There is no denying that the sachet economy becomes the trend in the Philippines for one obvious reason, the lack of financial capacity to afford to buy in bulk. Interestingly, while there are 1.3 million sari-sari stores patronized by 94% of the population, many of these sari-sari stores still struggle and find it hard to grow their business because of lack of capital. To address this problem, UNO Digital Bank has partnered with 1Sari Financing Corporation to help sari-sari store owners expand and have a more sustainable business.

UNO Digital Bank is one of the six digital banks licensed by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP), while 1Sari Financing Corporation provides support to MSME business owners primarily sari-sari store owners, and owners of other retail stores such as groceries and supermarkets.

“SMEs are a major driver of the Philippine economy. This partnership with 1Sari will help us drive credit inclusion for this very important segment. This is a good starting point for UNO Digital Bank in making Lending simpler and more accessible. We would like to offer loans both to the salaried class and self-employed through a combination of general-purpose loans, inventory, financing loans and working capital loans. This partnership with 1Sari Financing Corporation is just the start of our focus towards inventory financing,” Manish Bhai, UNO Digital Bank CEO and Founder.

“This partnership will give us a boost in providing loans to interested applicants. We are hopeful that with this, more and more sari-sari store owners will be able to expand and grow their business,” John Madarang, Co-founder, and President of 1Sari Financing Corporation said.

The potential for the sari-sari stores’ growth is also supported by data stating that they transact 70% of all manufactured goods in the country. Sari-sari stores are primarily cash-based businesses. They manage their cash flow on a day-by-day basis, which can limit their potential earnings. Therefore, loan access is crucial for these business owners. 

Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ (BSP) 2021 Financial Inclusion Study states that 57% of Filipinos still obtain loans through informal credit, mainly from relatives and informal loan providers. Rigid documentary requirements and the difficulty of the application process are two major reasons why borrowers choose not to apply for a loan from formal financial institutions, says the study.

UNO Digital Bank, a full-spectrum credit-led digital bank, aims to reduce informal lending practice by increasing loan access to more Filipinos. “Today, only 11% of Filipinos borrow from the formal sector (Financial Institutions and Banks). We want to take that number up. We believe credit inclusion is a very important part of financial empowerment,” Manish Bhai said.

UNO Digital Bank wants to promote responsible lending. Aside from this partnership with 1Sari, UNO is also working with Proxtera in their SME Financial Education Program. UNO is sponsoring the certification courses of 10,000 SMEs and those who successfully complete the program can avail themselves of accelerated onboarding and other exclusive offers from UNO.  

Through the use of proprietary algorithms, UNO can also make loan offers directly to those who currently only borrow from the informal sector. This is a prime example of using technology for good.

“Through this partnership with GCash, we will open the door for more people to experience fast, seamless, and well-protected digital transactions so they can avail of high-rate savings products to get started on their financial growth journey. We hope more Filipinos will be able to achieve their financial goals through GSave & UNO Digital Bank,” said Lester Cruz, Head of Liabilities and Payments -Products and Partnerships at UNO Digital Bank.

Through the GSave Marketplace, customers can manage their UNO savings accounts in one app. Filipino citizens who are at least 18 years old, and who are fully verified GCash App users with active mobile numbers and mailing addresses registered in the Philippines, are eligible to open an #UNOready savings account and an #UNOboost and/or #UNOearn Time Deposit account. Customers also get to enjoy seamless and free cash in and cash out from their GCash wallet to their UNO accounts. 

#UNOReady@GCash is a high-rate savings account that offers up to 4.25% interest p.a., higher than what is currently offered by traditional banks. Interest is credited daily, and it has no requirements for either a minimum or maintaining balance and has no service fees. Additionally, customers can get free life insurance coverage worth PHP50,000 for a minimum monthly Average Daily Balance (ADB) of PHP10,000.00.

