Prague-based
payments infrastructure startup Tapaya has raised €1 million in a pre-seed
funding round led by Passion Capital, with co-lead participation from Depo Ventures and follow-on investment from BADideas.fund.
Founded
in 2025 by Laura Ďorďová, Roman Kuchařík, and Petr Zahradník, Tapaya is
developing infrastructure that enables banks, fintechs, and software platforms
to integrate in-person payment acceptance directly into their applications. The
company is already working on integrations in the Czech Republic and expanding
partnerships across Central and Eastern Europe and the Baltics.
In-person
payments continue to rely heavily on dedicated hardware terminals, creating
cost and operational complexity for merchants and software providers. Embedding
payment functionality into platforms such as POS systems, ERP software, or
kiosks remains a lengthy and resource-intensive process due to certification
requirements and fragmented infrastructure.
Tapaya
addresses this by consolidating compliance, certification, and processor
integrations into a single software layer. Its platform allows developers to
enable payment acceptance across Android, iOS, and other commercial devices,
effectively turning standard hardware into payment terminals and removing the
need for dedicated devices.
By simplifying integration and reducing reliance on
third parties, the company aims to shorten implementation timelines from months
to days.
Commenting
on the company’s approach, co-founder and CEO Laura Ďorďová said:
We want
accepting payments to be as simple as turning on a light. For decades, it has
meant relying on a piece of hardware, buying it, carrying it, connecting it,
and reconciling it separately. Merchants are tired of that complexity.
The
system is designed to comply with evolving standards set by the PCI Security
Standards Council, including the PCI MPoC framework, which enables secure card
acceptance on commercial devices. By abstracting these requirements into a
single integration, Tapaya allows partners to offer in-person payments without
building their own certification infrastructure.
The
funding will be used to complete Tapaya’s PCI MPoC certification and further
develop its in-house technology, while supporting the expansion of its partner
network across Europe.