NPCI To Create BHIM Subsidiary, Appoints New CEO To Drive Digital Payments Expansion

The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is reportedly planning to spin off its Bharat Interface for Money (BHIM) app into an independent subsidiary to bolster its position in India's digital payments sector, according to industry sources quoted by Business Standard.

Lalitha Nataraj, formerly of IDFC FIRST Bank and ICICI Bank, has been appointed as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the new subsidiary. The goal is to establish BHIM as a standalone entity with a renewed emphasis on growing its user base as a payment application. This move has received backing from both the government and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), who are supportive of efforts to expand the app's reach.

As of now, the NPCI has not commented on the development, and Moneycontrol has not independently verified the information.

This strategic shift is seen as an effort by the NPCI to mitigate the concentration risk in India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) market. Currently, PhonePe and Google Pay, backed by Walmart and Google respectively, dominate the market, accounting for approximately 85 per cent of UPI transactions. In contrast, BHIM's market share is relatively small, with only 22.72 million transactions in June, representing just 0.16 per cent of the total UPI transaction volume.