Fintechs, banks can thrive on collaborative basis: Kotak Mahindra Bank's Shanti Ekambaram

The whole-time director of Kotak Mahindra Bank further added that, in India, unlike in the rest of the world, banks have moved forward on the experience side significantly.

"If you look at the leading private sector banks, including Kotak Mahindra Bank, they have all worked on the technology front end, and moving the experience factor for customers significantly by making investments," she said.

Ekambaram added that any fintech which is into the data science and analytics space will work with banks that have large consumer bases.

Also read: Kotak Bank open to acquisitions if value accretive, says Ekambaram

"Similarly, somebody who has a great account opening experience will work with banks, because you know, the banking customers don't have a licence, and so on and so forth," she added.

What other bankers say

Shanti Ekambaram’s is not a lone voice. Other bankers, while speaking at various events in the past, had echoed her views. On September 6, Amitabh Chaudhry, chief executive officer and managing director of Axis Bank, while speaking at the Global Fintech Festival in Mumbai, had said that a collaborative model between banks and fintech companies is a must for the overall growth of the financial sector.

"Fintechs do not have the business reach like banks and banks do not have the tech facility like fintechs. Hence, collaboration is the model both institutions need to work on," Chaudhry said.

Additionally, collaboration is coming in rapidly as both institutions understand the new developments in the industry, he said.

BharatPe chairman Rajnish Kumar believes that, in the future, banks will become like fintechs and fintechs like banks, highlighting the pace of changes that India's banking and payments space is going through.

He was speaking at Moneycontrol's Startup Conclave on July 7. Kumar said fintechs are rewriting rules for innovation and have advantages over banks in the payments ecosystem.

"Banks have advantages over fintechs in some spaces but nowadays, customers are likely to use payment systems operated by fintech companies," Kumar said.