Brú Finance

Why are you participating for Based India?

We are participating in Based India because we are already leveraging asset tokenization and decentralized finance (DeFi) to solve key financial challenges in India's underserved sectors, particularly in agriculture and small businesses on polygon network. With over $700 million in tokenized assets and partnerships in place with major institutions like the World Bank, Union Bank of India, Indian Bank, Bank of Baroda, MSC Bank, TVS Credit, DBS, and Mastercard, we I have already demonstrated our ability to drive impact through asset tokenization and amalgamation of TradFi with DeFi. We have secured $150 million in credit lines, onboarded over 1,500 asset custodians, and provided services to more than 25,000 satisfied customers. We are now expanding beyond India and have already established presence in South East Asia, USA, Central Asia and Africa. These achievements motivate me to scale these efforts even further in partnership with Based India, the largest L2 network of the globe. We seek to partner with base to bring value to Indian unbanked and underbanked communities leveraging the innovative technologies such as Coinbase Smart Wallet, Paymaster etc. Our project is already live on Base network. The opportunity to leverage blockchain technology to bring financial inclusion to millions of underserved individuals and communities is what drives us at Brú and partnership with Base will help us achieve these goals at a global level.

What challenges are you focusing on?

The key challenge we are addressing is the $8 trillion credit gap in emerging markets, that disproportionately affects the agriculture sector, small businesses, and rural communities. These sectors are often overlooked by traditional financial institutions, forcing them to rely on informal credit sources with high interest rates. This lack of access to affordable and formal financial services hinders their growth, stifles innovation, and keeps them in cycles of debt. In addition to the credit gap, fragmented markets and low price realization for small farmers further compound the issue. Farmers often face significant hurdles in accessing fair markets for their produce, leading to poor returns and financial instability. These challenges create a systemic problem that limits economic progress and financial inclusion for millions in emerging markets.

How does your submission address this challenge?

Our submission, Brú Finance, addresses the challenge of financial exclusion by leveraging TradFi and DeFi using asset tokenization to provide affordable credit and financial services to underserved communities, particularly small businesses, farmers, and rural sectors.

Using Brú Finance’s innovative approach of tokenizing real-world assets like agricultural commodities, the project enables farmers to use their stored crops as collateral to access loans through a decentralized commodities-backed bonds platform. This allows them to avoid high-interest informal lenders and bypass the barriers of traditional banks.

By connecting these communities to global liquidity providers, the project ensures they receive loans at lower interest rates while maintaining transparency and efficiency. The platform also facilitates the trade of tokenized assets, enabling farmers and small businesses to sell their products at optimal prices in global markets, improving their overall profitability. The impact of this project is evident in the numbers achieved so far. Brú Finance has empowered over 25,000 farmers and small businesses by providing access to critical financial resources and has created a robust network of over 1,500 asset custodians.

By partnering with major institutions like the World Bank, DBS, Union Bank of India, BOB & others, the platform has improved financial inclusion, particularly for small businesses and farmers, by enabling access to affordable credit and reducing reliance on high-interest informal loans. The success of these initiatives demonstrates how Brú Finance is already transforming underserved markets and addressing long-standing financial gaps.

Challenges we ran into

While working on this project, I encountered both technical and non-technical hurdles that required creative problem-solving. Blockchain Integration: One of the biggest challenges was integrating tokenized crop-backed bonds into the blockchain in 2019-20 when we started building. Many of the libraries and standards did not exist back then and hence building proper smart contract functionality to handle asset tokenization, collateralization, and bond issuance required a lot of engineering innovation. Regulatory Uncertainty: Navigating the uncertain regulatory environment around DeFi and tokenized assets posed a challenge.

How We Overcame Them: Technical Solutions: Continuous iteration and testing of smart contracts helped us build a robust blockchain system. We also employed in-house solutions to build asset tokenization platform, oracles and adopted cross-chain solutions to ensure data accuracy and seamless integration. Stakeholder Engagement: Building trust through education, transparency, and collaboration with local stakeholders such as banks, government and regulators helped in getting the community onboard. Demonstrating clear financial benefits to both farmers and liquidity providers was key to increasing adoption. Legal and Regulatory Adjustments: Close collaboration with legal advisors helped us navigate the regulatory landscape, ensuring that our platform remains compliant while protecting stakeholders.

Additional Features

Our project had a strong foundation before the Buildathon, but we introduced several new features that enhanced both functionality and user engagement and made it more compatible with Base ecosystem: Coinbase Smart Wallet: We integrated the Coinbase Smart Wallet into our dApp providing users with a secure, custodian wallet that eliminates the need to worry about private keys. Users can log in through their email, making their wallets easily accessible. Additionally, for enhanced security during transactions, users must authorize each transaction using a passkey stored securely on their device. This setup ensures a user-friendly experience while maintaining a high level of security for farmers and small business owners managing their digital assets. Coinbase Paymaster: The integration of Coinbase Paymaster allows for seamless, efficient gas payment processing on Brú dApp. By simplifying transaction flows and reducing friction, users can easily manage payments and transaction fees, ensuring a smoother process when issuing or redeeming crop-backed bonds. This feature helps make the platform more accessible to both farmers and liquidity providers.

Improved User Interface and Experience: The user interface (UI) was revamped for simplicity and ease of use, especially for non-tech-savvy users like farmers and rural business owners.

These new features have made our platform more comprehensive, scalable, and accessible, enabling us to better serve farmers, small businesses, and liquidity providers across emerging markets.