In the case of the banking and financial sector, there has been an emergence of Fintech companies that can contribute to innovation. Individual banks are collaborating with specific Fintechs to get new systems designed, developed and deployed. The difficulty in such a process is that each bank has to put in efforts to identify the right fintech partners. The difficulty the Fintech faces is that it has to knock on the doors of several banks not only for showcasing their product but also to develop the right product as there could be a gap in their understanding of requirements of banks.

It is in this context that innovation contests are quite helpful. They draw, from every nook and corner of the country, innovative ideas from individuals, academic institutions, fintechs, large IT companies and banks. Realising the value of such contests, IDRBT has been organising the Annual IDRBT Banking Technology Innovation Contest (IBTIC) every year since 2016. With a view to bring out latest innovations in the area of banking technology, the Institute organised the Fourth IDRBT Banking Technology Innovation Contest (IBTIC) on April 12, 2019 at IDRBT.

This year, the contest attracted good response from across the country from start-ups, banks and IT companies. In order to ensure greater transparency and objectivity, the submissions were subjected to a rigorous screening process. An eminent jury shortlisted the Top-10 applications, which were invited for presentations.

The 10-shortlisted teams presented their innovations to the Chief Information Officers (CIO) Forum, which consists of IT Heads of various banks in India. Over ten CIOs of various public and private sector banks participated and judged the innovations during the IBTIC 2019.

Speaking on the occasion, Dr. A.S. Ramasastri, Director, IDRBT, invited the all the innovators to work closely with the Institute so as to finetune these innovations and work towards implementing them in the Banking and Financial Sector. Smt. Anjana Dube, Deputy Director General, Department of Financial Services, Ministry of Finance, Govt. of India, was the Chief Guest. Speaking on the occasion, she flagged the following key issues:

• Fintech is an exciting space with a lot happening now. We need to channelise it so that we can derive more and better benefits.
• The focus should now be on developing and moving ahead with more products.
• Exporting some of these products need to be prioritised. This will give a big boost to the home-grown solutions.
• The innovators need to focus on designing products that are not only robust but also solve problems being faced by our people.
• While focussing on innovation, it is also important that we are in tune with the regulatory norms. So, it is important that the innovators have an understanding of these norms and comply with them.
• Interfacing start-ups, academics and practitioners is essential to make a product robust. IDRBT is uniquely placed to make this happen and this strenghths of the Institute need to be leveraged for the greater good of the nation.

The Winners

The 10 shortlisted teams demonstrated their innovations to the CIOs of various banks, who assessed the presentations and rated the innovations. And the winners are:

First Prize: The innovation titled “Decision Intelligence using Satellite Big Data Analytics for Agricultural Credit Lending in India”, presented by Team Satsure consisting of Pradeen Basu and Sarvesh Kurane, from Satsure Analytics India Pvt. Ltd, won the first prize of Rs. 60,000/-.

Second Prize: The innovation titled “Unification of Core Banking Involving Retail (Finware) & Wholesale (Ubs/Fcc/Fcr) into One Single Integrated Flexcube Core Banking”, presented by Team Team IT Application Lifecycle Management consisting of Sanjay Desai, Vaibhav Samant, Gopakumar Panicker, from HDFC Bank, won the second prize of Rs. 45,000/-.

Third Prize: The innovation titled “YONO” presented by Yono Team consisting of Sandeep Ubale, S. Rama Mohana Rao, and Niraj Kumar from State Bank of India shared the third prize of Rs. 30,000/- with the innovation titled “CANDI Branch” presented by Team Application Development and Maintenance consisting of L. Sankaranarayana, Abhisek Kumar, Navin Badge, Rachita Sinha and Swarna Saras from Canara Bank

The details of this prize-winning innovations as well as all the 10 shortlisted entries, can be had from booklet published on the occasion. (Download Booklet)