WhatsLoan
WhatsLoan has leveraged a variety of technologies to empower its platform strategy of serving customer needs:
WhatsLoan believes that ‘for every borrower, there is a lender’. It sees a huge opportunity to service consumer needs for loans uniquely.
The company’s founder and CEO Timmana Gouda D says it is the main intention of the company to help borrowers to connect with lenders by use of technology. He says a loan consumer primarily wants 3 things - credible information on multiple loan choices, smart online tools to compare and quick delivery of loans from the lender of choice.” Our mission is to meet this need in the loan market with innovative technology and lending solutions to empower the loan consumer, engage loan lead sources and connect to lenders efficiently,” he adds.
LAAS: PLATFORM ON MOBILE
WhatsLoan has online platform that uses technology to empower the loan consumers for loans of choice and enable loan distributors to service the loan needs to offer an enhanced experience to consumers across locations, loan products and lenders. Timmana Gouda compares WhatsLoan to Loan as a Service, or LaaS. He also describes it as Loan in a Box System, challenging existing LOS (Loan Origination Systems), even while coworking with existing legacy LMS (Loan Management Systems) and CBS (Core Banking Systems).
The platform organizes the loan distribution in very efficient way by using technology, sales and credit tools. “We offer a loan platform on the mobile to the loan consumers for online exploration, comparison and selection for empowering the consumers to ask for being serviced for a new loan and manage an existing loan for a replacement with low-cost alternative. We have also been enabling existing conventional channels of loan distribution,” says Timmana Gouda.
TECH FOR BFSI CONSUMERS
WhatsLoan has built a technology for BFSI consumers to find the most suitable lender by using digital infrastructure that is made available by the Indian government - IndiaStack, Aadhaar, Digilocker and UPI. The company uses government and non-government data and documents for business, banking and ease of access to loans. Similarly, it uses land and satellite sources for an instant, secure digital access to consumers to costeffective offers from the lenders. It also ensures the least turnaround time with risk controls, which meet compliance guidelines for AML and credit.
FARMER ID WITH CROP SCORES
WhatsLoan’s platform for agri loans is well established. Its platform for Karnataka Gramin Bank has impacted thousands of farmers for their use of Kisan Credit Cards and has won the Agri Enterprise of Year award from
NABARD, CISCO Agri Challenge and TIE. in 2020 and 2021. Says Timmana Gouda: “We have set out to change the way agri loans are approved for farmers by offering farmer IDs along with farm and crop scores, as alternative for better approval rates and supplementing credit bureau scores. WhatsLoan is building Agristack on Blockchain under Cisco Agri Challenge supported by the Government of India for offering Farmer ID, Farm ID and Crop ID, based on satellite data.”
The company has been accepted as a requestor on Digilocker. This has allowed it to work with banks and lending and BFSI companies to offer digital KYC as approved by RBI, IRDA and SEBI to make it paperless, instant and digital. It has also built an integrated home loan platform for banks, HFCs and builders to bring home buying and home loans on single platform for millions of home buyers in India. It is now building a similar platform car/bike buyers by working with manufacturers and lenders.
INCUBATION, ACCESS
WhatsLoan has also been building t e c hnology f o r borr o wers, which reimagines the lending space with convenience, lower cost and reduced TAT from days to minutes, eliminating the risk on data and documents. This was possible through incubation by NSRCEL of IIM Bangalore and acceleration by Global Accelerator for Innovation Network (GAIN) under NITI Aayog and MEITY StartUp Hub for global access and expansion.
SELF AND ASSISTED MODES
WhatsLoan’s platform comes with extendable interfaces, web, mobile apps, chatbots on self and assisted modes. Timmana Gouda says this is to make easy for borrowers’ self-journey for the digital natives or the assisted journey which is useful for late adopters like farmers and MSMEs.
KYS: SALES TO ENGAGEMENT
The platform moves BFSI from selling model to an engagement model. This is possible with embedded finance, APIs for e-commerce, enablement platform for home builders, car and bike manufacturers and dealers, where asset buying and loan assistance have been integrated.
Timmana Gowda says the company’s vision is to empower borrowers KYS, or ‘Know Your Self’. He says the company has planned B2B platforms with Agristack on blockchain and digital FINANCIAL identity on blockchain with the vision to change BFSI from selling products and services to buying consumer needs with decentralized blockchain based KYS.
INNOVATION LAB
WhatsLoan has established a virtual innovation lab to help experts and ace developers to build next-gen technologies to enhance the platform constantly for borrowers and lenders. It has delivered some of the best RPI-, AI- and MLbased technologies to integrate with its neo-digital platform. The unique ones that facilitate access to land and property records through RPAs and APIs across states.
PARTNERSHIPS
WhatsLoan has partnered with leading digital advertising agencies, system integrators, LMS and CBS providers to integrate its platforms with their client banks. “This has lead co-optation with existing and legacy technology giving enhanced return on investment by cutting costs and TATs for on-boarding, validation, decisioning and digital documentation. We have partnered with Satsure, an agritech and satellite data company, to offer enhanced data improving loan approvals for farmers,” says Timmana Gouda.
MICROMODULAR,CLOUD-BASED
WhatsLoan’s micro modular, cloudbased digital platform can work with any existing systems of banks and lenders. It offers both quick deployment of prepaid DIY models and post-paid
enterprise models. It has platforms for HFCs, NBFCs, MFIs, gramin banks and e-commerce platforms to go live with their customers, for any loan products.
MARKETPLACE MODELS
WhatsLoan’s t i e - ups wit h c l os e d loop marketplace models for L&T Group (LnTSufin) and other car ma n u f a c t u r e r s , p r e - o w n e d car marketplaces and builders with its HomeBuy and CarBuy platform, would
take up partnership-based marketplaces for offering embedded finance. Timmana Gouda claims this will take his company to the next trajectory of business with B2B2C marketplace models with capacity to cover all customer segments with increased access to loan demands and higher approval ratios with preapproved customers.
PLANS, TARGETS
The company is also on the constant lookout for technical experts in AI, ML, RPA and Blockchain, with deep exposure to mongo DB, Nodes JS, Java, cloud servers, Python and PHP to build a highquality team of about 50 people over next 2 years.
WhatsLoan has partnered with Processware and Somayaji Techserve. Timmana Gouda says these companies can take WhatsLoan platforms as plug-ins to their core banking systems with small and medium banks, NBFCs, HFCs and MFIs. “We are looking for partnerships with neo-banking companies for offering our lending platforms to enhance their offering for their customers,” he adds.