NPCI Bharat BillPay has introduced the concept of a centralized digital infrastructure designed to connect billing, payment, reconciliation, and financing processes. The goal of this system is to eliminate major obstacles for small and medium enterprises (SMEs), namely the complexity of converting sales into cash and transforming cash flows into credit resources.
The proposed system can help address the issue of formal credit deficit in the SME sector, estimated at 60 lakh crore rupees, while simultaneously reducing friction associated with receiving and matching payments.
This infrastructure envisions the digitization of the order-to-payment cycle through standardized APIs and the automation of reconciliation for over 200 million monthly GST e-invoices. Invoices confirmed by buyers can become financially backed documents, allowing lenders to assess borrowers based on the strength of their cash flows, rather than solely on collateral. Furthermore, a unified information layer can reduce discrepancies that lead to delays in SME payments.
According to a report prepared by NPCI Bharat BillPay in collaboration with Bain & Company, formal credit of approximately 34 lakh crore rupees covers only a fraction of the estimated SME debt financing demand of 92 lakh crore rupees, leaving a gap of about 60 lakh crore rupees. This deficit is most pronounced among smaller businesses, where formal channels satisfy only 30%–40% of the debt need.
The problem is exacerbated by payment delays: according to the report, about 8.1 lakh crore rupees of SME accounts receivable remains frozen due to untimely payments. Financial teams spend 30% to 40% of their time on transaction reconciliation and matching, including invoice processing, payment monitoring, and exception handling.
The core issue is not the lack of digital components, but their inability to interact with each other. Although India has digitized many aspects of its business ecosystem, the fragmentation of information flows across different platforms continues to create costs for businesses and limit their access to capital.
Bain & Company partner Saurabh Trehan noted that the next phase of B2B digitalization will require closer integration between business systems, payment providers, banks, financiers, and government systems. He stated that 'the next chapter of B2B transformation in India is not just about accelerating the movement of money; it is about making the underlying transaction visible, verifiable, and actionable across the entire ecosystem.'
The proposed layer will provide the overall infrastructure for these connections. Based on it, advanced analytics and agentic artificial intelligence can be developed to provide cash flow insights, dynamic risk scoring, agent-based credit underwriting, and market intelligence.
Noopur Chaturvedi, Managing Director and CEO of NBBL, emphasized that interoperability will become a key element of B2B commerce as companies digitize operations. She added that 'the future of B2B commerce will be built on interoperability.' A standardized and connected system can unify billing, payments, reconciliation, and financing, improving credit access for underserved SMEs.
The potential of this initiative extends beyond lending. According to the report, India's formal business sector is valued at over 130 lakh crore rupees and accounts for about 45% of the country's GDP. The interconnected digital ecosystem is identified as one of four factors contributing to the productivity enhancement of this sector.
