According to a senior executive, the State Bank of India (SBI), the country’s largest lender, is setting up a unit to manage project financing solutions for “new age industries” such as artificial intelligence, e-commerce, and fintech.
Ashwini Kumar Tewari, a managing director at the bank, said that the SBI aims to complete the project within a year and will hire ‘specialized professionals’ to staff it. He added that an external consultant is also being appointed.
SBI’s project shifts banks’ focus to emerging tech sectors
Tewari stated that the project finance unit will be called the ‘Centre of Excellence for Project Financing’ and will offer insights to other financial institutions.
The project was introduced at a time when new-age tech sectors such as e-commerce and fintech have spiked due to widespread access to smartphones and improved internet services in India.
As a result, India currently has over 820 million internet users, which is expected to surge to 1.2 billion by 2030.
Furthermore, the country‘s rapid AI adoption has driven global and domestic companies to build data centers in India. OpenAI is reportedly in talks to set up facilities, while AWS and Blackstone have pledged billions for new data centers.
Therefore, SBI’s decision to set up a new unit provides dedicated and swift solutions to these new-age sectors. As a result, financial institutions have changed their focus toward the new-age tech sector amid its increasing prominence in injecting money into the economic system.
SBI expands project finance as India fast-tracks infrastructure growth
The new initiative will broaden SBI’s project finance and structuring unit, which evaluates, structures, and funds big infrastructure projects. Increasingly, the bank has been putting more capital into new-age industries and renewable energy, suggesting it’s taking a new approach to project financing.
These sectors are set to witness more investments as Prime Minister Narendra Modi fast-tracks infrastructure development. According to SBI’s annual report, the bank financed 48 large-scale projects through its project finance division in the financial year 2024. Analysts expect this will make SBI an innovation-driven and sustainable economic growth leader.
However, on Wednesday, SBI experienced a technical problem with its UPI payment services, which caused inconvenience to users. The State Bank of India stated on X post, “We are facing technical issues in UPI, due to which customers may face intermittent issues in availing UPI services…Customers may continue to use UPI lite services for uninterrupted services.”
A few hours ago, the bank also cautioned all its customers and the general public about many deepfake videos being circulated on Social Media, falsely claiming the launch of an Al-based platform showcasing lucrative investment schemes supported by the State Bank of India in association with the Govt. of India and some multinational companies.
According to SBI, these videos misuse technology to create false narratives and deceive people into making financial commitments in fraudulent schemes. The bank has distanced itself from such schemes that promise unrealistic or unusually high returns and advises its customers always to verify information from their official website,
