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Alternate finance service provider OpenTap is eyeing the market potential in the industrial hubs of Coimbatore and Tirupur for offering its services.
The Chennai-headquartered start-up arranges finance for the salaried workforce, with particular focus on individuals earning between ₹7,000 and ₹25,000 a month.
“This segment of the workforce invariably finds it extremely difficult to borrow money from the organised sector, forcing them to get assistance from a local money lender or pawn broker at high interest rate. We facilitate by bringing the lender and borrower to the table and the rates are competitive,” Senthil Natarajan, Chief Executive and co-Founder of OpenTap told BusinessLine .
Aims at ₹600-cr loan bookClarifying that the company is not an NBFC but provider of tools in the peer-to-peer lending space, arranging finance for blue-collared workers, he said “we have served around 650 people in the last couple of months. The loan book stands at ₹1.2 crore. Our plan is to increase it to ₹600 crore or more in two years. We have already registered demand for ₹10 to ₹15 crore from different regions.” “We have not handled contract workers yet. The average ticket size is ₹20,000, but there have been instances of borrowing up to ₹50,000 with the support of the management. These are for short-term tenure —not exceeding 12 months. The borrower can avail shorter tenure assistance too.”
“Prospective borrowers should register online with necessary identity, address proof documents and salary certificate. After verification of the same, the application will be processed and forwarded to the lender and the borrower informed. The processing time is about 5-7 working days. There have been instances of less turnaround time in emergency situations,” he said.
OpenTap has officially partnered with a company in Tiruchi and is close to inking a bigger deal with another firm in the next four weeks.
It has established its presence in Chennai, Tirupur, Gobichettipalayam, Nasik and Bengaluru. Natarajan said that OpenTap’s sub-sales office in Chennai would be inaugurated next week.
App facility soonThe company plans to introduce an app very soon, so that people can upload details on the go and get alerts as well.
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