Xiaomi has today officially launched its credit lending service, Mi Credit, in India. However, this is not the first time that the company has entered into this space. As, last year, in May, Xiaomi initially unveiled the Mi Credit service (in pilot phase) in partnership with a Bangalore-based startup called KrazyBee, which was limited to a few MIUI users. During its pilot program, the company says that the Mi Credit platform has managed to disburse loans of over 28 crores (with an approximate rate of 1 crore per day), and 20% of its users have availed the highest loan value (of Rs 1 lakh).
Mi Credit is an all-new finance solution from Xiaomi, which is essentially a curated online marketplace for lending, to provide personal loans for Mi Fans. The platform is claimed to be built as the first personal loan choice specifically targeting young professionals. Currently, its list of lending partners onboard includes NBFCs or Fintechs such as Aditya Birla Finance Limited, Money View, EarlySalary, Zestmoney, and CreditVidya.
The new credit lending platform offers users a more intuitive interface and makes the application process for securing loans easier. According to the company, the new platform offers first-time users the ability to fill their digital application form within five minutes and allows returning customers to avail loans (up to Rs 1 lakh) with one-click disbursement. Once a user’s loan is approved, they get the option to choose the loan amount and the tenure of the loan. Since the platform offers a completely digital experience, customers can also get realtime disbursement of loans and lower interest rates. Furthermore, since there are multiple lending partners on the platform, the success rate of getting a loan approved is much higher, with increased chances for customers to get higher loan amounts at lower interest rates.
Xiaomi has partnered with Experian — a leading brand in consumer and business credit reporting — to allow Mi Credit app users to check their credit score instantly for free. To ensure that this data is secure, the platform uses Amazon’s Web Services infrastructure to store the user data in a secure and encrypted manner, within the country.
Speaking on the announcement, Manu Kumar Jain, Managing Director, Xiaomi India, said “In India, the lending industry is on an explosive trajectory. As per a recent report from CIBIL, there are over INR 4 lakh crores worth of personal loans outstanding from nearly 1.9 crore customers, with each user accounting to an almost INR 2 lakh of outstanding amount. Of these 1.9 crore customers, majority tend to avail it for medical emergencies followed by shopping, wedding, travel and education purposes. We are bringing Mi Credit to India hoping to provide yet another innovative and truly digital solution for their lending needs.”
The company said that currently, Mi Credit serves more than 10 states with over 1,500 pin codes, and that it plans to expand it to more than 19,000 pin codes by the end of the FY 2019.
Mi Credit is currently available for Android. Interested users can use the Mi Credit app to get loans, which comes pre-installed on MIUI phones and can be downloaded from the Google Play Store and GetApps on other Android smartphones.