Second Cohort of RBI Sandbox

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has released its second cohort of its regulatory sandbox. RBI has invited companies for the cross-border payments space so as to apply as part of the second cohort.

Background

The first cohort by the RBI was released under the RBI’s sandbox. It involved the companies in the retail payments space. It included companies ranging from the feature phones, offline payments or contactless payments.

Highlights

• For now, two entities have started to test their solutions while four are expected to begin the testing of their solutions soon.
• In the year 2019, India had received $83 billion. While during the first half of 2020, it received $27.4 billion. Thus, India has become the  largest recipient of the inbound remittances in the world.
• This Cohort will spur the innovations which are capable of recasting the cross-border payments landscape. The cross-border payments landscape will be done by leveraging new technologies. With the new technology; needs of a low cost, secure, convenient and transparent system in a faster manner would meet.

RBI Sandbox

RBI had released the framework for its regulatory sandbox in August 2019. The regulatory framework was framed in order to help companies and start-ups test new payments and lending solutions under the limited regulatory controls and supervision. The regulatory sandbox was created with the aim of testing the “viability of the products without the need for a larger and more expensive roll-out”. The sandbox also provides the regulators a “first-hand empirical evidence on the benefits, risks of emerging technologies and their implication.