YES BANK and Northern Arc Capital partner to bridge India’s credit gap

Chandigarh: YES BANK & Northern Arc Capital have entered a partnership to expand access to credit, scale digital lending and provide debt investment opportunities for its customers. This brings together balance-sheet strength, digital infrastructure, distribution capabilities, underwriting expertise, and technology platforms to expand formal credit access across underserved segments in India, in line with the government of India’s financial inclusion agenda towards fulfilling the Viksit Bharat vision of 2047. 

This strategic partnership is an outcome of YES BANK’s collaboration with Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation (SMBC), the largest strategic shareholder in YES BANK and a key shareholder in Northern Arc Capital. SMBC has helped bring together two complementary platforms with strong synergies across origination, distribution, and technology and balance-sheet capacity. This marks first of many synergistic collaborations designed to accelerate YES BANK’s and Northern Arc’s growth journey.

YES BANK is the sixth-largest private sector bank in India, with a pan-India network of 1,583 branches and BCBOs, and over 1,350 ATMs. The bank offers a wide array of products, services, and digital solutions tailored for retail, MSME, and corporate clients. With a strong franchise in digital and transaction banking, it leverages best-in-class technology and a robust API stack to maintain dominant leadership in digital payments, processing one out of every three digital transactions in India.

Northern Arc will leverage its network of 368 Originator Partners (financial institutions) to facilitate substantial credit deployment for YES BANK through its Placements Business. This partnership will provide YES BANK access to a diversified pipeline of granular credit opportunities sourced from Northern Arc’s established ecosystem of lending partners. By combining Northern Arc’s origination and structuring expertise with YES BANK’s lending capacity, the initiative is expected to strengthen the flow of formal credit to underserved borrower segments while supporting scalable and responsible credit expansion.

Further, this alliance aims to accelerate retail lending growth of both institutions through the co-lending model of Northern Arc’s nPOS. It will be supported by data-led underwriting, structured risk-sharing mechanism, and robust portfolio monitoring frameworks. Leveraging Northern Arc’s diversified origination partner ecosystem across underserved markets, designed to scale granular lending efficiently while maintaining portfolio quality and transparency. 

As part of the agreement, Northern Arc Investment Managers (NAIM), a wholly owned subsidiary of Northern Arc Capital, will offer Alternative Investment Funds (AIFs) & PMS services to YES BANK’s retail, affluent, and institutional investors. Altifi, Northern Arc Capital’s online bonds platform, will be integrated with YES BANK’s wealth ecosystem to provide seamless access to fixed-income investment products through a transparent and technology-enabled interface.

A key pillar of the partnership is the integration of technology platforms across both organizations. Northern Arc’s proprietary platforms such as nPOS, NIMBUS, and NuScore, will be integrated with YES BANK’s digital lending architecture for seamless loan onboarding and credit delivery at scale.

Commenting on the development, Ashish Mehrotra, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Northern Arc Capital, said, “India’s next phase of financial inclusion will be driven by institutions that can combine technology, distribution, and risk intelligence at scale. This partnership brings together complementary capabilities to build a more efficient and accessible financial ecosystem for underserved borrowers and emerging investors. At Northern Arc, we remain focused on strengthening the ecosystem that connects capital to opportunities across India’s evolving credit markets.”

Dr. Rajan Pental, Executive Director, YES BANK, said, “YES BANK’s partnership with Northern Arc Capital aligns with our strategy to build technology-enabled credit infrastructure that can serve India’s diverse financial needs at scale and contribute its part towards the Viksit Bharat vision for 2047. Northern Arc’s origination platforms and underwriting capabilities, combined with our strong balance-sheet and digital architecture, create a powerful engine for expanding formal credit across priority segments. On the investment front, this collaboration opens institutional-quality private credit and alternative investment opportunities to a broader client base.”

The collaboration reflects a shared commitment to building scalable financial solutions that strengthen economic participation and support the aspirations of underserved communities and emerging investors across the country.