Apoorv Anupam
02 June 2020, India:
Digital lender Indifi has launched Pragati, a collaborative resource centre for SMEs, small businesses, and start-ups. The platform aims to create a pool of financial and non-financial resources to empower 15-20 million SMEs struggling with revival plans in the post-Covid-19 economy.
In a recent survey of its borrowers, Indifi revealed that 90% and 80% of the open restaurants and retail shops respectively are experiencing at least 50% drop in sales. Whereas, half of this lot are operating at less than 20% sales of what they registered in the first two months of 2020.
The situation has impacted working capital too, with around 85% of retail stores and 70% of restaurants open at present are getting lesser credit from their suppliers. The survey also found that 75% of the restaurants and 55% of retail stores were non-operational during the third phase of lockdown.
Alok Mittal, CEO & Co-founder, Indifi Technologies, said, “At Indifi, the core of our business has been to support businesses in their growth. In sync with this mission, we have launched Pragati, a sector-agnostic, collaborative, multi-service resource centre.”
Alok Mittal, added, “The goal is to enable business owners to get different service providers and content under one trusted platform coupled with exclusive offers which will save them money and time. We invite partners who can provide relevant products and services to MSMEs to join the platform towards this collective goal, and in turn gain access to prospective customers. We also look forward to partners who would like to offer Pragati services to their base of MSMEs.”
Alok Mittal further added, “What makes this value proposition uniquely appealing is that the support system enabled by the Pragati platform can mutually benefit both small businesses seeking continuity and growth as well as the service providers looking to expand their customer base. For instance, in our recent survey, we found that 45% of our customers were facing a shortage of staff during the lockdown, a situation that can become exacerbated in the face of the ongoing migration of daily wage workers away from the cities. Here, a manpower management service provider can use Pragati to help out the ventures facing staff shortage while promoting its business at the same time.”
(Source – Indifi)