In addition to the #UNOready@GCash services provided, UNO Digital Bank is the first to offer time deposit products in GSave through its #UNOboost@GCash and #UNOearn@GCash accounts. #UNOboost@GCash provides up to 6.50% interest p.a. time deposits. Customers have the flexibility to choose their desired term ranging from 3-12 months, while #UNOearn@GCash is also a high-yield time deposit with a guaranteed interest rate of 6.50% p.a. that can be locked-in for 12 or 24 months. It also provides monthly interest payout. Customers can open up to five tranches each for #UNOboost and #UNOearn and can deposit up to Php100,000 per tranche.

Amit Malhotra, Chief Business Officer of UNO Digital Bank added “We are a customer centric bank, and all our products and services are designed to cater to our customers’ financial needs. We are initially offering our savings products that will help them grow their money by offering better than standard industry interest rates backed by superior digital experience. Other products and services like loans, insurance, and investment products will soon follow. Our goal is to provide the platform that can help them meet their financial goals in a convenient, simple, and safe manner.” 

“I am very excited about this partnership with GCash who have been pioneers of inclusion and innovation in Philippines. Discussions around present & potential opportunities have been very progressive with like-minded approach, and with GCash as our partner, we are well-positioned to create meaningful impact by providing financial inclusion and innovative products to majority of Filipinos. The 77M+ subscribers of GCash will now have access to UNO’s products and services that can help them accelerate the achievement of their financial goals, “said Manish Bhai, Founder & CEO of UNO Digital Bank.

“Our partnership with UNO Digital Bank is in line with GCash’s goal of giving Filipinos a secure and convenient banking experience by being an all-in-one app for all their financial needs, from banking to lifestyle essentials,” said Martha Sazon, GCash’s president and CEO. “Thanks to like-minded partners like UNO, we can make sure that more Filipinos can have access to essential banking services and help them gain financial freedom.”

Since beginning operations in 2022, UNO Digital Bank has made its mission to provide services for the unbanked population and help create a better financial system with online banking solutions hinged on the latest technology. The company was one of the first Fintech companies to receive a Digital Banking License from the Banko Sentral ng Pilipinas. UNO Digital Bank continues to partner with trusted and effective members of the banking and financial services industry to help elevate the banking experience to one that is more accessible, reliable, and secure.

“When you piece all this together, the financial literacy penetration is very low because people haven’t really understood what it means to integrate into organized banking or have a relationship with financial institutions,” Manish Bhai, CEO of UNO Digital Bank, described the challenge. “We want to promote financial literacy as an entry point to the formal financial sector.” 

“SFE provides financial literacy credentials which is the first step in providing an important indicator of intent to pay,” affirmed Saurav Bhattacharyya, the CEO of Proxtera. “We are very excited to have this partnership with UNO Digital Bank in the Philippines which supports the core purpose of Proxtera: to serve MSMEs through financial inclusion.” 

Amor Maclang, Convenor of Digital Pilipinas, spoke of the project’s utmost importance: “We need to prove that unbanked MSMEs without a digital identity can be given a digital identity and also a financial footprint through education.”

The SFE Program courses are heavily subsidized to ensure they are accessible to MSMEs. Users who complete the course will receive a digitally verifiable certificate. Furthermore, users will also gain access to a resource hub with financial services tools and knowledge services. Bhai said, “What Proxtera has done is developed these modules which are effective, fun, and engaging. With this partnership, we want to make sure that these modules reach the critical mass.” 

After the MSME owners complete their training, UNO Digital Bank will further support their financial journeys by giving them access to a digital bank account and loan facilities.

Nationwide growth and stability 

In 2022, the UNO Digital Bank team held a brainstorming session to plan how to use education in promoting financial literacy.  They were thinking of producing their own training modules and doing the actual mentorship to the MSMEs themselves. However, seeing Proxtera’s SFE courses during the program’s launch in Africa and Asia made UNO decide to establish a partnership with them instead, cementing it during the recent Philippine FinTech Festival (PFF).  

The PFF highlighted ASEAN as a global powerhouse for innovators with the participation of 200 international government and industry leaders. It was convened by Digital Pilipinas, the largest private sector-led movement championing technological adoption in the country, in partnership with Elevandi, which was founded by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to foster public-private-sector dialogue for FinTech advancement.   

Bhai said the Proxtera partnership “will definitely help the business owners out there to make use of multiple financial products which will enable them to grow their business, and be profitable and self-sustaining.” 

