Technology moves beyond disruption, focuses on customers now: Paisabazaar CEO

Paisabazaar.com needs no introduction today. Since its inception in 2014, the company has seen a staggering growth and has become one of the largest online marketplaces for all kinds of financial products.

In January this year, the company hit the milestone of registering annualised loan disbursal rate of $1 billion.

Moneycontrol.com spoke to Naveen Kukreja, CEO & Co-founder, Paisabazaar.com, to know more about the company’s roadmap, how technology is bolstering its exceptional journey and how, as a CEO, he is preparing to embrace “change”.

Q: How do you think technology is changing the role of a CEO today?

A: With people’s expectations from consumer brands rising rapidly due to technology innovations around them, CEOs can no longer sit on the fence and not embrace technology. If you look at the financial services industry over the last 5 to 7 years, technology has been the single most important factor that has driven change. Fintechs, digital platforms and even established and older banks are using technology to bring in ease of access, ease of buying and ease of use.

CEOs today know that innovations driven through technology and analytics will be key in increasing efficiency, bringing down costs and leading to better growth. And hence, technology today, especially for digital platforms like us, is driving strategy and business goals; and CEOs have aligned themselves with the changing times.

What challenges does this present to you in your role as a CEO?

A: Technology would continue to make financial transactions, interactions around it and the entire consumer experience extremely convenient and easy. The challenge, from financial services perspective, has been awareness around financial products and access to these products for the general population.

As far as changes through technology is concerned, all of them are being done by various participants for the benefit and convenience of consumers. In the long run, it will only strengthen the ecosystem, which is always welcome.

Q: What is one thing that you have learned from your technology team?

A: Technology has made financial services, across lending, payments, insurance and investment, much more customer-centric. And that’s a lesson technology and all people who have been part of it, have taught us - Keep the customer at the centre of everything you do, that's the only way you will grow.

Q: How does Paisabazaar.com ensure compelling value propositions for both consumers and partnering banks? Isn’t that a tough balance to maintain?

A: The best part of being a marketplace is that we do not have to choose. What’s good for consumers will always be good for our partners. Over the last 2-3 years, we have evolved from a ‘see, compare and choose’ website to a ‘matching platform’ where consumers are matched to the most suited lender or product, and this works best for everybody involved. Our consumers, through technology, are provided best-suited offers, basis their profile, and on the other hand, our partner banks are provided with relevant and eligible consumers.

Q: What are the critical business pain-points that technology addresses today at Paisabazaar?

A: We have used technology to solve three essential customer problems. First, the wide choice available at one place helps customers compare financial products on various parameters important to them. Second, the process of accessing and buying financial products has been made easy and transparent through digital, helping customers save both time and money. Third, empowering our customers to choose the right product that’s best suited to them by providing customized offers basis customer’s income, credit score, age, employment type etc.

Q: How do you see the fintech ecosystem evolving in the coming days? What will ensure success and sustainability to players?

A: Fintechs will become a more pivotal part of the industry in the next few years, and you would see a lot more integrated and deeper collaborations with banks and NBFCs. Agile and sharper fintechs that add meaningful value to partners and consumers will continue to drive the evolution. For fintechs, this is the start of the ‘hockey stick growth’, so there are bound to be some failures, but that’s part of any industry evolution cycle.

Q: What is next on roadmap for Paisabazaar?

A: While we have been the clear market leader for over two and a half years now, with an annualized loan disbursal of over Rs 10,000 crore, the size of the opportunity remains massive. Our aim is to reach 10% of the unsecured lending market; we are currently at 2%.