Sundaram Home Finance Launches Emerging Business Segment

Chennai, Jun 12 (PTI) Sundaram Home Finance has launched an 'emerging business' vertical as part of its diversification move and has set a target to disburse Rs 300 crore during this financial year in this segment, a top official said.

The city-headquartered company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Sundaram Finance Ltd, said the Emerging Business segment would comprise Small Business Loans and the Affordable Housing financing verticals.

Expecting it to be a growth driver for the company, Sundaram Home Finance Managing Director and CEO Lakshminarayanan Duraiswamy said he has plans to open around 20 branches in the Emerging Business segment in Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh and add another 200 employees.

"We had forayed into Small Business Loans financing in October 2022 and the response over the first 18 months has been quite satisfactory with the company having disbursed over Rs 125 crore... We felt the Affordable Housing financing has similar contours in terms of the loan amount, customer profile, market segment and geographies," Duraiswamy said in a statement on Wednesday.

"We believe that together the Emerging Business team can jointly cater to this growing segment of Affordable Housing and Small Business Loans," he said.

With this launch, Sundaram Home Finance would have two business divisions -- the traditional housing finance business under the 'Prime Housing' market and the 'Emerging Business' segment focusing on small business loans and financing to the affordable housing segment.

On growth plans for the Emerging Business segment, Duraiswamy said, "We see a lot of potential for both these businesses and these could turn out to be solid growth drivers for the company in the coming years. This segment will start off with the current set of 31 branches and around 300 employees.

"In the near term, our plan is to open around 20 branches in the Emerging Business segment in Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh. We plan to hire around 200 people for this segment, largely front-end staff," he said.

Lakshminarayanan said the company is aiming at disbursing around Rs 300 crore in the Emerging Business segment this financial year.

Sundaram Home Finance registered a net profit of Rs 236 crore on disbursements of Rs 5,039 crore for the year ending March 31, 2024.