Global Startup Cities Podcast: FinMapp’s financial ecosystem

Victor Swezey 0:04
Hello and welcome to a special edition of the buzz, a bank automation news podcast. Today is July 27 2023. My name is Victor Swezey, and I’m the editorial intern at Bank Automation News. Today is the third episode of our global startup cities series, where we take you to some of the most innovative tech hubs around the world to give you a look at these startup cultures and the markets they serve. Along the way, we’ll be talking to FinTech founders from new cities about the products they’re bringing to market. This week, we’ll be making a stop in Bengaluru, India’s lush garden city and buzzing tech capital will follow Bengaluru growth from IoT hub to full fledged startup ecosystem and compare it to the developing entrepreneurial culture in the capital of Delhi. Joining me today is the founder and CEO of FinMapp, a startup partnering with financial institutions to bring financial literacy to India’s growing middle class. Please welcome Kumar Binit.Kumar Binit 1:04
My name is Kumar Binit. I’m the founder and CEO of FinMapp. It’s a Fintech startup on a personal finance management space. As far as my background is concerned, I’m from the banking industry worked over two decades in multinational banks, in various locations in India, starting from Mumbai, to Bangalore to eastern side to Northern side in Delhi. And over the two decades of experience, whatever I’ve learned, being a banker, and the pain points, which normally a common working population faces in managing the day to day finances, is where we thought those experiences will come into the picture and we’ll be able to solve the problem of financial literacy which is not only an Indian problem, but a global problems even in the developed country like US or Europe have the financial literacy issue, right. And India specifically the financial literacy rate in India is probably less than 20% Among the Indian working population, and into which a lot of common people faces day to day challenges in managing their personal finance. That is the reason why a fin map came into existing existence, we just launched fin map around eight months back. And currently we’re expanding

Victor Swezey 2:25
to tell me a bit more about how food Map Works and you know, what tools does it provide users for tracking their financial health?

Kumar Binit 2:33
So, if you see personal finance management is categorized into four core sector which is planning budgeting, savings and investing right now, most of the people what happens so, just to give you a little bit of idea in terms of Indian household income, and India, how the markets is that top is that you know, say probably 40 million people in India belongs to a high income bracket right for example, earning probably you know $100,000 plus right, which is and but there is a huge middle class segment and India right, where people earn anywhere between you know, $1,000 to say 10,000 to $50,000. Now, these are the, this this segment is what we call as a middle class segment, and around 440 million people, you know, currently is within that segment. Now, in case if they want to take personal finance advice or take a financial advisor on board, it costs money right. Now, most of these people trust their parents for their work advisors or their close friends and families right, but those, but those hamper the decision making process, the reason why is whatever advice this they are taking from the parents from the friends and families are based on their own gut feel, and their own, you know, experience and that financial product, right. So, that is why we caught you know, fan map as a tools and services what we are offering as any user can do the entire financial planning, financial health check as to what they are doing is right or wrong, they can do the entire tax planning, they can get all the recommendations and advice on all the retail financial products, which is available in within the banking circle in India. They can get their real time, you know, portfolio tracking. So, all these tools and services are provided free of cost, you know, people can take and it’s on a real time basis. It’s run by, you know, a logarithm machine intelligence and AI right. Now, along with that tools and services. What we have also provided is all the retail financial products under one umbrella so that when people do their financial planning, take recommendations and advices from us that if and actually help capture they can do once the report is generated, you know, they have to take an action in order to, you know, to ensure their financial well being and the security of the families right. Now, when they take an action, we have all the retail financial products to help them to do it seamlessly. So you can call it fin map as a full financial ecosystem in one app. And that is what funnel map is all about.

Victor Swezey 5:24
I see. So if you provide this financial ecosystem, you know, free of charge to your to your users, what’s the business model? And where does the revenue come from?

Kumar Binit 5:34
Alright, so business model is basically so any transaction which is done by our users through my app, or if they buy any product based on our recommendations based on their financial planning based on their, you know, financial health check, right, whatever critic apps actions they do, and whatever product they buy, we have partnered with more than 40 banks and financial institutions in India offering more than 200 financial products across various retail financial products available in India. So whenever they transact, we don’t charge anything from the user. You know, but the banking and the financial institutions whom we have tied up with, they pay a certain percentage of commission on the transaction value. And that’s how fun map one of the revenue models often map as

Victor Swezey 6:18
I see, and I see the some of your partners include, you know, HDFC Bank. And

Kumar Binit 6:25
so as I said, we have more than 40 Plus banking and financial institutions, including the leading banks, and and ICSA, HDFC, IDFC. Bank, then we have all the all the asset management companies, people who are offering cards, Amex is one of them, which is already there in our app. So we have all the sub sectors of a FinTech industry covered under one umbrella, whether you require for a wealth tech, whether you’re you require it for lending tech, whether you require it for insurance, all insurance products are available. So that’s how it is currently,

Victor Swezey 7:05
you know, given your experience in the in the banking sector, how would you say that this banking landscape in India differs from the one that our users might be more familiar with in, in the US

