Universal banking on Ujjivan radar after reverse merger: Ittira Davis, MD & CEO, Ujjivan Small Finance Bank

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Ujjivan Small Finance Bank, which is back in the reckoning after a couple of bad years with high level of stressed assets and an exodus at senior levels, is planning to apply for universal banking license next year after the completion of the proposed reverse merger of its holding company Ujjivan Financial Services to itself. As preparation, the lender is now focusing on gaining scale by expanding product basket, adding more branches and growing manpower by about a fourth,managing director Ittira Davis told ET in an interview. Here’s an edited excerpt.Ujjivan Small Finance has regained stability with a solid set of numbers. What helped this turnaround? Have you done anything different? The entire problem was circumstantial.

It just happened that the new management and Covid came around the same time and that’s the reason behind such a difficult period. If the two events had happened separately, then the outcome could have been different. Our core area is micro banking and the bottom of the pyramid segment was the most affected during Covid.

But importantly, it is the bottom of the pyramid segment that turned around faster when the economy revived. People in the rural segment, even from demonetisation days, could come out of the woods faster than others. When they returned to us to revive their businesses, we supported them wholeheartedly.As the head of the organization, how much would you give yourself for this revival? See, the fact that we could turn around very quickly shows the depth of the organization.

I took over in January 2022 while turnaround started in September 2021 when the bank put in place a 100-day recovery plan. That was the starting point. I came on board when already the green shoots had been in place.