Niki.ai’s new Messenger bot lets you hail cabs and order snacks in India

Mobile payments startup Niki launched its Facebook Messenger bot today.

With an Android app and now Nikibot, Niki helps people in India hail a cab, order food, and pay for laundry or the electricity bill, among other things.

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Niki lets users pay for services directly in chat via PayTM without having to leave Facebook Messenger.

“Our payment is powered by both PayTM and PayU,” said Shishir Modi, one of Niki’s four cofounders. “Through PayTM, we are powering the first of its kind in-chat payment option which allows the users to complete the entire transaction without leaving chat or the messenger ecosystem. With PayU, its a link based payment system to pay using credit card, debit card and internet banking.”

Since the company was founded last year, Niki has earned an audience of 75,000 Android users and hired 25 employees. It currently processes more than 20,000 transactions a day for brands like Burger King, Uber, and 45 other companies.

Niki.ai was founded in May 2015. The company is part of FbStart, Facebook’s program to provide up to $80,000 in free resources to promising startups.

Investments of undisclosed value were made by Unilazer Ventures and Ratan Tata to help the company work with more businesses.