Indian businesses are setting up fintech partnerships at the Singapore Fintech Festival led by the State Bank of India’s launch of an innovation hub in the city state.

The State Bank of India (SBI) Innovation Hub was launched in partnership with APIX, a Singapore-based global collaborative innovation platform for financial institutions and fintechs, at the festival being held from November 6 to 8.

It is to provide dedicated space for fintechs, startups, and innovators worldwide to design next-generation financial solutions tailored to meet the digital needs of SBI’s diverse customer base.

The initiative is aimed at driving financial innovation and digital transformation as well as advancing financial inclusion, SBI said.

Designed to accelerate digital transformation, the SBI Innovation Hub allows participants to leverage SBI’s 250+ financial service APIs to develop and customise solutions within a secure sandbox environment.

Through structured challenges, hackathons, and partnership opportunities, the platform provides fintechs and startups with unique pathways to gain recognition, compete for official partnerships, and ultimately reach millions of users across India.

Vidya Krishnan, Deputy Managing Director – IT at SBI, said virtually at the launch, “The Innovation Hub of State Bank of India is a key step in our digital transformation mission to foster innovations across our banking and financial services.

“The platform’s capability for mutual discovery of APIs will enable the bank and group companies in collaborating with global innovators to create and build solutions that are innovative, impactful, and highly customer centric. We are simplifying the onboarding process by providing a single touchpoint for fintechs and startups.”

Umang Moondra, CEO of APIX, said, “While APIX has collaborated with many world-leading financial institutions, and fintechs, partnering with a major institution like SBI and delivering a unique platform dedicated to its needs is a tremendous achievement.

“The result of our collaboration is an exciting and pioneering innovation hub that represents a groundbreaking opportunity for fintech and innovators to engage with one of the world’s largest banks in a way that will benefit millions of customers.

“It also levels the playing field for innovators by providing direct access to core elements of innovation such as SBI’s secure sandbox and a suite of APIs, empowering developers to build solutions that resonate with consumers globally and promote financial inclusion,” he said that the launch.

Separately, Indian-origin Gupshup said it has established a strong foothold in Singapore’s rapidly evolving conversational AI landscape, particularly making waves in the financial services sector with a partnership with Standard Chartered Bank.

The partnership will showcase Gupshup’s expertise, where its AI-powered digital assistant handles complex banking queries in real-time, significantly enhancing customer experience and operational efficiency.

Gupshup’s specialisation in domain-specific large language models (LLMs) enables the creation of highly contextualised AI assistants that understand sector-specific nuances and compliance requirements.

“This specialised approach has proven particularly valuable in Singapore’s sophisticated banking sector, where precision and regulatory compliance are paramount,” said Ali Asgar Lightwalla, Senior Director of Sales for BFSI.

“Beyond banking, Gupshup’s innovative conversational AI solutions are transforming customer engagement across various sectors in Singapore, from retail and healthcare to logistics, helping businesses automate customer interactions while maintaining personalisation and service quality.”

Truecaller, the Swedish caller identification app provider, has named Rishit Jhunjhunwala as its group chief executive officer (CEO), effective from January 9, 2025.

This move comes as current CEO Alan Mamedi and Chief Strategy Officer Nami Zarringhalam decide to step down from their operational roles to focus on their board responsibilities and act as strategic advisors to Truecaller.

“We have a fantastic management team in whom we have immense trust, and we have a long-term strategy that everyone supports, and which has started to yield positive results. With these two pieces in place, we are convinced that the company is well positioned for future success to enable us to focus more on long-term strategy,” the duo, who co-founded the company in 2009, said in a statement.

Mamedi and Zarringhalam will continue to be employed by the Swedish company as advisors until June 30 2025.

“Nami and I will remain committed to supporting Rishit and the entire leadership team as board members and strategic advisors, and we are excited to watch the company continue to thrive under Rishit’s leadership,” the Co-founders of Truecaller, said in a personal letter following the announcement.

