{
  "id": 9542795,
  "title": "PhonePe plans 20,000 new hires to expand merchant network in rural India",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/24/phonepe-plans-20-000-new-hires-to-expand-merchant-network-in-rural-9542795",
  "topic": "business",
  "section": "Business",
  "published": "2026-09-24T10:44:53.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Business Recorder",
    "slug": "business-recorder",
    "url": "https://www.brecorder.com/news/40441040/phonepe-plans-20000-new-hires-to-expand-merchant-network-in-rural-india"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Digital payments platform PhonePe announced on Thursday its plan to hire an additional 20,000 on-roll sales employees over the next year. This move is part of their strategy to expand their merchant network into India's smaller towns and villages. The Walmart-backed company plans to deploy more than 5 million devices, such as smart speakers and point-of-sale terminals, within the next 12 months to increase digital payments acceptance across rural areas. This initiative follows India's National Payment Corporation of India (NPCI) decision to levy a 0.4% fee on select UPI (Unified Payments Interface) merchant transactions. A portion of these proceeds will be dedicated to expanding digital payments acceptance among small merchants in underserved regions.\n\nThe company cited the recently announced Merchant Discount Rate (MDR) framework as the reason for their long-term investment in merchant expansion. As of August, PhonePe's payments network had already surpassed 720 million registered users and over 50 million merchants.",
  "summary": "Digital payments platform PhonePe said on Thursday it plans to hire 20,000 additional on-roll sales employees over the next year as part of a push to expand its merchant network into India’s smaller towns and villages. The Walmart-backed company plans to deploy more than 5 million devices, including smart speakers and point-of-sale terminals, over the next 12 months to expand digital payments…",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 2,
    "also_reported_by": [
      {
        "outlet": "Channel News Asia",
        "title": "PhonePe plans 20,000 new hires to expand merchant network in rural India",
        "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/09/24/phonepe-plans-20-000-new-hires-to-expand-merchant-network-in-rural",
        "published": "2026-09-24T10:42:30.000Z"
      }
    ]
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}