CHENNAI: In a bid to accelerate FinTech investments in the State, the Tamil Nadu Industries Department has constituted a 10-member FinTech Governing Council (GC) under the chairmanship of Industries Minister Thangam Thennarasu. Chief Secretary Irai Anbu is the vice-chairman of the GC.The formation of the GC came after Pooja Kulkarni, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of Guidance (TN government agency for investment promotion), sent a proposal to form a council with members from the government and industry to facilitate the establishment of FinTech companies in the State.
Apart from Industries Minister and Chief Secretary, other members include Industries Department Secretary S Krishnan, Finance Secretary N Muruganandam, Information Technology Secretary Neeraj Mittal, MSMEs Secretary Arun Roy, Pooja Kulkarni, CEO of FinBlue and Dr Sanjay Tyagi, Director of Software Technology Parks of India, Chennai Centre.
The other members are from FinTech sector. They include Balaji Nuthalapadi, MD and head of operations and technology, Citi South Asia, Sundar Kannan, director at a leading Wall Street Investment Banking Corporation and Ramkumar Ramamoorthy, former chairman and MD, Cognizant and past president of Madras Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Ramamoorthy told TNIE, “Chennai has the unique distinction of housing technology companies that provide solutions to more than 250 global financial institutions. The rich talent that the State has in finance as well as technology has attracted some of the top financial powerhouses and FinTech companies to Chennai, including Citigroup, Standard Chartered, Paypal, Temenos, BankBazaar, Vivriri Capital, BNP Paribas, Creditmantri and Intellect Design Arena, among others.
“Consulting major McKinsey believes that the next generation of financial services is a $335 billion opportunity for India in the next 10 years. Tamil Nadu is uniquely positioned to capture a significant slice of this market,” said the former Cognizant chairman.
The mandate of the GC is to monitor the progress and implementation of initiatives in FinTech and related sectors. The GC will form sub-committees to address various themes in upcoming FinTech policy such as marketing and branding, business development and outreach, partnerships, education, venture capital and regulation.
It is learnt that additional representation from the government, industry and academia will be included in the FinTech GC as per the progress and requirement of activities to be undertaken.The FinTech policy, which will be unveiled soon, will lay the roadmap for positioning Chennai and the rest of Tamil Nadu as FinTech hubs. The focus of the FinTech policy will be on providing incentives for start-ups, infrastructure the State will be building and ecosystems that will come up.