencer Hanlon.

The company processed £2.8 billion of payments in 2019 after bringing on board large distribution partners, growing from £1.4 billion in 2018 and £800 million in 2018.

Ixaris is a preferred partner of two operators of global distribution systems that handle 80 per cent of the world's travel volume, said Mr Hanlon.

The company intends to launch in Q3 in the US, where Nium has set its sights on building its presence ahead of a public listing. Ixaris' 86 employees based in London and Malta will join Nium's staff pool of 500 people.

Nium, which received funding from Temasek, Visa and Vertex Ventures, has also signed a term sheet with an entity in India authorised by the central bank to deal in foreign exchange for specified purposes. Nium currently has approval for cross-border payments, but does not own its own licence.

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