PhonePe, NITI Aayog announce FinTech Open Hackathon winners

Digital payments platform PhonePe, in association with NITI Aayog, on Wednesday announced the winners of the 'Fintech Open Hackathon at a virtual awards ceremony.

The first prize was awarded to a hack called BizFiz, a solution for MSMEs to make loan application processes easier and make the process of loan underwriting easier for banks.

"The FinTech Hackathon which centered around 'Open Data with a focus on Account Aggregator,' has brought together some of the brightest minds in the Fintech space," Rahul Chari, CTO, PhonePe, said in a statement.

The second prize went to a hack called Sahitya, a one-stop shop for all its users that acts as a personal finance management tool. VisualPe was also awarded the second prize. It is a personal finance management system that collects all the financial information of its users and puts it in one place.

A hack called Althsis was awarded the third prize. It solves the problem of managing multiple bank accounts by analyzing the user's bank data and displaying all the relevant data in one place.

The final Hackathon prize went to a hack called Financial wellbeing. It is an app that helps improve the financial well-being of its users by gamifying the process of saving.

The Hackathon, which was a part of the month-long Fintech open event by NITI Aayog, witnessed some thought provoking keynotes, in-depth fireside chats, and panel discussions.

"The key takeaway for me is that the larger goal of financial inclusion in India can only be realized if we start breaking down the boundaries of how data is getting shared by individuals with their consent and with organizations that can actually bring about financial inclusion in a manner that encourages, inspires and creates healthy competition to grow and expand the market," said Chari.

"The Account Aggregator framework is personally one of the most exciting things for me after UPI, and I am looking forward to ensuring that PhonePe contributes to the Account Aggregator network as a license holder as well as uses the framework to expand lending in the country," he added.

The Hackathon entries showcased path-breaking solutions and innovative ideas using accessible Open Data Platforms like PhonePe Pulse, Open Government Data Platform, RBI reports on payments, etc to develop their hacks.

"The NITI Aayog Fintech month is the first event we are celebrating as a part of our experience studio. Going forward we will be showcasing one particular technology every month and highlight how it can make an impact in the life of the common man," said Anna Roy, Sr. Advisor, Niti Aayog.

"The kind of solutions presented today will take us to the second phase of financial inclusion. While the first phase was all about creating the institutions and infrastructure platforms like India stack, Jan-Dhan account and UPI, now is the time to look at the last mile and bring the under-served within the formal financial fold," Roy added.

--IANS

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