Slice的无银行账户信用卡赌注在RBI禁令后通过并入小型金融银行而存活

做的是什么生意

Slice issued card-like credit products and UPI payments to young Indians, then became a shareholder-run small finance bank through a 2024 merger.

启动资金：Raised a $50M Series C led by Tiger Global in June 2022 at a $1.5B+ valuation; earlier rounds plus later funding pushed total raised well past $200M.

起因

Founder Rajan Bajaj built Slice to serve Indians that credit bureaus had almost no data on. By mid-2022 the app claimed over 12 million users and was issuing 300,000–400,000 cards a month, one of the highest volumes in India.

经过

In June 2022 the RBI barred fintechs from loading credit lines into prepaid instruments, killing Slice's core model overnight. Slice reworked cards into per-transaction loans, then bought 10% of North East Small Finance Bank and in October 2023 won rare RBI approval to merge with it. NCLT and other approvals followed through 2024.

结果

The merger closed effective 27 October 2024, folding Slice's operations, assets and brand into NESFB — making the fintech a bank, an outcome only a handful of Indian startups have achieved.

可借鉴之处

当监管机构划定边界时，依赖漏洞的贷款模式是租约，而不是资产；成功的回应是在监管帐篷内移动，而不是对抗禁令。