Gramcover, a digital insurance platform, works to provide affordable insurance solutions to the low- and middle-income segments in India. Their technology-led distribution and servicing model reduces the inefficiencies and transaction costs involved in purchasing insurance policies. To meet their basic needs, 70% of the agricultural households in India spend more than what they earn.… Continue reading GramCover: Accessible & affordable insurance
Finlok is a financial platform that helps people save money and avail hassle-free credit through a group savings-based financial model. This blog explores how the platform will help the low- and middle-income segments gain greater control over their finances. Rohan, 21, works as a sales staff at a mall in Pune and makes… Continue reading Finlok: Save together digitally
This blog examines EasyPlan, a new-age digital savings app that allows low- and middle-income segments to overcome their chronic state of under-saving. Read on to see how EasyPlan makes use of various behavioral nudges (including gamification) to make customers save more and better. Rajat is a young millennial. His weekends are spent… Continue reading EasyPlan: Simple and digital savings for LMIs
‘Kya kaam hai Ji? Bolo!’(What do you want?) I see a man walking restlessly towards me. He wants to know why am I standing so close to the compound gate. He is Samil Pasha, the care-taker of a poultry farm. When he ascertains I am no trespasser, he invites me in. And suddenly we… Continue reading People of Bharat: Samil Pasha, Hyderabad
Healthcare is the most imperative need for any household. The expenses and time spent on it can sometimes be staggering. Especially for the hapless gig economy worker whose needs have been relatively ignored. Healthcare expenses usually involve direct and indirect costs. And these indirect costs can be staggering, especially for an ordinary individual… Continue reading Healthcare access for Gig economy workers
Ben Horowitz, in his book ‘Hard Things about Hard Things,’ sums up the importance of building a healthy company culture – “A healthy company culture encourages people to share bad news. A company that discusses its problems freely and openly can quickly solve them.” A startup, at its core, is a problem… Continue reading How important are ‘People’ to a startup, especially while scaling up?
I walk down a narrow dirt road, lined with trees on both sides. The road bends towards the left and I find her — a middle-aged woman; hose in hand, watering a small grove of betel nut trees. I notice pepper vines are clinging to each betel tree; and pineapple plants border the boundary… Continue reading People of Bharat: Selly Maushi, Udupi
Image by Sonia Dhankhar on Shutterstock In our previous blog post, we highlighted the case of farmers who use their smartphones to access entertainment/social media applications (see Figure 1) but at the same time cite lack of digital literacy and familiarity with technology as barriers to adopting digital agricultural/financial services. In general, this is consistent with existing research… Continue reading Smartphone applications for farmers — insights on design-related challenges
Photo by By Mahin Badusha on Shutterstock The study of household finance has been concerned with how households use and ought to use financial markets to achieve their objectives. A vast majority of Indian households are either inexperienced or new to the concept of using financial markets to achieve their objectives. In this setting, one of the… Continue reading Retail Financial Markets with Inexperienced and New Financial Consumers
Photo by By Saurav022 on Shutterstock Prateekbhai tells me most of his collection is European. “These are Hungarian,” he says with pride, as he points to two beautiful specimens. I shuffle my feet rooted in a small village along the coast of South Gujarat, where Prateekbhai shows me his prized pigeons. I am in a hatch, surrounded… Continue reading People of Bharat: Prateekbhai, Navsari
Photo by Saurav022 on Shutterstock Usually financial habits of a household are gauged through their cash management strategies, income-expense flows, investment in human capital, stock of physical and financial assets, borrowings, and transfers. In our ongoing survey of slum households in Chennai, we captured these details through an initial survey and conducted follow-up interviews with these households… Continue reading Ration shops with a banking rationale?
Boom Country? The New Wave of Indian Enterprise by Alan Rosling is a detailed, investigated narrative about the past and present entrepreneurial landscape of India with an overtone that brings to attention the future possibilities for entrepreneurship. The book originates from a deep, personal wrestle with the author’s own entrepreneurial intention and examines the multi-dimensional… Continue reading Boom Country? The New Wave of Indian Enterprise