Religare partners with Nasscom to propel tech adoption

Financial services company Religare Enterprises Limited (REL) has entered into a strategic partnership with Nasscom Centre of Excellence for Internet of Things (IoT) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) to build out business processes and solutions for the company as it seeks to bolster technology integration.

REL is looking at a capital outlay of Rs 100 crore annually for investing in solutions offered by startups in technologies such as AI, Machine Learning (ML), blockchain and IoT, REL executive chairperson Rashmi Saluja told DH during the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signing.

“Rather than developing technology platforms in house, we were introduced to start up companies that are already into the space. That is cost effective, and doesn’t require reinitiating the whole process by ourselves. These startups won’t be needing more than Rs 1-10 crore, and we have an annual budget of Rs 100 crore to put in these startups,” Saluja said.

The company is also hoping to improve regulatory compliance and governance to move past the fraudulent activities uncovered a few years back. “Governance is one of the most important aspects along with the transparency of information that we have, and without technology it is not possible. There have been difficult times that Religare has gone through and that was due to lack of governance. And if you have those governance parameters, any person dealing with that information won’t find it easy to violate it,” she said.

REL’s rebranding drive will continue and there are plans to rebrand the entire group after its health insurance arm was renamed to Care Health Insurance last year, as per Saluja. The company is also looking to introduce a number of new financial products in the near future, she added.