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Building a Digital Onboarding Platform for Foreign Investors (FPI & FVCI) — End-to-End Digital Transformation
Industry
Capital Markets
Technologies
Python, Angular, SQL Server
About Client

One of India’s leading Depository / capital market infrastructure institutions is responsible for maintaining investor records, managing investor registrations, compliance, and regulatory filings and enabling seamless settlement of securities. The client is playing a pivotal role in streamlining cross-border investments into India by overseeing - investor onboarding, regulatory reporting, custodial operations, Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs), Foreign Venture Capital Investors (FVCIs), and related participants.

Problem Statement

Legacy Onboarding Systems:

The client's existing investor onboarding platforms are facing several operational, technological, and compliance challenges:

  • Manual, fragmented processes across FPI and FVCI onboarding workflows.
  • Complex regulatory filings involving multiple entities: DDPs (Designated Depository Participants), Custodians, SEBI, Depositories, Banks, and the Income Tax Department.
  • Lack of a unified interface leading to operational inefficiencies.
  • Increased cost of compliance and client dissatisfaction due to delays and fragmented user experience.
  • High dependency on manual intervention, leading to processing delays, potential errors, and audit issues.

Expanding Regulatory Scope:

In addition to existing FPI processes, the regulator has introduced the need for streamlined onboarding for Foreign Venture Capital Investors (FVCIs) — with similar but not identical regulatory requirements.

The client is needing a scalable, integrated solution that can:

  • Simplify and standardize onboarding for both FPI and FVCI investor classes.
  • Seamlessly integrate with regulatory systems and external stakeholders.
  • Provide flexible workflows to accommodate evolving regulations.
  • Improve auditability, system resilience, and user experience.

Fragmented Workflows: The FPI and FVCI processes operated in silos with separate data flows, stakeholder interactions, and approval chains. This led to duplication of effort, increased processing time, and higher operational overhead.

Manual FVCI Registration: The absence of a digital workflow for FVCI required applicants to submit physical forms and documents. The review and approval process involved back-and-forth email communication, resulting in delays, document loss, and compliance risks.

Lack of Real-Time Tracking & Self-Service: Users could not track application statuses on their own and had to rely on email or calls to customer support. This dependency led to poor user experience and increased burden on helpdesk teams.

Limited Compliance Enforcement: Without a centralized system capturing audit trails, approval timestamps, and role-based actions, it was difficult to monitor compliance or demonstrate adherence to regulatory protocols in a transparent and scalable manner.

Oneture's Role

Oneture is selected as the strategic technology partner based on:

  • Deep capital markets and regulatory domain expertise.
  • Prior successful delivery of complex financial onboarding solutions.
  • Proven capabilities in scalable enterprise-grade digital platforms.

We are proposing and executing a phased approach that balances regulatory compliance, time-to-market urgency, and long-term scalability.

Solution

The unified investor portal is built on a modern microservices-based architecture, enabling scalability, modular deployment, and robust security. The architecture is designed with clear separation of concerns across layers:

Presentation Layer: A responsive Angular single-page application (SPA) serves as the primary user interface. It is designed with modular feature separation, role-based dynamic routing, and lazy loading for performance optimization.

Middleware (BFF): A .NET 8-based Backend-for-Frontend (BFF) layer aggregates and customizes API responses for frontend consumption. This layer helps streamline client-server interactions, manage authentication tokens, and implement request shaping.

Microservices Layer: Core business functions (Application Management, Document Upload, Digital Signing, and Workflow Processing) are split into independently deployable services. Each service communicates via REST APIs and is containerized using Docker.

Database Layer: A centralized SQL Server stores structured data including user profiles, application records, workflow status, and audit logs. Binary file storage for uploaded documents is managed securely within the application infrastructure.

Authentication & Authorization: The system uses JWT-based token authentication with fine-grained Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) to manage permissions across modules.

DevOps & CI/CD: GitLab CI/CD pipelines automate build, test, and deployment stages. NGINX acts as a reverse proxy, routing traffic to the appropriate services, with support for SSL termination and HTTP/2.

API-First Architecture: We are ensuring seamless integration with,

  • Custodians and Depositories.
  • PAN issuance via Income Tax Department APIs.
  • SEBI and other regulatory compliance systems.

The system is being designed to easily support future integrations and ecosystem participants.

Approach to Unified Digital Onboarding Platform (FPI + FVCI)

We are developing a unified web platform that handles the entire lifecycle of investor onboarding — from registration to renewals, modifications, surrender, and data updates.

We are delivering a seamless multi-stakeholder workflow across:

  • Foreign Investors
  • DDPs (Designated Depository Participants)
  • Custodians
  • Regulators (SEBI)
  • Income Tax Department (ITD)
  • Depositories
  • Banks

Phase-wise Delivery Approach

Phase 1: FPI Common Application Form (CAF) Platform

We are performing end-to-end redevelopment of CAF system for FPIs.

