Financial technology, or Fintech for short, refers to technology-enabled financial solutions. The interlinkage of finance and technology might seem like something fairly recent but has evolved over distinct eras.

The period between the Years 2015 and 2020 has seen phenomenal growth in the new start-ups. India has seen a 60% increase in FinTech investments to about $1,467 million in the first half of 2020 compared to circa $919 million for the same period in 2019.

India’s evolution as a progressive FinTech nation is due to its ability to solve for identity in the form of Aadhaar for formalization, getting everyone a bank account or equivalents (PMJDY) to store money, building scalable platform(s) to move money (IMPS, UPI, BBPS) and allowing banks and FinTech companies and wealth/insurance/ lending players also to access platforms like UPI, GSTIN, and Digi locker to innovate.

PAYTM was started by Vijay Shekhar Sharma in 2010 as just a recharge platform and then became one of the most successful mobile payment and money transfer application in India.

Recent Developments in FinTech Industry

• To facilitate innovation & enhanced reach, SEBI has relaxed the norms to allow FinTech start-ups & other entities to enter the mutual fund business.

• FinTech firms are piloting instant loan products and expanding the scope of their digital equated monthly instalment (EMI) products at offline stores, as demand for credit continues.

• Digital EMI, or ‘Buy Now Pay Later’ credit products, were largely offered offline at white-good and electronic stores.
• PhonePe has been running successful pilots around khata (digital ledger) and ATM services with kiranas as well as small and medium enterprises (SMEs).