We are thrilled to announce that Open Credit Enablement Network (OCEN) has been conferred with the prestigious Digidhan 2021-22 award for their Special contribution to the promotion of Digital Payments. The award ceremony was held recently in New Delhi, organized by the Ministry of IT and Electronics, and was handed over to Sagar Parikh, the …
Volunteer Hero: Amit Ranjan
“That will never work!” To iSPIRT volunteers, those four words are a rallying cry. Words that make us intrepid souls smile with a quiet confidence and inspire an iron will to get the job done. The best among us turn those words into their life’s work by building systems that serve millions of Indians. iSPIRT’s …
iSPIRT’s response to Union Budget 2023
Budget 2023 – Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) the ‘Mantra’ for New India iSPIRT Foundation, a technology think-and-do tank, believes that India’s hard problems can be solved only by leveraging public technology for private innovation. iSPIRT as a think tank pioneered the Digital Public infrastructure (DPIs) India is at the cusp of what could be the …
RBI Rationalized Reporting Process for Foreign Direct Investment (FDI)
iSPIRT is pursuing the Stay-in-India Checklist 2.0 with Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), Government of India, targeted to bring Ease of Doing Business for start-ups. Our efforts gained momentum with DPIIT’s Regulatory Roundtables since August 2022. Reserve Bank of India has further eased the reporting of FDI on the FIRMS portal. The …
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WANI 3.0: Unleashing Business Innovation and Open Wireless Network Growth for Universal Connectivity
PM-WANI has allowed sachetised access to WiFi connectivity. However, the true vision of WANI standard, where small business owners can participate as network service providers resulting in fast network growth, has not been realised. We propose the next version of the WANI standard where a more open ecosystem can be enabled to facilitate business interactions …
A New Chapter for Sahamati
Can public-tech usher in cash-flow lending at scale for small businesses? We will soon find out. Early pilots of the Open Credit Enablement Network (OCEN) have gone well. But they were without a key ingredient – the Account Aggregator (AA) system. Last September, AA went live for the public. Since then, it’s been doing well. …
ONDC – Is it the next game changer for Digital India?
If you have not come across ONDC – Open Network for Digital Commerce, its time you know about it and this post is to help better understand what problem it addresses, how it operates, and the value that it brings to consumers, businesses, retailers, existing e-commerce platforms and the state. Problem statement There are a …
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Balloon Volunteers – Sixth Session
“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others” ~ Mahatma Gandhi This is one of the core values that we cherish at iSPIRT. We started an open process of bringing in Balloon Volunteers by kicking off our First Volunteer Open House session in September 2020. We did this with …
PM-WANI: Business models
India, a large country with a lot of geographical and economic diversity, faces interesting challenges with last-mile connectivity for internet users. PM-WANI programme provides a powerful technical and policy framework towards the goal of broadband proliferation across the country. iSPIRT Foundation has been involved with the PM-WANI programme right from its inception. Dr Pramod Varma, …
38% of India’s Unicorns Are Not “Indian”
India currently has 90 unicorns – startup companies that are valued at over $1b – and will likely soon have 100 unicorns, becoming the third such country after the USA and China. Since January 2016 when the “Startup India” program was launched, the startup ecosystem of India including infrastructure for startups, be it incubators, mentorship, …
NavIC Grand Challenge Launched by Shri Piyush Goyal, Union minister on 17th May 2022
At the Fourth National Startup Advisory Council Meet held on 17.05.2022 under Hon’ble Minister of Commerce and Industry, Consumer Affairs, Food & Public Distribution, and Textiles Shri Piyush Goyal, the NavIC Grand Challenge (GC) was launched. The GC seeks to mainstream the use of NavIC and establish it as a domestic mapping solution. iSPIRT has …
iSPIRT Foundation’s Response to Union Budget 2022
Union Budget 2022 – Imprints of using Digital public infra with Private innovation iSPIRT Foundation, a technology think-and-do tank, believes that India’s hard problems can be solved only by leveraging public technology for private innovation through open APIs. This “innovation architecture” is now going mainstream. The Union Budget 2022 mentions five efforts that iSPIRT has …
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Bharat Distributed Ledger (BADAL) for accelerating trusted commerce in India
India has made rapid progress in digitisation of the economy in the last decade becoming a world leader in identity systems, digital payments and tax, and a new data sharing and empowerment framework. However, many deep-rooted issues still exist, such as extending true financial inclusion; formalisation and creating a higher trust economy, that is essential …
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Confidential Clean Rooms in DEPA
We are at the cusp of a data empowerment revolution in India. The DEPA architecture and its first instantiation, the Account Aggregator (AA) framework are empowering individuals and businesses to share their data at low cost and friction, enabling scenarios such as flow-based lending. The Unified Health Interface (UHI) is expected to drive a similar …