The Rise of Infrastructure-Led Fintech: How India Can Leapfrog with ‘Rails over Apps’

We often dream that innovation begins in urban boardrooms and eventually trickles down to small towns or rural corners. The future is first imagined in metros and later adapted by the rest.

But the truth on the ground tells a different story.

Today, it’s the Kirana store in Gorakhpur using UPI for supplier payments, MSMEs in Surat accessing credit via OCEN, and farmers in Bhopal verifying land records digitally. Innovation isn’t just trickling down It’s rising. Infrastructure-led fintech isn’t just connecting India; it’s reversing the flow of transformation.

As someone building at the intersection of access and infrastructure, I see this bottom-up momentum not as an exception but a new rule.

When talking about the past decade, India has been coming to view itself as a global force in digital finance. The narrative talks about the app-based fintech solutions whether wallets, lending apps or neobanks, many of which were tailored for the smartphone generation.

Now, while apps got all the attention, the real revolution was quietly happening underneath: a new layer of digital infrastructure, public rails that now form the backbone of India’s financial revolution. Only because we ought to transcend the boundaries of isolated apps, with the shared, robust digital infrastructure in place.

And today, we stand on a pivotal moment in the history of fintech, wherein the shift is underway from apps over everything to rail before everything. And this transformation could position India as the global blueprint for infrastructure-led fintech.

From Apps to Architecture: The Evolution

In reality, the first wave of Indian fintech was app-centric. Prominent players such as Paytm, PhonePe and others brought digital payments to the fingertips of millions. Lending startups redefined credit access with slick interfaces and quick approvals. Some of these solutions were largely proprietary, built on fragile integrations with legacy systems.

But then, game-changers entered: UPI (Unified Payments Interface) and Aadhaar. With open protocols, interoperable design, and government backing, these public rails didn’t just support fintech innovation they enabled it at scale. They laid the groundwork for what we now call Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI).

PaySprint, as a pioneer in this space, has been instrumental in scaling these digital capabilities by offering one of the largest and most versatile API stacks for banking, verification, and financial services empowering BHARAT to transact smarter, faster, and more securely.

Why Infrastructure-led FinTech Matters

The real power of fintech doesn’t lie in shiny apps it lies in enabling access at scale, reducing friction, and lowering the costs of services. Infrastructure-led fintech allows for exactly that:

• Interoperability: Platforms like UPI made it possible for banks, fintechs, and even kirana stores to transact across networks, not just within walled gardens.
• Cost Efficiency: By providing a shared backbone, the infrastructure reduces redundancy and overhead, allowing innovators to focus on unique value rather than plumbing.
• Inclusion at Scale: Tools like Aadhaar and OCEN (Open Credit Enablement Network) democratize access to credit and identity, allowing even underserved populations to become participants in the digital economy.
• Compliance and Trust: Public rails create standardisation, transparency, and auditability critical for sectors like lending, insurance, and verification.

Well, if UPI redefined payment transactions, OCEN is poised to do the same for credit. By unbundling the traditional lending model and allowing any platform to become the Loan Service Provider (LSP), OCEN empowers MSMEs to access credit from formal sources, without friction or dependency on a single provider.

This is where rails over apps becomes not just a concept but a necessity. A lending app can serve a few million users. But a credit rail like OCEN can transform the economy.

PaySprint has been at the forefront of this movement with solutions like SprintVerify, SprintNXT, and SprintOPN designed to integrate directly with these rails and enable real-time verification, banking, and financial access at scale.

What India Gets Right

It’s not just about enabling startups. It’s about reimagining how citizens, banks, and the government interact faster, cheaper, and more equitably.

India’s Digital Public Infrastructure is unique. Unlike the West, where private companies build closed ecosystems, India has chosen to invest in foundational digital rails—identity (Aadhaar), payments (UPI), data consent (Account Aggregator) and credit (OCEN). This creates a level playing field for private innovation on top of open, public infrastructure.

The Road Ahead: Rails as a Platform

The next decade of fintech won’t be dominated by super apps, but by super rails decentralised, composable, and interoperable. With UPI crossing 13 billion transactions a month and the Account Aggregator framework gaining adoption, we are moving towards an ecosystem where every app can tap into real-time payments, verified identity, credit access, and secure data sharing.

For this to succeed, the ecosystem must:

• Continue to invest in DPI innovation
• Encourage private players to build on top of open protocols
• Ensure data privacy and consent remain non-negotiable
• Extend these rails globally through cross-border partnerships

In reality, India’s fintech infrastructure isn’t just app-deep. It is infrastructure-first. By prioritising rails over apps, we’re building a financial ecosystem that is scalable, inclusive and future-proof. In doing so, we are not just digitising transactions we’re redefining trust, access and opportunity for the next billion users.

The apps will follow. But it is the rails and players like PaySprint that will change the game.