When 60 percent of the Indian population has no access to
financial services (or no bank account), that presents both a
challenge and an opportunity. The challenge is to provide financial
services to almost 600 million people, at the lowest possible cost.
Delhi-based ekgaon technologies has achieved this feat using
technology.
The company won the Dell Small Business Excellence Award 2009,
the Stockholm GKP Challenge Award 2007, and the Nasscom Social
Innovation Honours 2010 for its accomplishments. Its co-founder and
CEO, Vijay Pratap Singh Aditya explained how they did it.
“People living in the
rural areas are not just consumers—they are also
producers,” says Aditya. “Since they are at the bottom
of the pyramid, they have genuine service requirements and this has
a lot of market potential.”
Ekgaon’s mission
Ekgaon (one village), an Information and Communication Technology
(ICT) and management services company, has a mission to use ICT to
empower lives in rural areas. It opted for financial services
first, but also plans to offer other information-related
services.
Founded in 2002 by two entrepreneurs, ekgaon partners with
microfinance institutions, NGOs, NBFCs (non-banking financial
companies), banks and insurers. The company works closely with
self-help groups. For instance, in Rajasthan, it partners with an
organization called Pedo, which in turn works with the Bank of
Baroda for microfinance services. The company has a total of 50,000
customers in India.
Why mobile?
Ekgaon chose the mobile platform and open source solutions for its
microfinance projects running in Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan. Its
application interfaces are offered in most Indian languages.
“We chose the mobile platform because of its low cost and the
value associated with voice services. Also, due to its usability,
and its technical support for maintenance in rural areas,”
says Aditya.
Using ekgaon’s solution, banks and financial institutions
can connect to their customers in rural areas using a front-end
technology solution (on the phone) called One Mobile. This is
wirelessly linked to the One MIS application on the server, which
handles portfolio management and microfinance transactions.
About Author
Brian Pereira is a veteran IT journalist based in Mumbai, India. He is currently the Editor at InformationWeek India. Brian has written several articles on consumer and enterprise technology, since 1992. He has also spoken at Forums such as Nasscom, Cloud Computing World Forum and many others. During his career he worked for reputed organizations like Times of India, Indian Express Group, Jasubhai Digital Media and Infomedia18.
More articles by Brian Pereira