Mobile payments company Paydiant picks up $7.6M

A new mobile payments company, Paydiant, announced today that it has received $7.6 million in first round funding, led by North Bridge Venture Partners and General Catalyst Partners. The Boston, Mass.-based startup says the funding will go into product development and sales and marketing.

Paydiant is still in stealth mode but is planning to launch officially later this year. According to a press release, the company is focused on a cellphone-based payments solution for everyday purchases. That’s not saying much, besides the fact that they are entering a pretty competitive marketplace.

However, the company’s three founders (who were not available for interviews), Chris Gardner, Kevin Laracey and Joe Paratore all have experience in the field. All three have worked in various roles for Edocs, an online billing company which Laracey co-founded, and which was acquired by Siebel Systems in 2005. Gardner and Paratore both worked at m-Qube, an SMS mobile payments company that was acquired by Verisign in 2006.

Jim Moran from North Bridge and John Simon from General Catalyst are also taking seats on Paydiant’s board of directors.

Even if Paydiant is—for now—describing its plan in pretty broad strokes, previous track record shows that the team has plenty of entrepreneurial experience, and could come up with something interesting in the mobile payments sector. Watch this space.