Innovation in FinTech
India rebuilt its payment rails in public, and the rest of financial services has been catching up ever since. This category recognises the products and infrastructure moving money, credit and financial access forward — from UPI-native experiences to underwriting models and embedded finance.
Who should enter
- Payment products, rails and orchestration layers handling real transaction volume
- Lending and underwriting innovation, including alternative data and cash-flow-based credit
- Wealth, broking and personal finance products that changed customer behaviour
- Financial infrastructure: KYC, reconciliation, fraud, compliance and risk tooling
- Embedded finance built into a non-financial product
How entries are evaluated
Nominations in this category are assessed against the criteria below by an independent jury panel, not by the organisers.
- Scale and reliability — transaction volume, uptime, or customers served
- Regulatory soundness; innovation that could not survive supervision does not qualify
- Measurable outcome for the end customer: cost, access, speed or safety
- Defensibility of the approach against incumbents and against copycats
Who judges this category
The Aegis Graham Bell Awards jury is an independent panel of around 250 academics, scientists, government officials, industry experts and investors, drawn from institutions including the IITs, the IIMs, the IIITs, the Indian School of Business, the Department of Science & Technology, MeitY and CERT-In, and from organisations such as the ITU, GSMA and leading venture funds. Jurors are matched to the categories where their expertise lies. See the full jury panel.
Recognition
Winners are recognised at the 17th Aegis Graham Bell Awards ceremony on 18 February 2027 at Hotel Ashoka, Chanakyapuri, New Delhi, and join a roll of honour that runs back to 2008. Nominees may also be assessed for AGBA Innovation Star Certification.
Previous winners
Winners recognised in this and every other category are listed edition by edition in the winners archive, covering the 1st through the 16th edition.
Frequently asked questions
Can a bank enter FinTech, or should it enter Banking?
Enter Banking if the innovation sits inside banking operations or a banking product. Enter FinTech if you have built payment, lending or financial infrastructure that stands on its own.
Do we have to disclose transaction volumes?
You need to give the jury enough to judge scale. If figures are commercially sensitive, check the nomination guidelines for how to submit them.
How do I submit a nomination?
Nominations are submitted through the nomination process, which sets out the stages, the supporting material required and the current edition’s dates.
Related categories
- Innovation in Core AI — Recognising foundation models, agentic AI, RAG systems, edge inference and MLOps built in India.
- Innovation in Cyber Security — Recognising threat detection, privacy engineering, identity and security operations innovation in India.
Enter this category
Submit a nomination for the 17th Aegis Graham Bell Awards, or explore all 31 categories if another one fits your innovation better.