Top Credit Scoring Startups In India That Use AI
Typically financial institutions ask the credit bureau to furnish a credit score of an individual for deciding whether an applicant should be given a loan based on the applicant’s ability to repay it. This is typically calculated using the borrower’s credit history. There are many startups working on alternatives to design credit score models based on AI techniques to check the creditworthiness of individuals, especially those who may not have formal credit repayment history. There are many data points generated with a plethora of digital transactions that can provide important information about how people handle their financial obligations. That’s where Indian fintech startups have come in to accelerate the credit economy by leveraging artificial intelligence-based credit assessment, working alongside banks, NBFCs and other financial institutions. In this article, we take a look at the leading fintech startups in India that do credit scoring by utilising advanced analytics and AI modelling. Lendingkart Lendingkart Finance is a non-deposit taking NBFC which provides working capital loans and business loans to SMEs across India. Lendingkart has formed technology tools based on big data analytics which aids lenders to estimate borrowers’ creditworthiness and provides other related services. The company strives to transform small business lending by making it convenient for SMEs to access credit easily. The company utilises analytics tools, analysing thousands of data points from thousands of sources to automatically calculate the creditworthiness rapidly and accurately, aiming to disburse loans with minimal paperwork within 72 hours. Unlike banks and other NBFCs, Lendingkart does not focus on vendors’ old records such as Past Financial Statements and Income Tax returns to assess the credit risk profile of a potential client. The NBFC instead focuses on the client’s current year’s cash flows and business growth. When it comes to making the best use of data science, the company has done it extensively with a team of 150 individuals. The data it collects from customers is run through its algorithms, extracting more than 8,500 data points. Lendingkart’s systems can also crunch non-traditional data such as GST data, mobile data, product interaction data, social data for credit evaluation, quality lead scoring, and product interaction, among others. The startup has raised $242.5M so far from numerous investors. Capital Float Founded in 2013 by Gaurav Hinduja and Sashank Rishyasringa, Capital Float is one of the leading Fintech lenders in India. Decision sciences rest at the core of its product offerings, and they extensively leverage AI capabilities. The startup has custom-built affordable finance solutions and offers these through digital channels. Borrowers can apply for loans from Capital Float by presenting their basic information. Its API-based systems auto-pulls the needed data utilising the furnished data while its algorithms underwrite the application in real-time. Borrowers can smoothly avail a loan from Capital Float at various technological terminals like offline and online points of sale. Specific loan profiles within Capital Float are managed end to end by automated systems. By putting a bunch of pieces together, the firm can give small merchant stores a loan offer on the spot with its automated decision engineering loan app that runs in the background. The startup has raised more than $140 million from some of the most prominent VC funds, which include Amazon, Ribbit Capital, Sequoia, and Saif Partners. Crediwatch Crediwatch executes actionable credit analytics and dynamic credit assessment insights as a service to financial and banking firms. The company can accomplish this without human intervention by applying AI/ML and NLP tools, which provide comprehensive real-time insights.  Crediwatch is an insights-as-a-service platform that deploys scalable deep learning tools across diverse digital tracks of large and small private firms and their customers. The startup utilises over 18 million risk profiles of companies and unregistered small firms. The platform is designed to produce sharp insights over the credit lifecycle, from pre-disbursal to post-disbursal assessment, with its tools including Early Warning System (EWS). The platform plans to deliver lending companies and corporates the ability to manage and allocate credit efficiently. It does that by applying AI/ML algorithms on alternative data points like statutory payment statuses, litigations, bank statements, media sentiment, GST invoice data, and traditional data points. To date, the startup has raised upwards of $5 million funding Crediwatch is trusted by SBI, Aditya Birla Financial Services, Karur Vysya Bank, RBL Bank, etc. for its services. Perfios Perfios has created an extensible financial data analytics platform that can manage data from various sources with abilities to extract, curate, clean, and analyse data. The startup has partnered with over 200 banks, NBFCs and fintech companies globally. It was founded by VR Govindarajan and Debashish Chakraborty, who also founded Aztecsoft which was earlier procured by Mindtree. Banking statements come to Perfios and analytics is automated on the platform that enables them to make decisions quicker, thanks to its AI and data science techniques that generates insightful reports and relevant results. The process of data aggregation takes in complex, voluminous data and presents it in a summarised format for analysis and real-time decision making. Data Aggregation and Analytics platform from Perfios uses automation, allowing high-quality, accurate reports and reducing the turnaround time of the entire process. In consumer and SME lending, Data Aggregation and Analytics estimates the borrowers’ behaviour and define their overall credit health, credit movement, reducing fraud and improving risk management for the lender. Apart from this, Perfios Bank Statement Analyser is a potent tool that helps banks and financial institutions evaluate cash-flow performance and deliver smart insights. Perfios raised about USD 50 million in funding led by an affiliate of private equity funds managed by Bessemer Venture Partners and Warburg Pincus LLC. CreditVidya CreditVidya is one of the leading players in the alternative credit scoring space in India. The startup is leveraging alternative data, AI and machine learning to provide credit for the underserved. Its products are supporting a big share of the salaried and self-employed population to become noticeable to lenders, by making it viable for banks and NBFCs to underwrite borrowers for much smaller unsecured loans. It has partnered with 55+ leading banks and NBFCs including Axis Bank, DBS Bank, Indusind Bank, Yes Bank, IIFL, Xiaomi, and others. The customers use its products to manage the credit cycle end-to-end, including Prospecting, loan Underwriting and Delinquency Management. With over 10,000 data points, CreditVidya’s credit underwriting model is 2x more powerful than traditional bureau scores, helping banks to underwrite 15% more individuals, including the completely new-to-credit segment (first-time borrowers). To date, we have underwritten over 25 million individuals. Our products also help lenders cut the time of decision-making from several days to under five minutes, reduce costs, prevent fraud, and consequently, increase profitability.
Typically financial institutions ask the credit bureau to furnish a credit score of an individual for deciding whether an applicant should be given a loan based on the applicant’s ability to repay it. This is typically calculated using the borrower’s credit history.  There are many startups working on alternatives to design credit score models based […]
Typically financial institutions ask the credit bureau to furnish a credit score of an individual for deciding whether an applicant should be given a loan
["credit score", "credit scoring", "Startups"]
["data science", "artificial intelligence", "machine learning", "AI", "ML", "RAG", "NLP", "credit scoring", "deep learning", "Aim", "analytics", "credit score", "Startups"]
["AI", "artificial intelligence", "machine learning", "ML", "deep learning", "NLP", "data science", "analytics", "Aim", "RAG"]
Vishal Chawla is a senior tech journalist at Analytics India Magazine and writes about AI, data analytics, cybersecurity, cloud computing, and blockchain. Vishal also hosts AIM's video podcast called Simulated Reality- featuring tech leaders, AI experts, and innovative startups of India.