With Big Businesses Expected To Apply, Will NUE Make NPCI Redundant?

Beware! As they say, there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch, and this is especially true in the financial domain. Just as we had started to boast about the homegrown Unified Payments Interface (UPI) – an inclusive, user-friendly and largely free digital payments ecosystem developed and run by the umbrella entity National Payment Corporation of India (NPCI) – the Reserve Bank of India gave the green light to yet another New Umbrella Entity (NUE) in the retail payments space.

The most significant differentiator in this case: The NUE will be a ‘for-profit venture that will develop and push technology solutions, build niche expertise and, of course, earn ‘profits’ in the process (more on that later). As the RBI draft framework mentions “pan-India umbrella entity/entities”, it indicates that the central bank is open to more than one entity, subject to the applicants meeting all specified requirements.

The full article was originally published on Inc42.