By Prakash Narayan-
India’s gross domestic product (GDP) growth over the last decade is averaging 5.5% – making India the fastest-growing economy in the world. India is poised to become the world’s third-largest economy by 2027, overtaking Japan and Germany, and have the third-largest stock market by 2030. This is all thanks to the key investments made in energy and technology. It is expected that India will have a $7.5 trillion GDP by 2031 and the Bombay Stock Exchange could deliver an 11% annual growth and reach a market capitalization of $10 trillion in or about that time frame.
The question that comes to the minds of the diaspora living in North America is how to partake in this burgeoning economy. After all, there is a lack of awareness of the operational requirements, not to mention the complex documentation and cross-border compliance requirements. Several banks in India have set up shop in the US. However, they are primarily focused on the management and transfer of funds.
The need for the hour is a platform that provides an intuitive investment platform with tailored solutions like digital onboarding, robo-investing, portfolio optimization, and cross-border taxation support—something like a wealthfront, but for the Indian context. One such platform is iNRI – a Y Combinator portfolio company. A new investor can be onboarded in less than a week (compared to months with banks). iNRI provides a tax expert marketplace to help with many compliance services like tax filing, repatriation, consultation, and inheritance.
iNRI is a registered Mutual Funds Distributor with AMFI India, which is regulated by SEBI. iNRI offers investments in Indian Mutual Funds. iNRI has over 10k, NRI users from 30 pus countries with $2million invested through the platform. iNRI’s long-term vision is to build a one-stop financial platform that offers investments, remittances, payments, insurance, and banking to NRIs.
In a conversation with Hemant Gangolia, founder and CEO of iNRI, when indica asked what motivated him to venture into India-focused iNRI; Gangolia took a pause and said that he has been residing as an NRI for the last seven years in the United States. He wanted to make some investments in India and had to run around several hurdles. He came across a few platforms for investing in the Indian market. However, these were suitable for residents of India and not NRIs. Given his diverse professional experience of 10+ years in technology, product and management consulting – including stints at Meta and McKinsey, he felt that if he faced hurdles and difficulties in getting started, others were bound to encounter similar issues. iNRI also collaborates with third parties to facilitate opening NRE/NRO accounts, get an OCI card, get a PAN card – in other words, become a one-stop shop for NRIs.