Bhattacharyya agreed, saying, “Our whole purpose as a company is to help MSMEs in financial inclusion—which is where UNO Digital Bank is starting and targeting their customer base as well,”  

He further explained the importance of supporting MSMEs, especially when it comes to banking services and financial literacy: “MSMEs contribute to a large percentage of the employment of many countries. The moment they grow, their ability to pay their own employees grows. Everybody benefits because the fabric of society, which is a large percentage of the population employed by MSMEs, also does better economically. And that brings better overall economic stability to the country.” 

“MSMEs are the lifeline of the economy, and funding and proper money management are the lifeline of the business. The MSMEs have a need for credit rating, financial investment, and other financial services. And we, as a digital bank, feel like providing that is our moral responsibility to them,” said Amit Malhotra, Chief Business Officer of UNO Digital Bank

Moving forward

UNO Digital Bank and Proxtera are preparing for the SFE’s next phase as the MSMEs graduate. Guia Donido, Chief of the PTTC Training Division, says they will continue to enroll MSMEs whose main problems are access to finance. “What’s the usual concern of MSMEs?,” she elaborated. “Additional capital and learning how to manage and grow capital. These were addressed by the learning modules provided through the website. This is a good program that addresses the concerns of MSMEs from training and financial education to access to finance services.”

The strategic partnership will leverage Trusting Social’s expertise in AI-led customer onboarding solutions, including credit scoring with UNO’s new digital banking platform, designed to provide a one-stop financial solution for all Filipinos. Trusting Social’s big data scoring technology has the capacity to use telco data—which is crucial for the Philippine market that has around 157 million prepaid mobile subscribers—to provide accurate credit risk profile assessment, including unbanked customers. This will enable UNO Digital Bank to achieve its aim of building a more financially-inclusive banking landscape in the Philippines, where access to formal credit remains limited. 

Trusting Social Philippines CEO Johnny Escaler said: “Trusting Social and UNO recognize that solving the problem of financial inclusion in the Philippines will require bringing the best of both institutions to the fore—deep analytical expertise, best-in-class risk management and deep domain expertise in building sustainable and inclusive products.”

UNO Digital Bank CEO Manish Bhai said: “Our partnership with Trusting Social will allow us to offer our services to unbanked Filipinos who otherwise won’t have access to formal lending services. With Trusting Social’s data science tools and technology, we will be able to access highly reliable risk profile information, making it easy for any credit-worthy Filipino consumer to formally borrow money in a faster and easier manner.”

Addressing the reluctance of many people to get a bank account from the brick-and-mortar financial institutions, he said that a digital bank can open the door for them because it has less documentary requirements and can accomplish real-time online banking, ranging from deposits, payments, to securing loans.  What digital banks can offer is speed and ease in accessing financial solutions.

UNO Digital Bank is one of the six licensed digital banks by Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) and the first FinTech in the region to get an outright digital banking license.  

It launched during the inaugural Philippine FinTech Festival (PFF) and the World Fintech Festival Philippines on October 18-21, 2022. Convening both the PFF and the WFF-Philippines is Digital Pilipinas, the largest private sector movement for creating a technology and innovation ecosystem geared to bring about technological acceleration in the country and building an anti-fragile system in its societal structures and industries. 

The week-long event was held in partnership with Elevandi, an organization founded by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) to foster public-private-sector dialogue to advance FinTech in the digital economy.

The products available in the initial version of UNO mobile app are the following:

1.  #UNOready HIGH-RATE savings account

• A base interest rate of 3.50% gross per annum applies to accounts with available end of day balance below ₱5,000.00 while a step-up interest rate of 4.25% gross per annum applies to accounts with an available end of day balance of ₱5,000.00 and above. 
• #UNOready Savings Account comes with FREE life insurance with ₱50,000.00 coverage. This is automatically activated with a minimum ₱10,000 ADB.
• It also comes with a free UNO Virtual Debit Mastercard (this is automatically activated with a ₱100 minimum deposit) to offer an easy and convenient way to make purchases and manage banking transactions.     