Kumar Binit 7:17
banking landscape, I’m saying the banking landscape might be more or less similar to the US, right? But the way the product is offered to the end consumers is where through the technology is where, you know, probably you can differentiate, that’s that’s a good differentiation between Indian and the US banking approach towards towards the consumers. So, you know, and for example, if you see LM there, it’s more of a problem oriented approach, we take into hands where, you know, many Indian startups focus on solving local problems, you know, addressing the needs of the Indian population. Secondly, you know, if you see, if I compare with US and India, while the United States has a more mature startup ecosystem, India’s startup scene has gained prominence in probably recent years, due to these unique factors like collaborative ecosystem, venture capital funding offices of venture capital, family offices, rising middle class and digital penetration initiative taken by the government of India, diversity and talent load, which is which is, which is also dependent upon the first class education institutions we have. So, all these things put together, I guess that is where, you know, we see a combination of problem oriented approach. Our diverse talent balloon, a government support a growing consumer market, is what differentiates between the US startup ecosystem and the Indian ecosystem startups. It’s,

Victor Swezey 8:47
it’s fascinating, and do you think that this growing startups ecosystem is part of, you know, what’s created the market for fin map and the market for people you know, who require financial literacy tools? And what do you think that the impact of an increase in financial literacy could be on the Indian population?

Kumar Binit 9:06
See, the impact of financial literacy is somehow you can see it, you can you can see it on the data of the Indian working populations. Now, for example, you know, because of this low financial literacy rate, you will be astonished to hear that 80% of the Indian working population still don’t plan for their financial future. Right? They don’t invest in financial assets, you know, real estate and gold was a traditional way of investing. My father’s forefathers have invested in real estate and gold but they have never looked into various other investment opportunities, which is there in India and still 90% of the Indian working population still don’t invest in financial assets. You know, you know, probably more than 80% pay their medical bills from savings, they don’t have adequate insurance, you know, and probably, you know, more than 50% are not aware of the cop As required for retirement. So, you know the the statistics itself tells that you know, in case if we are able to increase the financial literacy problem in India, right or financial literacy rate in India, all these figures will come down and once these figures will come down it will help us in achieving a trillion dollar economic which we are invoicing and messaging. So, it gives an overall macroeconomic situation of India will improve considerably

Victor Swezey 10:30
understood. So, you know, returning to India’s startup scene, I think a lot of people associate Indian startups with Bengaluru and you know, its reputation as the Silicon Valley of Asia. Could you maybe walk our listeners through how Bengaluru became this startup hub? What the startup scene the develop there is? And, you know, where, where maybe where it’s going today?

Kumar Binit 10:55
All right, I mean, say for example, I mean, everybody knows that Bangalore is now called as a Silicon Valley finisher. And it can be attributed to various factors, you know, including the emergence of companies like Infosys and Wipro in the 1980s. The liberalization of Indian economy and the subsequent development in the 21st century, which has happened. So, for example, you know, I just mentioned Infosys and Wipro in the 1980s you know, Bangalore had become the birthplace of these two Indian leading IT services companies. And these companies were founded by Indian enterpreneurs focused on software development and IT services, their success chakra asked bangaloreans potential as a technology help and laid the foundations of city’s growth in the IT sector, liberalisation of Indian economy, you know, added of you to the file. And that’s how, you know, development of all the technology parks, the government initiative, like special economic zones, office spaces, infrastructure, electronic city, you know, all these initiatives and amenities provided a collaborative ecosystem for the technology companies to operate and thrive. And that’s how Bangalore came into existence. And along with that, obviously, because the education system in India is so robust, and there are very superior education institutions, like you know, and the bad ideas, you know, Indian Institutes of science etc, which is based out of Bangalore, you know, the talent pool just kept on growing, and it’s not about the growth of the talent pool also, it is about sharing the knowledge. So, if you see banglori, Bangalore, Bangalore is probably, you know, the hub of various, you know, accelerators, program, incubation programs for the startups and mentorship program for the startups and it is also backed by the government of Karnataka. So, that’s how, you know, the Bangalore, Bangalore came into existence in the world, global worldspace as a Silicon Valley of Asia.

Victor Swezey 13:00
Thank you so much for walking us through that history. I think that’s really informative for our listeners, and you compare maybe being based in Delhi, but you know, I believe you’re about to open an office in Bangalore and you compare the startup scenes there a bit that tell me what it’s like to be an entrepreneur in Delhi and you know, maybe how what similarities and what differences exist between those two, which I know Delhi, you know, some are saying that now Delhi startup scene is growing really fast too and it’s almost comparable to Bengaluru. So, can you maybe compare those two cities? Yeah. So,

Kumar Binit 13:33
probably if you see, if you see the history of investments, which has happened in startup in India, specifically in Bangalore tops, the second comes to Delhi right. And obviously, if you compare the startup ecosystem or the culture probably you know, Bangalore were the pioneers of that and Bangalore is currently the number one, but in comparison to Delhi, if you see the Bangalore and the Delhi comparison, if you see I can you know, there are three prominent you know, the comparison which can look at it Bangalore as a wretched talent pool, right, that is for sure, in terms of educations and institutions and you know, the learning or the even the basic education is on the learning which normally happens in Bangalore, the startup ecosystem culture, the environment, the diversity, which Bangalore has probably Delhi is yet to see that but it is still coming up to that ladder. So, you know, probably, I can see, five years down the line probably, you know, Bangalore and Delhi will be one comparative cities to look at it. The Delhi has proven over the last two, three years that they are catching up very soon, but the Bangalore City as such.

Victor Swezey 14:50
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