When a 51-year-old financial powerhouse decides to reinvent itself for a generation raised on smartphones, the results can be transformative. Shriram Capital, best known for financing India’s bottom-of-the-pyramid entrepreneurs, truck owners, and small businesses, Life and General Insurance has taken a bold leap into the digital age with the launch of its Shriram One App.
Shriram Capital operates across multiple verticals: Shriram Finance (NBFC), Shriram Life Insurance, Shriram General Insurance, and Shriram Wealth. Each vertical traditionally had its own applications and processes, making customer engagement fragmented.
The vision for Shriram One was clear—bring everything under one roof. Customers would no longer need multiple apps to access different services. Instead, one application would handle fixed deposits, loans, insurance products, and wealth management solutions, all while enabling payments and lifestyle services.
“We wanted one app to do everything—from opening a fixed deposit to booking travel tickets. It’s about convenience, but it’s also about future-proofing our engagement with customers,” says Sendil Kumar Venkatesan, CTO, Shriram Capital.
The Shriram One Super App is a unified digital platform that brings together all of Shriram Capital’s financial services and value-added offerings into a single mobile application. It allows customers to open and manage fixed deposits, apply for and track loans, purchase life and general insurance products, and explore wealth management solutions—all from one place.
The motivation behind Shriram One was twofold:
1. Cross-Sell Across the Group – Shriram Finance, Shriram Life Insurance, Shriram General Insurance, and Shriram Wealth under one digital roof.
2. Attract Next-Gen Customers – deliver a single, intuitive platform with an experience similar to popular consumer apps.
What the Super App Delivers
The Shriram One Super App is designed as an ecosystem of services, not just a banking tool. Customers can:
* Open and manage fixed deposits quickly with a simplified process that takes just a few clicks.
* Apply for insurance products and generate leads on Lending products
* Use UPI payments and the Bharat Bill Payment System (BBPS) for a range of transactions.
* Access lifestyle conveniences like travel bookings via integrated partners such as EaseMyTrip, RedBus , Shopping, Entertainment, Services etc
The app also serves as a cross-selling platform. For example, customers with fixed deposits can explore life or general insurance, while insurance policyholders can be offered wealth management solutions.
Technology Backbone: Cloud, Kubernetes & Microservices
Unlike its legacy core systems, which remain on-premises for operational reasons, the super app was developed entirely on the cloud. Built using Kubernetes and micro services architecture, it ensures scalability, flexibility, and fast integration of new features.
“We wanted an app that could automatically scale up during high demand and scale down during lean periods. Kubernetes and microservices were the obvious choice,” notes Sendil Kumar.
This approach also facilitates integration with third-party APIs, essential for features like UPI and BBPS, and for connecting with external service providers to build an extended ecosystem.
The Numbers: Early Success and Customer Impact
The app has already onboarded 17+ million customers, of which nearly 50% are new to the Shriram ecosystem—a clear sign of its appeal to the younger demographic.
Digital transactions have surged as well.
“One of my peers saw a demo and within minutes opened a fixed deposit through the app. That’s the power of simplifying customer journeys,” Sendil Kumar says proudly.
Lessons from the Journey:
The super app’s development wasn’t without challenges—post-COVID attrition, migrating customers from multiple legacy apps, and integrating diverse services posed significant hurdles. From these experiences, Sendil Kumar, felt that for any application development we should ensure that there should be REST, where he means REST as :
Resiliency: The ability to recover quickly from system disruptions.
Efficiency: Optimizing infrastructure and ensuring high performance.
Stability: Building robust systems with stable performance.
Transformation: A mindset of continuous innovation to stay ahead of competitors.
“Security is non-negotiable. With UPI and third-party APIs, we cannot compromise even for a second,” says Sendil Kumar, emphasizing the importance of cyber resilience.
Cost, Compliance & Cloud Realities
While the shift to cloud enabled speed and scalability, it also came with cost implications.
“Cloud credits look great at first, but once they expire, costs can skyrocket. We have to constantly demonstrate value and control infrastructure spend,” Sendil Kumar cautions.
Another key focus is regulatory compliance. Shriram operates under the oversight of multiple regulators (RBI, IRDA, SEBI), each with stringent IT guidelines, which help the group to enable strong security posture. Company has invested heavily in observability tools to monitor performance and security in real-time, ensuring adherence to compliance while supporting rapid innovation.
“We want to create an ecosystem where partners, processes, and people work together seamlessly. That’s how we’ll stay relevant in the age of digital finance,” Sendil Kumar explains.