ICICI Bank introduces iStartup2.0 in India

By Edil Corneille

Today, ICICI Bank announced the launch of a programme for startups that takes care of their banking as well as beyond-banking needs such as regulatory assistance, analytics, staffing, accounting, customer acquisition, and digital outreach to customers, among others. iStartup2.0 offers customers an eponymous Current Account which is available in three variants of Platinum, Gold, and Silver. Businesses up to 10 years old including partnerships, private and public limited companies as well as limited liability partnerships can opt for the Current Account.

Startups can open an account and get the account number instantly at the time of incorporation as the bank has integrated its APIs with the website of the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA). It is said to offer convenience to founders/ entrepreneurs as it saves time and effort since they don’t have to fill the details again to apply for an account. ICICI sends an official to startups at a time of their choice to verify the original documents for KYC.

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The Current Account has a Relationship Manager available. Premium savings account for promoters and salary accounts for employees and waiver of quarterly average balance for a year are the other benefits. Startups can customise and choose the facilities required in their account and use the single account for domestic and international trade transactions with preferential pricing.

The beyond-banking services are available under an umbrella named ‘Startup Assist’ that offers services in association with partners. With ‘Startup Assist’, the convenience of single-point access to a host of services is available. It consists of a ‘Set-up’ concierge, which provides access to an array of experts at a discounted price to help startups with complex services like company registration, taxation, compliance, logistics, facility management among others.

For startups wanting to expand business digitally in the virtual world, a ‘Digital concierge’ is available. It offers a one-stop solution for services ranging from website development & hosting, social media marketing, SEO & SEM among others, thus making the digital transformation of a start simpler and easier. Furthermore, the ICICI Bank has tied up with various other companies to bring in offers on solutions for instance on ‘Work-From-Home’, IT hardware deals, web-hosting, accounting software, telecom packages, printing, and stationery, among others.

Pankaj Gadgil, Head- Self Employed Segment, ICICI Bank said, “The MSME & self-employed segment in India is the backbone of the economy. Within this, we foresee that the startup segment in the country is poised for rapid growth with favourable regulations in the ecosystem and high spirit of entrepreneurship. We believe that ‘iStartup 2.0’ is the most comprehensive programme available in the country. It offers them unprecedented convenience of getting on-boarded with us instantly in a digital manner during incorporation with MCA. It undertakes all business, trade and personal banking requirements within this one relationship and transact digitally using the robust mobile and internet banking platforms on-the-go.

Our research shows that startups also need immense hand-holding initially for other areas of business like website development, digital marketing, staffing solutions, regulatory and tax solutions and accounting. Armed with this insight, we have tied up with companies who are leaders in their fields to offer services under ‘Startup Assist’. It provides a ‘one-stop shop’ for nearly all the early stage as well as growth stage needs of a startup. We believe that this ‘all-in-one’ and comprehensive iStartup 2.0 programme will provide easy banking and beyond- banking services to start ups, free up their bandwidth from paper-intensive procedures and thus boost their business growth by improving overall productivity and efficiency.”