MSME-lending fintechs Loans4SME, Prest Loans, Rubique, and Vayana Network share their status updates with Sourcing Hardware, on how they will bridge the financing gap for businesses in 2019
By Mrinmoy Bhattacharjee
Loans4SME
Mumbai-based Loans4SME offers “greater” choice of cash flow-based loans relevant for MSMEs and high growth businesses. It provides six products viz unsecured business loans, invoice discounting, solar project funding, impact loans (cash flow-based loans to MSMEs operating in areas like agriculture, healthcare, education and sustainability), cross border factoring, and equipment finance.
“We have added cross border factoring and equipment finance to our products and offer benefits to a wider target group,” says the company’s founder and CEO Simmi Sareen. “While cross border factoring provides an additional working capital option to exporters, our equipment finance lenders offer to fund for capital expenditure to growing businesses, both in the form of loans and operating leases.” In 2019, she says, the company will continue to build its network of lenders to offer more capital to MSMEs. “We will be shortly launching our next-generation technology platform that will make it even easier for MSMEs to access these lenders, informs Sareen.
Prest Loans
New Delhi-based fintech NBFC Prest Loans has a “very high-end” technology-driven platform to disperse credit to small businesses and enterprises and MSME units from various sectors such as auto ancillary, textiles, education & training, food processing, etc, drawing from the tier-I and II cities. “Our technology is not dependent on geography and is highly scalable as we continue growing. We are aimed at helping the new and existing business organisations meet any financial crisis.” says the company’s CEO Ashok Mittal.
“In last two years, we have added many new features and automation of the tech platform of Prest Loans. Through the list of questionnaires in-built in the tech-driven system the correct customer profile/eligibility is assessed at the client premises. Depending on the customer profile it auto-generates the scientifically arrived amount / ROI / tenure which is communicated instantly to the client, ensuring faster turnaround time with low ROI and hassle-free loan disbursal process,” shares Mittal. He adds, “We have grown 100% in terms of loan disbursal amount, portfolio quality management, customer base, geographical coverage, product enhancement, team size, etc in comparison to last year and ensure 100% growth in current and future years.”
Vayana Network
Pune’s Vayana Network offers two major lending services: network financing and buyer-initiated payments to suppliers (BIPS), besides GST and related services. Under its network financing service, the company’s digital network enables finance B2B trade through its “simple and affordable” financing programmes. It allows access to low-cost financing with no additional investment or changes in the current process and nil or minimal collateral for growing businesses. The company’s BIPS is a buyer-led financing programme that allows access finance “at lower than market rates” to better manage working capital for reducing risk in growing business.
Apart from the metros, the company has penetrated in smaller towns such as Chak Agra in Jammu & Kashmir, Zirakpur in Punjab, Behror in Rajasthan, Murshidabad in West Bengal, Maddur in Karnataka, Pudukkottai in Tamil Nadu, and Alleppey in Kerala, informs the company’s founder & CEO, R N Iyer. “Vayana Network will take the convenience and easy access to fair-priced finance to the last tiers of the supply chain by financing the SME to MSME trade, including scoring for businesses that previously did not have access to credit using the GST and E-way bill information. We have till now focused largely on the SME to large corporate segment or mid to mid-size businesses,” he avers. The company, he informs, will increase cross-border trade finance footprint with a special focus on Indo-US and ASEAN-US corridors.
Rubique
Mumbai-based Rubique provides finance options by unsecured business loans and loan against property. Under its unsecured loans service, the company extends the loan to the self-employed, partnership, proprietorship and limited company entities on the borrower’s financial position and credit history. Under the loan against property, it lends against the mortgage of property. It offers the loan as a certain percentage of the property’s market value, usually around 40% to 60%. It considers the loan amount based on the type of property, current usage of the property and the market value of the property. The property should be fully constructed, clearly demarcated, identifiable & registered.
“Our ‘Technology Thinking’ is transforming the way credit disbursal is facilitated. Rubique’s proprietary AI-based recommendation engine and its financial matchmaking platform allow financial institutions real-time processing, instant online approvals and seamless disbursal,” says the company’s MD and CEO Manav Jeet. He adds, “The current liquidity crisis in this sector has been an eye-opener for all of us. This was an opportunity in disguise for us to reevaluate our business in terms of cost, processes and fine-tune overall model towards self-sustainability. In 2019, we will stick to business basics and will focus on self-sustenance. While we used to cater to all loan products earlier, hereon we will focus on only four product segments – credit card, personal loan, business loans (unsecured and secured) and insurance. In terms of penetration, we will expand hubs to 15 cities. As the market potential is huge, we are planning for a 4x jump in disbursal with annual revenue around Rs 145-plus crore.”
