With a $418 billion finance gap in the Indian SME sector alone, the roll-out of the digital platform will extend new financing and working capital opportunities to the bank’s numerous clients - and their partners - expected to boost the number of digital transactions across the nation. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “Digital India” initiative - which aims to drive economic development through wide-ranging digital transformation across the country - has set an ambitious target of reaching 25 billion digital transactions in 2017-18.

Furthermore, increasing trade across a country rapidly establishing itself on the global stage is a high priority - India’s exports of $261 billion are up by 47.7 per cent since 2009, and its internal trade as a proportion of GDP is at a healthy value of 54 per cent.

Finally, by supporting the bank’s manufacturing clients across the country, the platform is helping Modi’s “Make in India” initiative become a reality - transforming India’s economy into to a world-class manufacturing hub.

The solution provides a full range of supply chain finance products - covering pre- and post-shipment, vendor finance, dealer finance and payable finance - and is highly flexible and scalable, with an omni-channel user interface that supports rich analytics. By increasing automation and straight-through processing, while enhancing reporting capabilities, the platform should drastically reduce transaction costs and risks while uplifting satisfaction of the bank’s clients.

Mr. Litesh Majethia, Head of Supply Chain Finance, Bank of Baroda, says: “With this latest state-of-art digitized SCF product, we are now live with a few large corporates and many more in the pipeline. With this product we will be augmenting our relationship with Large Corporate Customers and SME clients. This product will help us enter new Large Corporate Relationship and MSME clients. In line with our Prime Minister’s “Digital India”, “Make in India”, “Stand-Up India” initiatives, this solution will augment the strength of the companies that are driving the country’s growth - opening up new financing opportunities for companies of all sizes via a cutting-edge digital product. We have received positive & encouraging response from many of the customers and they are happy that Bank of Baroda’s SCF product is not only delivering value in terms of speed of transactions and information but is very swiftly acquiring dealers & vendors. This product will empower the Bank and give us competitive positioning in the market, highlighting our intent as a leader in the field of Supply Chain Finance. This project is an example of transformation agenda that we are driving in the Bank: Digitization, Centralisation, and seamless & faster Transaction Processing.”

Manish Maakan, CEO of iGTB, says: “Our strong experience in supporting other Indian banks and financial institutions means our supply chain finance offering is the most mature and sophisticated it has ever been. Supply chain finance - when done properly - provides banks with an opportunity to become a valuable partner in their clients’ supply chains and ensures sustained growth and profitability of clients and their business partners. We are delighted to see Bank of Baroda seizing this through their digital leadership, and we are committed to playing an ongoing role in their transformation.”