Faced with a tough macro-economic environment, private sector lender YES Bank is sharpening its focus on emerging sectors such as life sciences, IT, education and healthcare to boost growth.

“Macro-economic environment is pretty tough. Yet there are sectors which are doing well and consciously the approach of the bank is... (to get growth from) emerging segments such as life sciences, IT, export-focused businesses, education and healthcare,” YES Bank, Group President & Country Head-Corporate and Institutional Banking, Amit Kumar, told PTI.

Kumar, who was speaking on the sidelines of BT-YES Bank Emerging Companies Excellence Awards, said that the rural markets are fairly strong and a lot of these sectors are getting the growth from under-penetrated markets.

“We continue to see a lot of companies which are managing the business very well in these sectors and there is a tremendous scope for the banks to really partner in their growth,” he said.

He said that the bank has identified these sectors which are largely driven by domestic consumption and such companies are very dedicated on consumption-bound growth.

Clients business

Kumar said that the bank is focusing on enhancing support to clients’ business, which can drive its P&L (profit & loss) growth.

“So, our focus is to work on P&L. And even that if it means moderated growth, we are fine with that as long as we achieve our P&L. In our road map for the next five years, we have said that we will quadruple the size of the bank over these five years.”

He said that YES Bank is on track in terms of growth strategy, which was charted out about three-and-half years ago.

During the first quarter of this fiscal, the bank had reported 38.1 per cent increase in its net profit at Rs 400.8 crore. Total income rose to Rs 2,839.9 crore against Rs 2,174.4 crore in the first quarter (April-June) of last fiscal (2012-13).