Leading SMEs of India 2020

3 Message On behalf of American Express India, I would like to congratulate Dun & Bradstreet for the 11 th edition of its annual SME publication – Leading SMEs of India 2020 and 1 st edition of its Mid-Corporate publication – Leading Mid-Corporates of India 2020. We are delighted to partner with Dun & Bradstreet for this year’s publications. Employing over 110 million Indians and contributing nearly 30% to India’s GDP, the MSME sector is the cornerstone of our economy. MSMEs are also an integral part of the supply chain and contribute about 50% to the overall exports from the country. For long, access to credit has been one of the foremost concerns for the MSMEs and the Covid – 19 pandemic has added to the economic hardships for this sector. The pandemic has presented challenges by disrupting supply chains and muting the demand cycle. The revival and future growth of this sector and its ability to find new markets within India and abroad will be a key factor in India’s overall economic recovery. Government has stepped forward with initiatives like the Atmanirbhar Package to help this sector recover and drive future growth. The NBFCs and Banks also have a role to play here and contribute to enabling the future growth of this sector. American Express is the global leader across all commercial payment segments– fromsmall andmid- sized businesses to the largest global companies in the world. We serve over 14 million Card members in over 200 countries. We partner with companies – small, medium and large operating locally, regionally and internationally in providing them expense management solutions tailored to manage and monitor their travel and related entertainment expenses as well as everyday business expenses within companies. Emerging trends on corporate payments range from credit capacity to security of data to solutions that are mobile-first and just easy to use. For businesses, end to end payment processes are manual and costly – so saving time and money are high priorities. Workflow needs for efficiency, reconciliation, and automation are above many other considerations. Regardless of size, they need help with management of invoice/payments and receipts, greater visibility / control over cash flow, payment reconciliation, and in some cases access to easy, fast, and competitively priced short- term financing and FX solutions. There is greater focus on automated and connected solutions; nothing is really standalone any longer – as service providers start to think about their client’s ecosystems and pull together an overarching payments program. American Express’ integrated platform creates access to richer data and insights, a network of buyer and supplier relationships and real economic advantage for our customers. Our integrated platform and our global scale create unrivalled transaction information. With data from over 60% of Fortune 500 companies and millions of small businesses, our analytics and recommendations help our customers to realize significant savings on their travel, entertainment and broader supplier spend. We at American Express, proudly service a wide network of MSMEs with our suite of commercial payment products and digital solutions. We are continuously evolving our business model to cater to the growing needs of this sector. I am confident that through our products and offerings we will be able to contribute significantly to the growth of MSMEs. Megha Chopra Country Business Head Global Commercial Services Dun & Bradstreet