Unlocking $ 15 b economic value: Hans Wijayasuriya on Sri Lanka’s digital ambition

Participants of the inaugural Sri Lanka Fintech Summit at the BMICH

• Asserts this is not an IT project, nor is it a digital transformation project
•  Aims to expand digital economy share from 3% of GDP to 15% within decade
• Systems must be robust as global scams siphoned over $ 1 t in 2024, including over $ 500 m in Asia
• Digital Public Infrastructure blueprint includes 100% trusted digital ID, national data exchange, and interoperable payments
• Fintech innovation projected to unlock $ 15 b in economic value, with potential for global product exports 

By Devan Daniel

Chief Presidential Adviser on Digital Economy and ICTA Chairman Dr. Hans Wijayasuriya, delivering the keynote address at the inaugural Sri Lanka Fintech Summit 2025 at the BMICH yesterday, said that fintech will play a decisive role in accelerating the country’s digital economy and uplifting overall national growth, unlocking an estimated $ 15 billion in value.

“I believe that fintech plays a key role in the overall story of digital economy acceleration,” he said. “It’s not an IT project, it’s not a digital transformation project. It is a determined attempt at uplifting the normative economic growth of our economy by at least two points, if not three, by expanding the digital economy component of our macroeconomic.”

Sri Lanka’s digital economy currently accounts for about 3% of GDP compared with India’s 12%. Dr. Wijayasuriya said the Government has set a target of increasing this share to 10% and then expanding to 15% over the next decade. 

“The very act of expanding the digital economy provides an uplift on the overall economy of the country,” he explained, adding that fintechs are central to this transformation because they act as “a magnet” drawing citizens, sectors and industries into digital transactions and digitally enabled activities that grow both the digital economy and the formal financial system.

He emphasised that four components must work hand in hand to ensure success: technology and innovation, inclusive adoption by citizens and businesses, proportional regulation that adjusts to size and risk, and above all, trust. 

“Fintechs should holistically address the problems to solve in the financial system,” he said, noting that these problems change dynamically and are often beyond technology, relating instead to ecosystems, capacity building and mindsets. Adoption is the first priority. “Adoption means broader participation, broader inclusion in terms of payments, credit, savings, investments,” he said. Improving user experience through frictionless and easy on boarding is critical, as is addressing liquidity issues in marginal segments of society. 

He pointed to “micro X” solutions such as micro-payments, micro-insurance and micro-lending, which require innovation not only in technology but also in regulation and ecosystems.

Dr. Wijayasuriya said Sri Lanka must balance two ends of innovation. “On one end, we must compete with the best in the world. On the other, we must be champions of inclusion,” he observed, warning that the country must win global trust in the robustness and credibility of its financial system. 

“If you forget any one of these elements, the result is an island with many broken pathways with nowhere to connect.”

He cautioned that while the digital economy is expanding, a parallel “scam economy” is also growing. “As of 2024, global scammers siphoned over $ 1 trillion, and in Asia alone over $ 500 million,” he said. 

Artificial intelligence, scale, falling technology costs and personalisation are powering scams just as they are driving digital innovation. “If you gain one thing through digital economy expansion but lose through lack of trust to scams, the net is negative,” he warned, adding that fraud tech, cyber security and regtech are the barriers protecting the system.

Turning to solutions, Dr. Wijayasuriya presented Sri Lanka’s digital public infrastructure blueprint, which he described as the backbone of fintech enablement. 

Built on open architecture, interoperability and principles such as AI-first, cloud-first and mobile-first, the infrastructure will include digital ID, a national data exchange, advanced payments systems, authentication and verifiable credentials such as digitally signed driving licences, exam certificates and health records.

“An ID trusted 90% is as good as an ID trusted 0%,” he said. “It has to be 100% trusted in order to deliver a faceless, presence-less experience to the citizen or the business.”

He said Sri Lanka was among the first in the world where mobile operators created a unified mobile verification system across all networks, enabling both SIM cards and mobile devices themselves to be 100% trusted. 

“The accumulation of these three layers of trust, verification and validation will enable fintechs to build services on a secure foundation,” he said. This DPI framework will soon be available to developers through a sandbox to test and build applications.

Payments remain at the heart of digital public infrastructure, and he said the goal is to move towards seamless interoperable payment rails where banks, fintechs and big tech can maximise consumer choice. 

This will evolve towards account aggregation for individuals and businesses, enabling open banking, open lending and open insurance. “Data sharing and interoperability, facilitated by the DPI layer of the digital economy blueprint and supported by proportional regulation, will propel more innovation,” he said.

He gave the example of credit inclusion. Expanding activity generates more data, which can be turned into intelligence such as credit ratings, instant peer-to-peer facilities and alternative lending. Artificial intelligence, he added, will further transform credit scoring, fraud detection, compliance reporting and foresight. 

“Intelligence will replace collateral,” he argued. “The intelligence you have about a business or an individual will be even more powerful than collateral.”

AI will also enable explainable decisions, conversational interfaces, super-personalisation and make small transactions economically viable. 

“The challenges legacy institutions faced in making small transactions profitable will be far less of a problem in the AI world,” he said. These innovations, he added, will unlock pathways between the top, middle and bottom of the economic pyramid, generating inclusion and feeding the formal financial system.

Dr. Wijayasuriya stressed that fintech innovation should not only aim at large ecosystems but also create sectoral solutions for small ecosystems, which when aggregated, form the larger picture. 

He said the potential was vast. “I have been selling this $ 15 billion economic value creation to multiple audiences,” he said, “but the fintech audience is the one at the centre of creating the linkages that will deliver this value.”

Government, he said, will provide the rails and architecture while enabling the ecosystem to innovate. “Our philosophy is to build 20% and enable 80%,” he said. The success of the digital economy, he noted, will come from democratic access to digital rails, shared risk-return mechanisms, and exportable fintech products that can scale globally. 

“If you can innovate on this canvas, you can take those products beyond our shores because digital public infrastructures are becoming universal,” he said.

Concluding his address, Dr. Wijayasuriya urged participants to commit to the collective mission. “Together we can uplift our digital economy by five years within the next five years,” he said. 

“Government, private sector and citizens must work hand in hand. The fintech industry is at the centre of creating the linkages to deliver this value.”

Pix by Upul Abayasekara