We are building full digital processing of:

  • Investor KYC, Depository & Bank details, PAN validation, Annexures, Document Upload.
  • Maker-Checker approval flow for DDPs.
  • Real-time integration with PAN allotment APIs at Income Tax Department.
  • Role-based access control for participants.
  • Email/SMS notifications.
  • Transaction upload modules.
  • Comprehensive reporting framework.

Phase 2: FVCI Onboarding Platform Extension

We are extending platform capabilities to handle FVCI onboarding workflows.

We are creating separate FVCI-specific forms and workflows aligned to SEBI guidelines.

  • Simplified landing pages for FPI/FVCI selection.
  • Role-based user authorization.
  • Document uploads, declarations, KYC, annexures.
  • Parallel development to meet aggressive regulatory timelines.

Implementation Timeline

  • Estimated Execution Window: 19–30 weeks (approximately 5–7 months)
  • Timeline Factors: Timelines were customized based on the client's readiness, infrastructure complexity, and resource availability.
Value Delivered

Enhanced Operational Efficiency: By End-to-End Digitalization of Investor Onboarding consolidating workflows and eliminating manual processes, the portal significantly reduces turnaround times for both FPI and FVCI onboarding.

Improved Stakeholder Collaboration: The maker-checker approval flow and role-based dashboards streamline coordination between applicants, custodians, and approvers.

Real-Time Visibility: Status tracking, dashboards, and acknowledgment receipts provide transparency for all stakeholders.

Regulatory Compliance: The system enforces audit trails, access controls, and DSC-based approvals, ensuring adherence to regulatory mandates.

User Experience Improvements: A guided, responsive interface with validation and autosave enhances usability and reduces user drop-off and Improved user experience for DDPs, Custodians, and Investors

Cost Savings: Automation and reduced support overhead contribute to long-term operational savings. Flexible architecture is allowing rapid extension for FVCI onboarding without major rework. Unified platform is minimizing future maintenance efforts through reusable components.

Flexible architecture is allowing rapid extension for FVCI onboarding without major rework.

Technologies

Technology Stack

Layer Technology Used
Frontend Angular 14+ (Material Design Components, PWA Support)
Backend .NET Core (for FPI) / Python Django (for possible backend scaling in future)
Database SQL Server
Integration RESTful APIs
Deployment Fully On-Prem
Hosting Model Hybrid (initially on cloud for rapid POC, then fully migrated to on-prem as per client’s security policies)
Lessons Learned

Modular Platform Architecture Enables Rapid Regulatory Extensions:
The reusable design of components is allowing us to extend FPI platform features quickly for FVCI onboarding.

Strong Stakeholder Alignment is Critical for Success:
Continuous engagement with multiple parties (SEBI, ITD, Custodians, DDPs) is proving crucial to avoid rework and ensure regulatory alignment.

Integration Testing Must Account for Multiple Ecosystem Dependencies:
Early identification of integration dependencies (PAN APIs, Depository Services) is helping avoid downstream delays.

Hybrid Engagement Model Helps Manage Complexity:
A combination of Fixed Scope-Fixed Fee (for core modules) and T&M (for evolving modules) is providing flexibility as regulatory clarifications emerge.

Cloud as Sandbox Accelerated Early Development:
Using cloud environments for initial prototyping is helping reduce time-to-market while securing final deployments to client’s on-prem infrastructure.

Why Oneture?

End-to-End Solution: Our platform covers the entire lifecycle of FPI registrations, modifications, renewals, and surrenders, ensuring a seamless experience for both applicants and DDPs.

User-Centric Design: We emphasize intuitive, guided user journeys with responsive forms and contextual help to enhance usability.

Robust Review and Approval Workflow: Multi-level review mechanisms for DDPs, with automated alerts and audit trails, align the platform with regulatory compliance needs.

API Integration Prowess: Oneture's experience in integrating with DDPs, Custodians, SEBI, and ITD ensures smooth real-time exchanges for PAN verification, authorization, and status updates.

Security and Compliance: Enterprise-grade authentication, encrypted APIs, and DSC integration ensure data security and regulatory alignment.

Customizable and Scalable: The system’s architecture supports custom configurations and seamless scaling as user volumes grow.

Proven Expertise: We’ve successfully delivered similar financial and regulatory solutions, demonstrating deep domain knowledge and delivery capability.

Client-Centric Approach: Our methodology prioritizes stakeholder collaboration and tailoring the product to meet evolving business goals.

Innovative Technology Stack: Leveraging modern frameworks (Angular, .NET 8, Docker, REST APIs), we build reliable, cutting-edge solutions that are ready for the future.

This unified portal for FPI and FVCI onboarding demonstrates the power of a modular digital platform to transform legacy financial operations. It enhances compliance, efficiency, and user experience while laying the foundation for broader investor onboarding services in the future. Oneture is delivering not just a platform, but a long-term foundation for seamless investor onboarding, regulatory compliance, and operational agility.