Eko India Financial Services Pvt. Ltd. is an Indian fintech company, servicing the

State Bank of India State Bank of India (SBI) is an Indian Multinational corporation, multinational Public sector undertakings in India, public sector bank and financial service body headquartered in Mumbai. It is the largest bank in India with a 23% market shar ...

(SBI),

ICICI Bank ICICI Bank Limited is an Indian multinational bank and financial services company headquartered in Mumbai with a registered office in Vadodara. It offers a wide range of banking and financial services for corporate and retail customers throu ...

, and

Yes Bank Yes Bank (stylised as YES BANK) is an Indian private sector bank, headquartered in Mumbai, catering to retail customers, MSMEs, and corporate clients. The bank was founded by Rana Kapoor and Ashok Kapur in 2003. Its network is spread across 3 ...

, and provides banking services and mobile banking. With Bharti

AXA Axa S.A. is a French multinational insurance corporation headquartered in the 8th arrondissement of Paris. It also provides investment management and other financial services via its subsidiaries. As of 2024, it is the fourth largest financi ...

Life Insurance Company, it provides Bharti AXA Life - Bachat Bima, micro-insurance policies. It was established by 2 brothers Abhishek and Abhinav Sinha and two others in 2007. It allows low-wage immigrants workers in the Indian urban areas to remit money to their homes using mobile phones.

History

Based on the recommendations of the Khan Commission, the

Reserve Bank of India Reserve Bank of India, abbreviated as RBI, is the central bank of the Republic of India, and regulatory body responsible for regulation of the Indian banking system and Indian rupee, Indian currency. Owned by the Ministry of Finance (India), Min ...

, in its 2005-2006 policy year introduced the concept of 'Business Correspondents' to enhance

financial inclusion Financial inclusion is the availability and equality of opportunities to access financial services. It refers to processes by which individuals and businesses can access appropriate, affordable, and timely financial products and services—which ...

in the Indian banking sector. At the time co-founder Abhishek Sinha, a graduate of BIT Mesra, was working with

Mahindra Satyam Mahindra Satyam (formerly Satyam Computer Services Limited) was an Indian information technology (IT) services company based in Hyderabad, India, offering software development, system maintenance, packaged software integration and engineering ...

, and was involved in developing a

mobile commerce The term mobile commerce was originally coined in 1997 by Kevin Duffey at the launch of the Global Mobile Commerce Forum, to mean "the delivery of electronic commerce capabilities directly into the consumer’s hand, anywhere, via wireless techno ...

application for a foreign company. Eventually inspired by a similar program in Brazil,

M-Pesa M-PESA (M for mobile, ''PESA'' is Swahili language, Swahili for money) is a mobile banking, mobile phone-based money transfer service, payments and Micro-finance, micro-financing service, launched in 2007 by Vodafone and Safaricom, the largest ...

model in Kenya where Vodafone-enabled subscribers send cash to other phone users by SMS,

Globe Telecom Globe Telecom, Inc., commonly shortened as Globe, is a major provider of telecommunications services in the Philippines. The company operates one of the largest mobile, fixed-line and broadband networks in the Philippines. As of November 2023, ...

and

Smart Communications Smart Communications Inc., commonly referred to as Smart, is a wholly owned wireless communications and digital services subsidiary of PLDT Inc., a telecommunications and digital services provider based in the Philippines. As of November ...

, both in the Philippines, Abhishek Sinha with brother Abhinav Sinha launched Eko in September 2007 with $0.5 million donated by family and friends as a financial service company providing peer-to-peer money transfers, cash deposits and withdrawal, wage and salary payments, micro-insurance, and micro-credit facilities to individuals through small neighbourhood shops, which became their

banking agent A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. As ba ...

s. Eko planned to tie up with Centurion Bank of Punjab in 2008, to open accounts, which fell through after the latter merged with HDFC Bank, and the company hit a rough patch.

Bill Gates William Henry Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American businessman and philanthropist. A pioneer of the microcomputer revolution of the 1970s and 1980s, he co-founded the software company Microsoft in 1975 with his childhood friend ...

visited the

Uttam Nagar Uttam Nagar is a suburb situated in West Delhi. Uttam Nagar has the Pincode 110059.{{Cite web, title=Uttam Nagar S.O Pin Code 110059 West Delhi Delhi, url=https://pincodeindiafinder.in/p/uttam-nagar-so-110059-west-delhi-delhi.html, access-date=2 ...

, New Delhi situated mobile banking project of Eko, in November 2008. In March 2009 it received a "grant funding" of $1.78 million from CGAP Technology Program which is housed within the

World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and Grant (money), grants to the governments of Least developed countries, low- and Developing country, middle-income countries for the purposes of economic development ...

and co-funded by

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation The Gates Foundation is an American private foundation founded by Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates. Based in Seattle, Washington, it was launched in 2000 and is reported to be the third largest charitable foundation in the world, holding $ ...

. In February 2009,

(SBI), the largest state-owned banking and financial services company in India, appointed Eko Aspire Foundation as its official business correspondent, which works actively in the field, while its Eko India Financial Services provides technological and non-technological support to the former. Thus around October 2009, with another grant from CGAP Eko started operations with the launch of 'SBI Mini Savings Bank Account' at

New Delhi New Delhi (; ) is the Capital city, capital of India and a part of the Delhi, National Capital Territory of Delhi (NCT). New Delhi is the seat of all three branches of the Government of India, hosting the Rashtrapati Bhavan, New Parliament ...

on 23 February 2009, this allowed account holders to carry out financial transactions like deposit and withdrawal from their accounts through their mobile phones at various SBI Eko Customer Service Points, like local

grocery store A grocery store ( AE), grocery shop or grocer's shop ( BE) or simply grocery is a retail store that primarily retails a general range of food products, which may be fresh or packaged. In everyday US usage, however, "grocery store" is a synon ...

s, stationery stores, petrol pumps, PCOs and pharmaceutical shops in far flung villages of

Bihar Bihar ( ) is a states and union territories of India, state in Eastern India. It is the list of states and union territories of India by population, second largest state by population, the List of states and union territories of India by are ...

and

Jharkhand Jharkhand (; ) is a States and union territories of India, state in East India, eastern India. The state shares its border with the states of West Bengal to the east, Chhattisgarh to the west, Uttar Pradesh to the northwest, Bihar to the north ...

and Delhi, where the low-wage people rarely have access to a banking system. Meanwhile, it also tied up with

, which started a ''Apna Savings Account'' scheme. In April 2012, Eko was appointed by Yes Bank as a Business Correspondent to provide domestic money transfer services. The services went live in June 2012. By January 2016, Eko had grown to manage ₹200 crore (₹20 million, or $30 million) among 1.1 million clients. Today it services 180,000 users through a network of 700 ''branches'' (

s) through "Customer Service Points" (CSP), located in neighborhood grocery and pharmacy stores. It has locations in

Delhi NCR The National Capital Region (NCR; ) is a region centred upon the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi in India. It encompasses Delhi and several districts surrounding it from the states of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Rajasthan. The NCR and ...

, six districts of

and one district of

state.

References

{{Reflist

External links

Eko India Financial Services, website

Leaders of Tomorrow: Eko India Financial Services
at ''

The Economic Times ''The Economic Times'' is an Indian English-language business-focused daily newspaper. Owned by The Times Group, ''The Economic Times'' began publication in 1961 and it is sold in all major cities in India. As of 2012, it is the world's secon ...

'' Financial services companies based in Delhi Indian companies established in 2007 State Bank of India ICICI Bank Financial services companies established in 2007 2007 establishments in Delhi

History

See also

References

External links