New Delhi: BharatPe on Wednesday appointed Amit Jain as its chief risk officer. A seasoned professional in credit risk and portfolio management, Jain will work closely with BharatPe’s co-founder and CEO, Ashneer Grover and BharatePe’s group president, Suhail Sameer, said the company.

Prior to joining BharatPe, he was the chief risk officer for consumer lending at Bajaj Finance.

Jain has over 17 years of experience in portfolio and credit risk management across consumer and SME lending, in renowned banking and financial institutions. During his stint of over nine years at Bajaj Finance, he held multiple roles including managing Risk for Personal Loans, Consumer Lending, Credit Card, EMI Cards and Payments, as well as Business Head for the EMI Cards Portfolio. Prior to Bajaj Finance, he held a senior role at SBI Cards in Risk, and Credit Policy team. He has also worked with Standard Chartered Bank and GE Capital.

Commenting on the appointment, BharatPe co-founder and CEO Ashneer Grover said, “Talent at BharatPe is an amalgamation of Grade A operators with industry experience and passion to do things differently. Amit Jain joining us from Bajaj is a great validation for our lending business model and sets us up for building a high quality book at scale. I look forward to working closely with Amit to build a differentiated lending team and business with a wider set of products for our merchants.”

The new appointment is part of the company's larger goal to strengthen its leadership team. Earlier this year, BharatPe roped in PAYBACK’s former MD and CEO, Gautam Kaushik to lead the payments business, and Amarchand Mangaldas’ former partner Sumeet Singh as general counsel and head of corporate strategy.

Talking about his new role, Jain said, “These are exciting times in the digital lending industry and I look forward to working with this incredible team at BharatPe and serving the credit needs of millions of unbanked and underserved merchants in the country. I believe, with my experience of leading risk and credit for several products in great institutions like Bajaj Finance, I would be able to make a meaningful impact at BharatPe, and therefore, in the lives of our merchants.”