Jibika - A microfinance application that lets you borrow credit in a trustworthy and efficient way.
Course
Design Project - Fourth Semester
Interaction Design | UX Design | UI Design
Duration
4 weeks
Overview
The microfinance sector plays an important role in promoting inclusive growth by providing credit to borrowers at the bottom of the economic pyramid especially for post pandemic economic reforms. The Jibika app is an initiative to make such reforms hassle free and more trust worthy with less defaulters and more financial security.
The Process
Discover
Secondary Research
Primary Research
Deducing Insights
Define
Personas
Deducing opportunity areas
Defining the brief
HMW questions
Develop
Brainstorming
Ideating concepts
Business Model
Design Language
Deliver
High Fidelity Wireframes
Prototyping and testing
Review and feedbacks
Discover
Indian Microfinance Scenario
Snapshot of players in the Indian microfinance industry
Potential for growth of microfinance in India
Source - https://www.rbi.org.in/scripts/BS_ViewBulletin.aspx?Id=19775
Digital Finance Boom in India
By end of 2025, 900 million active users will be from rural India , with 45% growth surpassing urban India
Needs for digital microfinance ecosystem.
Primary Research
Semi-structured interviews were conducted with people having small scale businesses from rural and semi rural areas in and around my area, to have an understanding of the current user experience and behaviors of both existing physical credit systems and MFIs. I also tried to understand if the users understood the digital space and what are there existing financial behaviors.
What people had to say
“ Loans from banks ask for a lot of collateral. I don’t have that much to support my loan”
“Lenders do not trust that I can return the money and make profit myself”
“Return periods for individual lenders is too short. I cant manage in such short time”
“Most loan amounts goes into managing daily needs. Cant even generate a good amount of profit”
“Local MFIs high on security money and processing fees”
“Individual lenders often asks for unrealistic paybacks. ”
Insights
On analyzing the collected data points from the primary and secondary research , I performed an affinity map to derive themes and clustered them to generate working insights
Define
Personas
After analyzing the collected data points from the primary and secondary research and developing the insights I came up with the two personas defining their characteristics, painpoints and motivations
High level goal of users
To trust and use a platform intuitively without fear of defaulting and failing in the process.
To have flexible and personalized repayments , collaterals and profit margins for both borrowers and lenders
To trace misusage and malice in the system and having transparency and accountability for the same.
The Brief
To design an intuitive and trustworthy platform that caters both lenders and borrowers in an micro financial setting with flexible and personalized repayments , collaterals and profit margins.
How Might We
Design
How might we build an intuitive and trustworthy platform
How might we cater values of both lenders and borrowers in a credit oriented system
How might we have personalization and flexibility suiting varied user needs
Financial Model concept
After brainstorming with the how might we , I ideated around what should the financial model would look like suiting the best for all stakeholders
Strategic Financial Model
Introducing Jibika
Jibika is a Bengali word meaning livelihood It stands for daily sustenance and support.
Deliver
Onboarding
Minimal, loud and clear brand message with easy 3 step verification of user authenticating phone number , Adhar and Pan.
On boarding Screens
Jibika Navigation
The navigation revolves around the primary functions to apply for a loan, repay a loan , manage profits and validate others businesses to achieve rewards and extra credit points.
Navigation Screens
Applying for a loan
Minimal, loud and clear brand message with easy 3 step verification of user authenticating phone number , Adhar and Pan.
Loan Application Screens
Validating Others Business
Validating others business helps earn credit points and make your own business proposal have better visibility to lenders. More credit points better visibility , better chances of getting loan sanctioned
Validating Business Screens
Testing and reviews
“If I fail to pay the loan after repeated attempts, is my shop at risk ?”
— Jhontu Mandal | Kirana Shopkeeper
“It is pretty easy , but online if any issues happen whom do I contact”
— Krishanu Barui | Tea Stall
Some of my other projects
Wyse
Live Project | Edu-tech
An application that helps upskill your knowledge.
SAMS - System Research ( part 1 )
Academic Project | Health-Tech
A system Design Research on Health care focusing on Emergency Health Response system
SAMS - Ideation ( part 2 )
Academic Project | Health-Tech
A system to enable people help mitigate medical emergencies in an efficient way.