Jhunjhunwala has been with Truecaller since 2015, initially serving as head of product. In June 2020, he was promoted to chief product officer, and in May 2021, he assumed the role of managing director for India.

“His deep product knowledge and leadership experience have been critical to our success, and we have always regarded him as a co-founder of Truecaller. Over the past two years, I’ve had the privilege of personally mentoring Rishit to take on a larger role within the company, and Nami and I are confident that he is ready to lead the company on a global scale,” the letter added.

Jhunjhunwala, born and raised in India but a Swedish citizen, worked and lived in Sweden from 2015 to 2022.

“Together with the rest of the management team, I look forward to taking Truecaller to even greater heights. Having worked closely with Alan and Nami since 2015, I know these are big shoes to fill, but I am confident to continue tirelessly working towards getting us closer to our mission to make future communication more safe and secure,” Jhunjhunwala, remarked.

The Swedish caller identification app, with India as its largest market globally, has over 500 million monthly active users.

For the Sweden-based company, India remains the biggest market with the region accounting for 75.8% of the total net sales for the financial year 2022-23, owing to its three revenue streams—Truecaller for Business, premium subscriptions, and ads.

Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) major Freshworkshas reported a 22% growth in revenue, climbing to $186.6 million for the third quarter ended September 30, 2024, up from $153.6 million in the same period last year.

The Nasdaq-listed company parred its losses by 3.55% to $29.9 million during the quarter under review, compared to $31 million in the previous year.

“Freshworks delivered a strong third quarter, with revenue growing 22% year over year to $186.6 million, net cash provided by operating activities margin improving to 23%, and free cash flow margin improving to 21%,” said Dennis Woodside, CEO & President of Freshworks.

“We continue to see mid-market and enterprise companies choose Freshworks as the AI-powered service platform that enables them to scale with exceptional customer and employee experiences,” he added.

Total income from operations amounted to $24 million, up from $17.4 million in the third quarter of 2023.

Earlier in May this year, the California-headquartered firm announced the appointment of Dennis Woodside as the new CEO, with Girish Mathrubootham transitioning to the role of Executive Chairman.

The company reported a rise in its total operating expenses to $195 million in Q3 of 2024, up from $166 million in the corresponding period last year.

The firm reported free cash flow of $40.1 million for the third quarter of 2024, up from $22.1 million a year earlier. As of September 30, 2024, cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities totaled $1.05 billion.

The net dollar retention rate stood at 107%, compared to 106% in the second quarter of 2024 and 108% in the third quarter of 2023.

Net Dollar Retention (NDR) is a key performance metric that measures how well a company retains and expands revenue from existing customers over time.

The number of customers contributing over $5,000 in annual recurring revenue (ARR) grew 14% year-over-year, reaching 22,359.

In addition, Freshworks onboarded several new customers to its portfolio, including Republic Airways, City of Bellevue, ChampionX, University of Oxford, Sparebank 1, aand TechStyle Fashion Group, among others.

Freshworks also announced that its Board of Directors has approved a stock repurchase programme, authorising the buyback of up to $400 million in outstanding Class A common stock.

A stock repurchase programme or buyback is when a company buys back its own shares from the open market in order to increase the value of the remaining shares by reducing the overall supply.

The firm ended the quarter with the launch of Freddy AI Agent, an easy-to-deploy autonomous service agent designed to enhance both customer experience (CX) and employee experience (EX).

The introduction of Freddy AI Agent comes at a time when many enterprises are adopting AI agents to streamline their workflows. The AI agents can be deployed within minutes and have resolved an average of 45% of customer support requests and 40% of IT service inquiries, said the company in a statement.

In September, Freshworks welcomed former ServiceNow executive Murali Swaminathan as its new Chief Technology Officer. Additionally, after nearly five years, the company’s Chief Product Officer Prakash Ramamurthy stepped down to pursue new career opportunities.

An SEC filing on August 5 announced the appointment of Philippa Lawrence as Chief Accounting Officer. Earlier in the year, Pradeep Rathinam, who served as Chief Revenue Officer, left the company in February.