NCPI RuPay ON-THE-GO Designathon: Finding The Next Disruption In Digital Payments

In 2014, the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) launched the multinational financial services and payment system RuPay. A first-of-its-kind card payment network in India, RuPay has been instrumental in helping RBI achieve its vision of a “less cash” economy. 

In the last nine years, RuPay has made significant strides in equipping India’s extreme corners with a mode of digital payments- especially since 2022, when RBI allowed the linking of RuPay credit cards with India's Unified Payments Interface (UPI). 

In order to further enable digital payments in India, RuPay envisioned a way to find alternative payment instruments. And it looked to India’s Gen Zs for inspiration. 

In this case study, we’ll take a look at how RuPay, with Unstop, planned a truly innovative challenge - an ideathon that tested college students’ creativity and ability to design for the future. 

An Ideathon For Innovative Payments

RuPay wanted to expand the universe of cashless payments - going beyond the QR codes and cards in our wallets and phones, making digital payments even more accessible to the general public. RuPay knew, to find the future of digital payment, it had to connect with the future. Thus, it looked for students who could pave the way, the future pays. 

Why did RuPay want to work with college students? Because to innovate for the next wave of digital currency, RuPay wanted more than just ideas. It also wanted to understand how the coming generations look at the problems of the present and the solutions they seek. 

Thus, to solve for the future, RuPay wanted to engage with the student community at large. That’s when Unstop, which has a continuously growing community of 5.6 Mn+ early professionals, students and freshers, stepped into the picture. 

Together, Unstop and RuPay came up with ON-THE-GO Designathon - a unique design challenge wherein college students from across India had to ideate and design a completely new digital payment instrument. It was a unique ‘ideathon’, where students battled it out. Currency of competition - ideas, the more innovative, the better. The prize - a rare chance to collaborate with RuPay and actually understand how an idea translates into reality while winning Apple products. 

Pave The Way The Future Pays

The ON-THE-GO Designathon challenge was broken down into two stages. The first stage was an eliminatory round. The challenge tested students’ creativity and the ability to adapt their ideas and improve them for practical application. 

Let’s take a look at the competition structure: 

Form Factor & Design Submission: Participants had to select a form factor. A form factor refers to the physical form of the digital instrument. For example, a ring, wristband, keychain, etc. After selecting the form factor, participants had to design for that form factor. 

Participants submitted a PPT elaborating on why a particular form factor was appropriate for a payment instrument, how it was convenient for the customer, and the underlying inspiration behind the design created for that form factor. 

More than 16,000 students engaged with the opportunity via Unstop, sharing their vision for the future of payment with RuPay. RuPay utilized the Unstop platform to view and evaluate the submissions - providing a score, ranking them, and shortlisting participants for the finale. Through the Unstop platform, the cumbersome process of submission and evaluation was streamlined and eased for all involved parties - RuPay and the eager participants. 

National Finale: On the basis of their submissions, 15 participants were shortlisted for the national finale. These finalists worked on their proposed design with RuPay representatives, taking their inputs and technical guidance. 

The participants received a rare opportunity to get mentored by industry leaders - getting a crash course on how an idea goes from the drawing board to the market. Most college students, with minimal to no work experience, have limited exposure to the process, the many iterations and revamps that an idea goes through before transforming into a product. This once-in-a-lifetime opportunity provided invaluable insights into the process, enabling the students to develop a more comprehensive approach to ideation. 

The revised designs were presented to the final jury. The presentation included a demonstration of the participants’ prototype that showcased the form factor and design and how it caters to the problem statement.

Participants were assessed by a panel of industry experts on the parameters of creativity, customer convenience, usability, and scalability of the concept.

Ka-Ching, It’s The Sound Of Success

The challenge pushed participants to marry creativity with practicality in order to innovate for the future. And it was a resounding success. 

• The design challenge crafted especially for RuPay by the Unstop team caught the attention of 33,93,815 students from different disciplines.  
• 16,913 participants registered for the challenge, competing for a chance to win an Apple iPad Pro and Apple Pencil, along with a chance to collaborate with RuPay. 
• Approximately 29% of the total registrations, i.e. 4,844 participants were women.
• Since the challenge was open to all college students, NCPI RuPay got a chance to engage with students from various backgrounds - 68% of the participants were from engineering, 19% from management, and the remaining from other disciplines.