Fintech Startups To Watch: 5 Indian Fintech Startups That Caught Our Eye In May

Based on Inc42’s May 2026 “Fintech Startups To Watch” series, five innovative Indian fintech startups have emerged as leaders in reshaping India’s financial infrastructure across remittances, healthcare financing, investment technology, secured lending, and banking infrastructure.

Frex | Cross-Border Remittance Platform

Founded by Aditya Varma, Himanshu Arora, and Nikhil Shanker, Gurugram-based Frex addresses India’s $125 billion annual remittance market by using blockchain-based rails and stablecoin infrastructure to enable near real-time money transfers at better-than-mid-market FX rates with zero fees. The startup raised ₹9.5 crore in a pre-seed round co-led by Zeropearl VC and White Venture Capital, with notable angel investors including CRED’s Kunal Shah and Urban Company’s Abhiraj Singh Bhal. Since launching in November 2025, Frex has targeted $1 million in monthly transfer volume, competing in a global digital remittance market projected to reach $60 billion by 2030 with a CAGR of 16.7%.

iCReDS | Healthcare Claims Financing

Founded in 2026 by Nikhil Kurian, iCReDS tackles the ₹38,000 crore working capital crisis facing approximately 29,000 hospitals across India that wait 45-270 days for approved insurance claims to convert to cash. The startup connects lenders to verified claims data from NHCX, India’s government-built health claims exchange, aiming to reduce healthcare financing costs from 20% to 8% by turning approved claims into real-time working capital within 24 hours. The company is currently pre-product and pre-funding while engaging with hospitals, insurers, financiers, and policymakers.

Kalpi | Quantitative Investment Platform

Founded in 2025 by Ashwar Gupta, a BITS Pilani alumnus and former quantitative researcher, Hyderabad-based Kalpi democratizes quantitative investing through two products. Kalpi.ai offers retail investors a no-code platform to build rule-based stock baskets, backtest strategies, and execute trades through broker integrations, while KalpiQuant.com provides institutional clients access to over 300 pre-computed investment factors, backtesting engines, and portfolio optimization tools. The startup raised ₹3.75 crore in seed funding from Zerodha’s Rainmatter Capital, operating in an investment market expected to grow at 21% CAGR between 2025 and 2030.

Neoble | Securities-Backed Lending

Founded in 2023 by Jayaprakash Sinha, Mumbai-based Neoble operates as a digital NBFC providing instant secured loans of up to ₹5 crore against mutual funds, shares, bonds, and insurance policies. The platform processes applications in eight minutes and transfers funds within four hours, offering interest-only repayment options as an alternative to expensive personal loans or premature investment withdrawals. Neoble has raised $174,000 across three rounds from investors including PointOne Capital and Acies Ventures, competing in India’s MSME-focused embedded NBFC sector projected to grow at 16-20% CAGR.

Spense | Banking Infrastructure Provider

Founded by Pawan Kumar and Srinivas Krishnamurthy in 2023, Bengaluru-based Spense provides full-stack infrastructure enabling banks and fintechs to issue secured credit cards, prepaid instruments, and forex products while ensuring regulatory compliance and legacy system integration. The startup raised $1.85 million in a pre-seed round led by GrowthCap Ventures, with angel participation from CRED’s Kunal Shah and executives from Google and Microsoft. Operating in India’s banking-as-a-service market projected to grow from $1.14 billion in 2022 to $4.43 billion by 2030, Spense is integrated with multiple regulated entities and expanding beyond secured credit cards.