The StartUp world is booming with ideas to make life simpler for masses. Keeping that in sight, Jodo, a Bangalore-based Fintech startup rolled out in January this year. Financial products are usually not customised to specific needs. Jodo touched this nerve to bring out tailored plans for specific needs of its customers.
Brainchild of IIT Alumnus, Atulya, Raghav and Koustav, Jodo works on customised financial products for middle-income households. The startup helps in managing academic expenses in families. The idea came after an 8-month extensive research by the co-founders. The key deductions from the research were that there was heavy reliance on informal financial sources like moneylenders and education was the biggest expense for 40% of interviewed household. This paved the way to bring tailored financial product for academic expenses.
For families that run on tight monthly budget, it becomes tough to manage finances when expenses like fee instalment and health care come. To help such situations, Jodo has partnered with schools in Bengaluru and for parents opting for Jodo payment plan, the startup pays the fee on their behalf. The parents, based on their financial profile, pay Jodo back throughout the year. The startup charges a nominal fee on the plan with no interest rate on the fees.
The founders are working on streamlining and digitizing the process as the product is very extensive and needs efforts to make it operationally excellent. There is a huge scope of growth for Fintech in India given the vast market opportunities. The government as well is emphasizing on digitizing processes and Jodo compliments that. According to the founders, India is urbanizing at a fast pace and they should have 100 million households in their target segment by 2025. Jodo looks a promising service which can change the way academia is looked at and make it easier for families to provide better education to their children.