SIDBI, Google ink pact with $15 mn corpus to help MSMEs

Hyderabad: Business all over the world have been hit by the Covid-19 and they are in short of either finance, manufacturing material, etc., to provide assistance to such business, Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI), the principal financial institution engaged in the promotion, financing and development of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) has announced partnership with Google for having a social impact lending programme with financial assistance up to Rs 100 lakh at competitive interest rates targeted at micro enterprises.

This partnership brings a corpus of $15 million (approx. Rs110 crore) to micro enterprises as a crisis response related to Covid-19 to reinvigorate the MSME sector in India and also a loan programme targeted at micro enterprises (having turnover up to five crore), with loan sizes ranging between Rs25 lakh to Rs1 crore, being implemented by SIDBI. The major focus under the programme shall be on enterprises run by women entrepreneurs, with suitable interest rate concession.

Sivasubramanian Ramann, IA&AS, Chairman and Managing Director of SIDBI said: "MSMEs are undoubtedly the life blood of the Indian economy serving as catalysts to economic growth and helping usher in equitable growth and social change. In line with SIDBI's mandate and commitment to the sector to ensure its sustainable growth, we have launched various programs for an emergency response to the sudden advent of Covid-19 such as Safe, Safe plus scheme, Arog, and Shwas. Today we feel proud that SIDBI's efforts in reviving the sector are backed by a strong collaboration with Google, a public spirited and conscientious partner. This one-of-a-kind program brings a corpus of Rs 110 crore to small businesses and crisis response related to Covid-19 to reinvigorate the MSME sector in India. This also marks SIDBI's launch of a paperless journey to its customers from onboarding to the disbursal stage."