- Cantaloupe, Inc., former USA Technologies Inc., is an American company, whose patents range from payment processing, transaction methods, and terminal connection methods to energy management and telematics.
- The ePort Connect, Cantaloupe’s primary product, wirelessly facilitates electronic payment options to consumers with credit, debit, or NFC-enabled electronic wallets like Apple Pay and Google Pay while providing operators with both telemetry and machine-to-machine (M2M) services.
- Ravi Venkatesan was named chief executive officer and a member of the board of directors at Cantaloupe in September 2022 and has led the company by driving innovation with new product introductions, streamlining the business and building a strategic initiative to broaden the company’s product offerings globally.
Cantaloupe, Inc., former USA Technologies Inc., is an American company known for its work with ePort cashless acceptance technology running on its patented ePort Connect service, a PCI-compliant service.
Proxy battles of USA Technologies
USA Technologies was founded in 1992 and holds more than 87 patents on its products and services. Its patents range from payment processing, transaction methods, and terminal connection methods to energy management and telematics.
There were currently over 250,000 connections to its ePort Connect Service. The company was named in Deloitte L.L.P. ‘s 2014 Technology Fast 500 List of the fastest-growing companies in North America. The Nilson Report ranked USA Technologies 6th in the US (and 28th worldwide) in POS shipments, and they received the 2014 Frost & Sullivan North American Customer Value Leadership Award in Financial Services and Retail M2M Communications.
In 2010, a proxy fight for the company’s board of directors took place with shareholder group SAVE Partners. This proxy fight ended with the addition of two SAVE Board candidates and the modification of company policies.
In 2012, there was another proxy fight involving SAVE, but this dispute resulted in no change to the board.
USA Technologies’ CEO George Jensen was suspended on 4 October 2011, after he was revealed to be posting company information to an investor board and resigned two weeks later.
Stephen Herbert was appointed as CEO and held that position until he stepped down in 2019 due to the “start of a proxy battle brought by its largest investor”, Hudson Executive Capital.
USA Technologies announced its name change to Cantaloupe, Inc. on 19 April 2021.
The outstanding ePort for self-service consumption
The ePort Connect, Cantaloupe’s primary product, wirelessly facilitates electronic payment options to consumers with credit, debit, or NFC-enabled electronic wallets like Apple Pay and Google Pay while providing operators with both telemetry and machine-to-machine (M2M) services.
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As a cashless payment terminal for vending machines, kiosks, and POS terminals, the different series of ePort accepts magnetic swipe cards and contactless cards, FOB, PIN, and virtual wallets such as Apple Pay and Softcard. It features an inclusive system for providing remote audits, cashless payment, and interactive transaction capabilities in a vending machine.
Therefore, the ePort technology is primarily found in vending machines, kiosks and point-of-sale (POS) terminals, but the ePort Online and ePort Mobile products have extended the network to accept recurring payments from a PC or retail outlets and the taxi industry through smartphone devices.
In 2010, the ePort EDGE won the National Automatic Merchandising Association (NAMA) award for innovation in cashless vending technology.
Specific to vending machines, Cantaloupe holds over a dozen patents and has maintained partnerships with MasterCard Worldwide, Dr. Pepper/Seven Up, Kodak, ZiLOG, CineMachine, MEI, and Wurlitzer, among others The company has been ranked several times among the leading shippers of point-of-sale terminals by The Nilson Report, a source of news and research on consumer payment systems worldwide.
In February this year, Cantaloupe acquired Cheq Lifestyle Technology to expand its product range into solutions for sports venues, entertainment venues, festivals, hotels, theme parks, and full-service and fast casual restaurants.
Ravi’s leadership towards broader services
Ravi Venkatesan was named chief executive officer and a member of the board of directors at Cantaloupe in September 2022, after serving as chief operating officer starting in February 2022 and as chief technology officer from December 2020.
He graduated from Bangalore University with a degree in electronics and went through a post-graduate program in finance and information management from the Management Development Institute.
Earlier in his career, he spent 6 years as a consulting leader with Accenture, deploying large-scale Enterprise systems for Fortune 100 clients. Later, he served as the vice president of information technology strategy and delivery at Cbeyond for 4 years, deploying PaaS products to power Cloud and Communications for SMBs.
He spent 6 years at Bridge2 Solutions developing industry-leading loyalty SaaS products and 1 year at BAKKT driving innovation in cryptocurrency and loyalty consumer wallets.
As the head of innovation at Bakkt, He held the dual roles of chief technology officer and chief product officer at Bridge2 Solutions, preceding its sale to ICE, the parent company of Bakkt.
As a proven leader with extensive expertise in product development, information systems, software development and program management, Ravi brings more than 20 years of experience in driving innovative change within technology environments.
Since his debut as CEO of Cantaloupe, he has been responsible for leadership of the company’s architecture, development, network and business operations, product teams, as well as customer success.
And he has led the company by driving innovation with new product introductions, streamlining the business and building a strategic initiative to broaden the company’s product offerings globally. Specialising in driving corporate strategy, operational excellence, and cross-functional alignment, Ravi is driving breakthrough revenue growth.
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With micropayment processing, enterprise cloud software, IoT technology, and point of sale innovations, Cantaloupe empowers businesses of all sizes to provide self-service experiences for consumers, keeping them ahead of the adoption curve, meeting them on location, partnering with them to grow in new markets, and helping them reach new customers.
Ravi and Cantaloupe’s leadership will be committed to executing a bold vision to develop the most advanced products and services in the market, succeeding through innovation and efficiency that truly embodies the culture, values and slogan of Cantaloupe.
