ONDC and UPI together will reorder India's supply chain: Nandan Nilekani

Speaking at the Global Fintech Fest 2022, he said the supply chain will become far more efficient and will help reach products and services to everyone much more easily

Technology innovations due to India’s digital stack such as credit enablement through United payment interface (UPI) and account aggregator (AA), and the Open Network of Digital Commerce (ONDC) will fundamentally reorder the supply chain of India, said Infosys Chairman Nandan Nilekani.

Speaking at the Global Fintech Fest 2022, Nilekani said: “India's supply chain will become far more efficient and will make it far easier to reach products and services to everyone.”

He added that the AA system championed by the Reserve Bank of India will revolutionise the credit and lending ecosystem.

"Once the AA system is applied to credit and lending, it will make lending as simple as making a payment. At the same time, since it is based on data, it will be much more stable and risk-free,” he said while addressing the GFF delegates.

Speaking on ONDC, he said the network will allow retailers, suppliers and logistics players to participate in a democratised manner, and will have a big impact on how commerce is done because everybody in India will now be doing e-commerce. “This will also have an impact on hyperlocal commerce and quick commerce,” he added.

Nilekani said that with the launch of the latest offerings--UPI Lite, Rupay Credit Card linked to UPI and Bharat Bill Pay System—the integrated bill payment system—will democratize UPI even further.

“Today we have about 260 million people using UPI, and with the launch of offline UPI (UPI offering) 123 we will add another 500 million to the payments system. Almost half a billion people in India will be doing digital payments,” he said.

He added that RuPay credit card's integration with UPI is the first step towards credit on UPI. “It is a very sensible step. As we go forward and as RBI gets more confident with this, they will open up to more forms of credit on UPI. Imagine what this system can do if there are 400-500 million people on UPI and if they get credit access online,” said Nilekani.