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– The event was attended by over 1,200 policymakers, regulators, financial sector leaders and global experts
– Keynotes, Panels, and Showcases explored conversations on Account Aggregator’s Role in Financial Innovation and the future of Open Finance in India
SamvAAd 2024, the annual event of Sahamati, the consortium of Account Aggregators in India, concluded as a landmark gathering focused on the transformative potential of the Account Aggregator (AA) framework in advancing Open Finance across India and globally. Held at Westin Powai in Mumbai, on 19th November the event convened over 1,200 industry leaders, regulators, policymakers, and financial innovators. The discussions and conversations focussed on India’s Account Aggregator ecosystem and broader global trends in Open Finance.
The year 2024 marks the Account Aggregator ecosystem not only as the fastest-growing Open Finance ecosystem worldwide—with an impressive 1059% year-on-year growth from 2022-23 to 2023-24—but also the largest, having surpassed 124 million consents as of October 2024. This year, to ensure long-term stability in the system, Sahamati initiated an ecosystem wide ‘participatory governance’ process where ecosystem participants comprising FIUs, FIPs and the licensed AAs came together in various committees to deliberate and finalise fair use guidelines and codes of conduct for the ecosystem
The day at SamvAAd started with a Keynote Address by Mr. K.V. Kamath, Banking Veteran and Chairman, Jio Financial Services, who delved into the transformative potential of the Account Aggregator Framework for the country in terms of financial inclusion and economic growth. The Guest of Honor-Mr.Ashish Verma, General Manager, Reserve Bank of India, spoke about the importance of responsible practices for regulated entities operating in the Account Aggregator Framework and Mr. R.Gandhi Former Deputy Governor, RBI Advisory Council, Sahamati, explained the criticality of ensuring participatory governance in the AA Ecosystem as we grow and scale with his talk on ‘Evolution and Progress of Participatory Governance in the AA Ecosystem’.
The dignitaries highlighted the potential of AAs as an enabler for expanding the reach of formal financial services to the grass-root level and in minimising digital frauds.
To acknowledge the impact of the Account Aggregator system on the Indian MSME sector, Mr.Nandan Nilekani, Non-Executive Chairman, Infosys, unveiled Sahamati’s report on ‘Open Finance from Inclusion to Empowerment of MSME’. The report, prepared in partnership with McKinsey India, indicates that the AA-enabled ecosystem has the potential to accelerate growth of India’s formalised MSME segment from 35% today to about 50% over the next 5-7 years.
Sahamati along with Open Finance Connect also launched the first comprehensive report titled ‘Global Open Finance Adoption Report 2024-2030’offering an analysis of Open Finance growth across key regions, including India, the US, Latin America, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Oceania and Africa. The report was released by Mr.Pramod Varma, Former Chief Architect Aadhaar, UPI and India Stack and CTO at EkStep Foundation.
Through the day, the event saw insightful discussions with Mr.Nandan Nilekani – Non Executive Chairman, Infosys; Mr.Ivan Mortimer Schutts- Policy Advisor, Dataswyft and IFC; Mr.Chanchal C Sarkar – Adviser, Financial Stability & Cyber Security (FS&CS) and IER, Dept of Economic Affairs, MoF; Mr. Kunal Shah – Founder, CRED and Mr. Sharath Bulusu – Director & Product Head, GooglePay.
Mr.BG Mahesh, CEO, Sahamati said, “The year 2024 truly has been a year of phenomenal growth for the ecosystem. We touched 124 million consents, making India a world leader in Open Finance. The industry wide acceptance clearly reflected in the steady increase in network participants reaching 522 FIUs and 168 FIPs in October. Addition of GST information on AAs is another development that we believe will catapult the reach of financial services to the SME sector. We at Sahamati are committed to support and grow the AA ecosystem and are confident of high adoption of AA in the coming years.”
To support innovation in the sector, Sahamati had introduced the Sahamati BuildAAthon 2024, an Account Aggregator Hackathon. A team of esteemed judges chose three winners from the 630 applicants, who got a chance to present their ideas at SamvAAd, to an audience of more than 700 people.
Through the day, the event had distinct thematic panels such as- “Building inclusive personal finance models”; “Harnessing Open Finance Data and Collaborative efforts for Enhanced Fraud Detection”; “Enhancing Privacy in the Transition from Open Banking to Open Data”. Each panel focused on different aspects of the complex world of Open Finance to foster collaboration among key stakeholders.
Following the success of Sahamati’s inaugural event in May 2023, the second edition proved to be a platform for the industry players to deepen insights and expand the dialogue on opportunities of data-driven open finance.
About Sahamati
Sahamati is a member driven industry alliance that works across the three verticals: advocacy, shared techno-legal services and participatory governance all aimed at empowering customers with their own data via the AA Framework. Sahamati is incorporated under Section 8 of the Companies Act 2013, dedicated towards institutionalising consent-based data- sharing mechanisms through the AA framework. As of October 2024, the Account Aggregator ecosystem had-168 FIPs (Financial Information Providers) across banks, insurance firms, investment, pension and taxes and 522 FIUs (Financial Information Users).