After Xiaomi, Realme Forays Into India’s Fintech Space

China-based mobile phone brand Realme, on Tuesday (December 17), announced that it has forayed into India’s financial services sector with the launch of its new mobile platform, ‘Realme Paysa’.

The mobile application, which is available on both Google Playstore and Realme App store, will have four businesses across lending, savings, payment and protection. While the beta launch of the platform has started, a full roll-out is expected in the next six to twelve months.

For the lending segment, Realme Paysa’s beta app offers personal loans up to INR 1 Lakhs and digital SME loans up to INR 5 lakhs. Larger loan requirements for both individuals and SMEs are serviced by the Realme Paysa teams present in various cities across India.

For improving financial awareness, especially among users living in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities, the platform gives an instant free credit report with an easy to understand interface, account-level details and free updates for three months.

For the disbursal of the loan, the company has partnered with two fintech startups — Early Salary and Lending Kart. Realme has also partnered with Credit Mantri, which will help the platform’s users to get their free financial report. There would be more tie-ups as the platform expands, Realme said in a press statement.

Further, the new platform also offers screen damage insurance for both old and new phones with an option of insuring mobile screens for one or two damages per year.

Realme Paysa, by 2020, aims to disburse loans of approximately INR 1000 Cr, acquire three to five million new customers, launch multiple new products and take its first step in financial services in India. In the next two years, Realme Paysa plans to acquire 25Mn customers by making mainstream financial products accessible to consumers in emerging India.

“We plan to win by bringing innovation in our OS and hardware to simplify access, co-develop products with partners and develop products that are easy to use,” said Varun Sridhar, head of Realme Paysa.

Amid the data privacy issues currently going on with tech companies, Sridhar said that all the data is fully localised and permissions taken are very transparently displayed in the app.

Madhav Sheth, CEO of Realme India, said the company is aiming to repeat its success in the mobile business and become one of the top five new entrants in financial services in the next three years.

Notably, another Chinese electronics giant, Xiaomi, has recently also opened its digital payment platform Mi Pay to all Android users through the Google Play Store. Similar to other payments platforms such as Paytm, Phonepe, among others, Mi Pay offers services like recharges and bill payments for cellular services, DTH, broadband and other bill payment facilities.