New Delhi, Sept. 18 -- India's financial "rails" have turned competition into forced collaboration, industry executives said during a panel discussion at the VCCircle Finserv Investment Summit 2026 in Mumbai on Friday.

The rails, or shared digital infrastructure, are so valuable that there is little point in building them for oneself, whether it is UPI or the Bharat Bill Payment System, now known as Bharat Connect, said Shweta Dasgupta, head of product at NPCI Bharat BillPay Ltd.

She said India's public rails have helped reduce information asymmetry and allowed companies to differentiate themselves through service rather than early-mover advantages.

The panel, titled "Co-opetition: Reinventing Financial Services Across Banks, NBFCs, Fintechs", also included Pankaj Gupta, managing director and chief executive of Godrej Finance; Ashish Mehrotra, managing director and CEO of Northern Arc; and Baskar Babu Ramachandran, managing director and CEO of Suryoday Bank.

Panellists discussed how the availability of strong rails that everyone can access means collaboration is no longer driven by choice or ideology but by hard economics. Institutions are increasingly pushed towards partnership models rather than owning the entire stack.

Suryoday Bank's Ramachandran said accountability now has to be ecosystem-wide when anything goes wrong.

"It goes without saying that the customer is owned by the entire ecosystem and (all of) the partners. It's not just one (partner)," Ramachandran said, adding that customers no longer distinguish between a bank, fintech, or NBFC.

Partnerships also help firms gain insights and access to new and undiversified areas.

"As a company, we understand broadly almost all the segments across the spectrum with our management team, experience, and depth. Then there are certain segments which we do not understand as an organisation, (then) we do partnerships," said Godrej Finance's Gupta. "The primary thing here is access to capital and access to the customer segment, and (consequent) understanding."

The panelists argued that the old mindset of "partner now, disintermediate later" is being displaced by long-term partnerships that combine capabilities.

In a country like India, the objective of the digital lending guidelines is to make the lending institution responsible for its actions, ensure transparency and protect customer interests.

Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from VC Circle.