News by SB Informer

India: Citibank launches CitiBusiness to target small businesses and professionals

SB Informer
Thursday, June 1, 2006; 02:23 AM

Citibank India, a part of Citigroup, the world’s leading provider of financial services, has launched "CitiBusiness," a suite of business and financial solutions targeted at the small businesses and professionals (SBP) community with annual turnovers of up to Rs. 50 crore (USD 10MM).
 
Small and medium size enterprises make up 95% of businesses in Asia Pacific. In India, the small businesses and professionals (SBP) community is estimated at more than three million, representing over 98% of business enterprises locally.
 
Through this new offering, Citibank responds to the key insights obtained on the present-day needs of the SBP community from their financial services providers. According to an independent survey commissioned by Citibank in November 2005, it was found that small business companies and professionals in India often lack the resources, support and networks to expand their business. Among the findings is the fact that the SBP segment is over-banked but under-served. These companies demand a long-term relationship orientation, product customization and flexibility, financial partnership for overcoming scale disadvantages, all which providers typically offer only to large corporations.
 
The survey further concludes that SBP segment participants are disappointed that banking services received by them are merely transactional services and small loans, and because of their size and relatively low cash flow requirements, their relationship itself is often not well attended. Furthermore, SBPs employ fewer people and hence do not have the manpower for non-core business activities such as Accounting and HR, as their larger counterparts. All of these weaken SBPs competitiveness and restrict their expansion.
 
CitiBusiness aims to comprehensively address these customer concerns through four distinct offerings: PowerAccess, the only community of its kind supported by a financial institution designed to address the scale disadvantages faced by smaller businesses by leveraging on the collective power of CitiBusiness customers; the CitiBusiness Account, the relationship core, serviced by a dedicated Relationship Manager for both personal and business banking needs; the CitiBusiness Card, a business payment credit card based on the VISA platform that offers large-size credit lines of up to Rs.10 Lakhs; and specialized business lending products such as short-term unsecured business loans, term loans, overdraft facilities, and non-fund based limits for letters of credit, bank guarantees and even future contracts. The range of these facilities can be from Rs. 10 Lakhs to up to Rs. 10 crore. SBP can thus get assistance for equipment finance, working capital, export finance, and purchase of commercial real estate. The package is made more meaningful with the addition of advisory services for strategy, marketing, HR, and web services, among others.
 
In addition, the CitiBusiness suite also provides customers a comprehensive evaluation of their financial health through Business CitiPro, a custom-developed application that benchmarks SBPs with their peers.
 
Speaking on the occasion, Mr. P.S. Jayakumar, Country Business Manager, Global Consumer Group, Citigroup India, said, "The small businesses and professionals community is key to India’s continuing economic vitality and their contribution to exports, employment generation and to the country’s GDP is remarkable. We are extremely pleased to bring this exciting new generation of companies into our spectrum of customers through the CitiBusiness platform."
 
Mr. Rajiv Jamkhedkar, Business Manager, CitiBusiness, Citibank N.A., added, "Through CitiBusiness, we aim to place this new segment of SBP center stage. The survey provided us with a 360 degree view of the values, needs and ambitions of our customers and we are confident that CitiBusiness will naturally fill the gap between what is being offered by the market and what these companies really need."
 
Presently, PowerAccess hosts exclusive deals and discounts for CitiBusiness customers on business-related requirements from DHL, eOfficePlanet (eOP) India Pvt. Ltd., Fortune Hotels, Hewlett Packard, Samsika Marketing Consultants Pvt. Ltd., Sarovar Park Plaza, among others. It also offers a complete assortment of value-added information such as travel services, events and seminars, resource center, and business assistance. The network will be continually expanded with the empanelment of more such renowned and reliable service partners.
 
In addition to the enhanced credit limits, the CitiBusiness Card has all the essential features of a Citibank Gold Card along with cash limits of up to 60% of the credit line, the flexibility to assign and set credit lines for employees, and access to additional funding.

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