Signzy: Ankit Ratan on Building a Global Digital Trust System for Financial Services
Why is it that ordering a physical coffee mug on Amazon feels like a seamless digital experience, while opening a bank account—a purely digital transaction—often feels like a bureaucratic nightmare? Ankit Ratan, Co-founder of Signzy, is on a mission to bridge this "digital trust gap." By automating the complex web of compliance, legal, and risk decision-making for banks, Signzy is turning global financial services into modern, customer-first organizations.
Ankit’s path to becoming a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree was paved with experimentation. A graduate of IIT Delhi, he spent his early years in data analytics before co-founding his first startup, Crosslink. While Crosslink gained traction with top Indian brands, Ankit realized it was leaning towards an IT services model rather than a scalable product. "I wanted to build something where technology truly solved a systemic pain point," Ankit reflects. This led him to co-found Signzy, focusing on the often-ignored but critical infrastructure of legal and compliance tech.
The Banking Anomaly
Financial products are inherently digital—money is just a theoretical concept. Yet, the experience of interacting with a bank is full of friction. Signzy solves this by automating operational decision-making. "We use AI to read documents, understand fraud, and take the decisions a human operation team would normally take," Ankit explains. "This allows a user to get a financial product in minutes, not weeks."
Pioneering Video KYC
In 2016, long before it became a regulatory standard, Signzy won an award from the RBI for its "Video KYC" concept. At the time, many in the room felt the idea was "too futuristic" and "not practical." Today, Video KYC is the backbone of digital onboarding for almost every major bank in India. "Getting that first validation from the regulator was a game-changer," Ankit recalls. "It gave the largest banks the confidence to trust a young startup with their core operations."
This early breakthrough allowed Signzy to scale rapidly, moving from a side hustle between Ankit and his brother to a global player serving massive enterprises. The company’s success is built on "hustling" into B2B boardrooms, sometimes showing up at a customer's door 50 times just to earn that initial trust.
Blockchain, Neobanks, and the Power of Sovereignty
Ankit offers a nuanced view on the trending topics of blockchain and neobanks. He believes that while decentralized finance (DeFi) has established value outside the system, the use of blockchain internally by banks to bring efficiency is still unproven. On neobanks, he challenges the category: "I struggle to see what problem a neobank solves that a well-run traditional bank can't. If the issue is a poor call center experience, that's not a banking problem; it's a customer service problem."
Perhaps his most provocative insight is on the future of Bitcoin and government regulation. "The fight against crypto isn't about money laundering," Ankit asserts. "It's about sovereignty. The power to print currency is the power to regulate a nation. No sovereign will easily give that up. We will likely see a parallel world: a digitized 'black market' through DeFi and a sovereign-controlled 'white market' through central bank digital currencies."
Ankit's Playbook for B2B Founders
- Start Small, but Start: You don't need to quit your job or college immediately. Build an MVP on the side to give yourself the confidence to leap.
- Hustle for Trust: There is nothing "cool" about early-stage B2B. You have to literally end up at a client's door 50 times until they trust your persistence.
- Raise Enough to Breathe: Don't fall into the trap of over-fundraising, but raise enough so you can focus on building talent rather than just surviving the month.
- Treat it like an MBA: Even if you fail, the experience of running a startup is more valuable than a ₹60 lakh MBA. 95% of startups fail—luck is as much a factor as capability.
The Second Wave of Core Banking
Ankit sees the next 5-7 years as the "second major wave" of banking transformation, following the core banking shifts of the 80s and 90s. Signzy aims to lead this wave by helping traditional banks transition into AI-enabled, real-time organizations. For Ankit, the goal is simple: to make financial trust as digital and reliable as the air we breathe.
Signzy at a Glance
- Innovation: Pioneers of Video KYC and automated operational decision-making.
- Scale: Trusted by top private and public sector banks globally.
- Heritage: Born out of a side hustle, validated by an RBI award in its first year.
About the Guest
Ankit Ratan is the Co-founder of Signzy. An IIT Delhi alumnus and a serial entrepreneur, Ankit has a deep background in data science and analytics. He is a recognized leader in the global fintech space and was featured in the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in 2017. Ankit is dedicated to building robust digital trust systems and is a frequent contributor to discussions on the intersection of AI, law, and sovereign finance.
Signzy is a digital trust system that provides a unified platform for automating risk, legal, and compliance processes. By leveraging advanced AI and NLP, Signzy enables financial institutions to offer a completely digital and seamless experience to their customers, reducing onboarding times from days to minutes while ensuring the highest standards of fraud prevention.