For those who don’t know me, I have approximately 3 decades of experience in digital media. Yes, digital media. Nothing to do with fintech. The closest I have been to fintech is as a user of many applications.
After exiting Oneindia in Feb 2019, a company I founded in 2006, I was looking to do something fresh. I had met a few entrepreneurs from the fintech space. I was in touch with Govi, Founder, Perfios for over 10 years. We discussed a few ideas. I told him I was taking a 2-month break and wanted to read up on a few things. He asked me to look into the public credit registry (PCR).
I took a 2-month break with my family. During my time off, I had decided to do something in fintech which would have a big impact in the country. I was sure about wanting to do “fintech” and “big impact” but I had absolutely no idea what!
After the break, I went to meet Govi to share my thoughts on PCR. The first thing he said was, “Keep it aside, I think you will like AA”. I dreaded that a month+ of my reading had gone down the drain in a few seconds! Instead, Govi gave me a very crisp introduction to Account Aggregators (AA).
Initial Meeting
After a few reschedulings of the meeting with Sid, when I finally went to meet him, I landed up in the wrong building. Sid came to take me to the right one. I hadn’t expected to meet anyone that tall! In all respects, everyone looks up to Sid, an intellectual asset to the country.
Sid started the conversation with the assumption I was part of the team. He went over the presentation on what AA’s goal was.
The persona of Rajni, a local vegetable vendor, and her story caught my imagination. For those who are not familiar, here’s how vegetable vendors fund their business: they take an informal loan in the morning and must repay it by evening with interest, paying interest rates ranging anywhere from 2-10% per day! The fact that account aggregators can be an enabler to help Rajni get a far cheaper loan convinced me that I wanted to play a role, however small, in this journey.
A Blockbuster Launch of Sahamati
We had to start an industry alliance (Collective) for the Account Aggregator ecosystem. Sahamati’s main task was to get all regulated financial institutions onto the AA ecosystem.
Within 25 days of joining, I had to organize the launch of Sahamati! Yes, I was nervous. I didn’t know anybody in the fintech world. Thanks to the dedicated volunteers of iSPIRT, they took care of that part. I soon realized I could start delegating each task to an iSPIRT volunteer. I just had to figure out the overall structure of the event.
We designed the banners for the event. Sahamati was very prominent all over the hall. A few hours before the event I was told “Sahamati should be less prominent in the branding”. Well too late for that, we had splashed it all over the place 😩.
The event was a grand success.
AA Outreach Campaign
Since AA is a new concept, not just in India, but the entire world, evangelization is key to the adoption of the AA framework. We have been evangelizing through workshops, FAQs and innumerable phone calls.
The first workshop was held on the following day after the launch – July 26, 2019. ICICI Bank was very gracious to host Sahamati and the attendees. The workshop was well received and after that, we held one workshop per week until December 2019.
The workshops were very insightful – for the attendees and for Sahamati. We got a good understanding of their understanding! We heard first-hand, their expectations of AA.
The workshops and phone calls became the main source for populating our Frequently Asked Questions.
Building a Relationship with Account Aggregators & Banks
In 2019, I was totally new to the Fintech entrepreneurial ecosystem. The early set of entrepreneurs knew of me, so connecting with them was far easier. I did ask Govi, will the ecosystem work with me?
But after I started getting introduced to account aggregators, touch wood, the journey has been smooth. The AAs work well with each other as a group for now; we have to see how it will transform after they launch their services commercially as competitors 🙂
In my previous life, I rarely travelled out of Bengaluru. But Sahamati required me to travel way too often, as, after all, the big financial houses are in Mumbai.
My first meeting with a bank was with ICICI Bank. I told the helpful banker, I am way too new to this. Please bring me up to speed and I got a fantastic introduction to what Banks see in AA. In a similar way, I went bank to bank (& NBFCs) and introduced myself and Sahamati.
By November 2019, the entire ecosystem was working closely with each other. We had a few in-person meetings (sounds almost like a concept now, during the pandemic times) and worked on many tasks by forming Working Groups. These groups were anchored by AAs, Banks. A lot gets done when the ecosystem collectively solves problems.
The Effect of Covid on AA
We had planned for a major event in May 2020. That obviously got hit by Covid. The month of April was slow for us as financial institutions were not designed for WFH (in view of security).
Covid fast-tracked digitization in all fields. Lending institutions would want less contact in their branches and AA would be the perfect solution for them – customers would not’ have to submit physical documents, their employees would be at less risk from meeting customers.
Demonetization helped the adoption of UPI. Covid may do the same for AA.
Grand Celebration of Year 1 with Account Aggregator Hackathon
Our young volunteer Aaryaman Vir was determined to hold an AA hackathon. When it was announced in July, we got a fantastic response. I remember Aaryaman telling me he was worried about the high traction it gained within 48 hours of the launch!
The masterclasses held during the hackathons have been super insightful. About 40 teams presented their ideas, 10 of them made it to the finals.
If the launch of Sahamati was grand, the first year anniversary was super grand, because of the hackathon.
India Needs Many More Think Tanks
Working in a not-for-profit company is a new experience for me. While I did my bit to introduce Indian languages in the digital space, I had never worked on a public good project. One has to be very committed and passionate while working on a public good project. There is a lot of responsibility on the team to deliver as millions are waiting to benefit from such a product.
I am convinced every vertical in India – education, digital media, health, infrastructure etc – needs a no-greed-no-glory think-tank to work with both the government and the private sector to take on challenges for the country.
The Year Ahead
Sahamati has delivered during the first year only because of the invisible volunteers (you don’t see them, you don’t hear them speak outside). Every think tank would benefit from such dedicated volunteers.
The next year is going to be a lot more challenging as we expect to see over 100 institutions joining the AA ecosystem.
I look forward to year 2 of Sahamati. Under the guidance of our governing council and advisors, I am confident we will be marching towards the goal of financial inclusion.
Leave a Reply