India's Digital Infrastructure - The Innovation that will unlock the $300 Billion MSME Lending Market - OCEN (Open Credit Enablement Network)

This is Part 1 of the series where we discuss India's Digital Infrastructure.

Over the last few years, the Indian Government along with the support of iSpirt,  have build India Stack. We're now close to seeing the full potential of India Stack with the recent launch of Account Aggregator, which will soon be followed by Open Credit Enablement Network.

In today's episode, we deep-dive into the world of OCEN and discuss how it has the potential to unlock the $300 Billion MSME Lending market.

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Episode Timeline:
(02:02) - What is India Stack and how it's been the foundation for India's Digital Infrastructure
(04:49) - The $300 Billion Credit Gap in India's MSME Sector
(07:26) - The current models of BNPL are NOT the lending market that we need to develop the country
(08:46) - The Challenges with MSME Lending - High Costs
(10:04) - Why MSME's prefer to take Loans from Informal sources
(17:07) - What are Account Aggregators?
(22:07) - Why we've not seen a true Loan marketplace and why API Standardization is important to unlock the lending market
(28:54) - What will the lifecycle of loan look like when its powered by India Stack
(33:14) - 'Lending as a Feature'
(40:26) - Lend & Forget model vs. Lend, Monitor, Collect Model (Balance Sheet vs Cash Flow Lending)

Here are some research notes that we compiled or referred to for this episode:

ISPIRT - First Open House on OCEN
Loan Service Providers & Cashflow Lending
The Indian Dream's Research on India's Fintech Infrastructure