2. #UNOboost Time Deposit

• Earn a guaranteed interest of 6.5% while having the flexibility to choose your desired term of 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, or 12 months.
• You can open an #UNOboost account for a minimum of PHP 5,000 and deposit up to PHP 2,500,000 (or 5 tranches of PHP 500,000).

3. #UNOearn Time Deposit

• Add another source of income to support your lifestyle with #UNOearn, a HIGH-YIELD Time Deposit that provides a monthly payout. 
• Lock-in a guaranteed interest rate of 6.5%  for a longer period and enjoy an additional income stream credited to your UNO Savings Account on a monthly basis. You can choose between terms of 12 or 24 months.
• You can open an #UNOearn account for a minimum of PHP 5,000 and deposit up to ₱2,500,000 (or 5 tranches of ₱500,000).

All deposit products are insured up to ₱500,000 per depositor by PDIC.

Another innovation that can open more financial access while increasing digital security is UNO Digital Bank’s Numberless Card. Developed in cooperation with Mastercard, its built-in chip contains all the customer’s card information with none of the usual details being printed on the card. If the card is misplaced or gets lost, it cannot be used for fraudulent transactions because the card information is not available in the physical card.  This is an innovation in payment security. With this extra layer of protection, customers can focus on saving and growing their funds for the future. 

With its public launch, UNO Digital Bank is now available to millions of Filipinos, ready to provide its services. Its full-spectrum approach means that it provides a digital banking platform and a trusted interface to meet all of its customers’ financial needs: to save, borrow, transact, protect, and invest. 

UNO Digital Bank plans to expand its services in the future with loans, insurance, and investment products.

Aside from the innovative products mentioned earlier, you can also use the UNO mobile app to send and receive money (cash in is FREE in over 7,500 outlets nationwide), pay bills and scan to pay.

Other products in the pipeline are loans, insurance, and investments products.  

The UNO Digital Bank mobile app can be downloaded for free at the App Store and Google Play Store (links below): App Store Google Play Store

Chief Executive Officer Manish Bhai, who is also the co-founder of the Singapore-headquartered financial technology company UNOAsia Pte. Ltd., one of the primary incorporators of  UNObank Inc., said, “We are a credit-led digital bank that is pioneering an elevated approach to banking: one that makes meeting life’s financial needs simple and accessible for the customer, while also fueling growth and innovation in the industry. These are the attributes that we have mirrored in the new brand.”

“We are not content with functioning on the status quo. Instead, our work is innovation-led and growth-focused, committed to always being numero uno when it comes to meeting needs and adding value to our stakeholders,” he added. 

Who is UNO Digital Bank?

UNO Digital Bank is a full-spectrum credit-led digital bank that elevates our customers by making banking simple, better, and accessible.  We will offer one trusted interface to meet anyone’s full financial needs for life, with speed and ease.

We elevate the customer’s way of life by helping them address their present financial needs while growing their confidence and capacity to meet long-term financial goals.

We offer simplicity. Money is complicated enough, we will make it simple by translating the complex world of financial management into easy, actionable tools and steps that help our customers grow both in their wealth and in the confidence to manage and maximize it.

We are fast. We help our customers bank at the speed of life, managing their money in real-time. We don’t believe people should “make time” for banking; instead, banking should be a natural part of life and its routines, and should be accomplished in line with that speed.

We want to be better. Not only to grow with our customers, we grow our customers. By offering better products and a smarter banking experience, we help those who bank with us achieve financial goals and grow in their capacity to meet ever-evolving financial needs. We elevate those who bank. 

We are accessible. Wherever and whenever the customer needs to monitor, maximize, grow, or secure their money, we should be there to help them do it. We don’t ask the customer to go to us. Neither do we go to them. Instead, we’re already where they are, the moment they need to reach (for) us.

Look and Feel

The primary color palette of the UNO Digital Bank logo represents four aspects of financial needs: Manage Money (Capri), Grow Money (French Violet), Leverage Money (Steel Pink), and Secure Money (Goldenrod). UNO Digital Bank’s icons represent these four aspects of financial needs.

Visit www.UNObank.Asia to learn more about UNO Digital Bank.