Atlas
Back to Payments
Strategic Advisor·Payments

Paresh Patel

Founder and CEO at PayRange

Portland, Oregon, USA

PP
LinkedIn
Why they matter

Two-time vending-payments founder now consolidating the category via PayRange's 2025 KioSoft acquisition — a firsthand view of unattended-retail payments M&A.

Background

Paresh Patel is the founder and CEO of PayRange, a Portland-based mobile payments company that lets consumers pay at vending machines, laundry rooms, and other unattended retail equipment via smartphone. A serial vending-industry entrepreneur, he previously founded Courtesy Vending as a teenager and later founded VendScreen, a touchscreen vending payment company, before starting PayRange in 2013. He holds an MBA from the University of Washington and a PhD from Capella University, and holds 45+ patents in unattended-retail payment technology.

Notable deals

  • 2013
    Founded VendScreen and launched successor company VendNext, an Android touchscreen payment platform for vending machines
  • 2014
    Raised $2.75M seed round for PayRange from PayPal co-founder Max Levchin and ex-Google Payments head Osama Bedier
  • 2015
    Closed $12M Series A for PayRange led by Matrix Partners, adding ex-Square exec Jared Fliesler to the board
  • 2025
    Led PayRange's acquisition of rival KioSoft Technologies, consolidating the unattended-retail cashless payments market under his leadership

Call-prep brief

Paresh Patel — Founder & CEO, PayRange

Background

  • Lifelong vending-industry operator: founded Courtesy Vending at 17, built it into one of the largest vending operators in the Pacific Northwest.
  • Founded VendScreen (2011), a touchscreen vending payment company, before starting PayRange in 2013 after a personal frustration paying for air at a gas station.
  • MBA (University of Washington), PhD (Capella University); holds 45+ patents in unattended-retail payment tech.

Current focus

  • Leading PayRange following its December 2025 acquisition of KioSoft Technologies, combining two of the largest cashless-payment platforms serving vending, laundry, and micro-market machines (8M+ app users, 500K+ machines, 10,000+ operators).
  • Integrating KioSoft's 285 employees and IoT/cashless tech stack; Charles Lee (former KioSoft president) becomes Vice Chairman with a significant ownership stake.

What he cares about

  • Eliminating cash/coin as a "payment barrier" in self-service retail — his stated founding thesis for PayRange.
  • IP leverage: PayRange and KioSoft were prior patent-litigation adversaries (2024 settlement, up to $62M licensing deal) before merging.

Potential sensitivities

  • Financial terms of the KioSoft deal were not disclosed — he may be guarded on valuation/integration specifics.
  • Past patent litigation with KioSoft could make him cautious discussing competitive dynamics in the space.

Questions to ask

  1. How is the KioSoft integration progressing, and what's the combined entity's go-to-market strategy?
  2. What's the total addressable market left to convert from coin to mobile/cashless payments in unattended retail?
  3. Given the prior patent dispute, how defensible is PayRange's IP position against new entrants?

Outreach draft

Subject
Unattended-retail payments: quick call?
Hi Paresh, I came across PayRange's recent acquisition of KioSoft and wanted to reach out. We're a deal team evaluating opportunities in payments and merchant acquiring, and your vantage point building — and now consolidating — the cashless payments category for vending, laundry, and micro-markets would be extremely valuable to us. Would you be open to a 20-30 minute call in the next couple of weeks? We'd love to hear your perspective on where unattended-retail payments is headed, how the KioSoft integration is going, and what you're seeing from operators and competitors alike. Happy to work around your schedule. Best, [Placeholder Name]

Sources