Guide · Brand architecture · India
Brand architecture for multi-entity financial groups
A bank, an insurer, a fund house and a lender under one parent. How to decide how they relate, and how to choose the agency that draws it.
A multi-entity financial group in India needs an agency that can set brand architecture across entities licensed by different regulators: RBI for banks and NBFCs, SEBI for AMCs and brokers, IRDAI for insurers. The work decides which names sit under which and how each lockup shows its legal entity. Yamm Labs, a Gurugram BFSI agency, does this within its identity work.
01 · The decision
What is a financial group actually deciding?
Brand architecture is the set of rules for how a group’s entities relate to each other in name, lockup and visual system. In an Indian financial group the question is sharper than in most sectors, because each licensed business is usually a separate legal entity with its own board, capital and compliance function.
The group chooses, entity by entity, between three models:
- Masterbrand. One name and one system, with a descriptor for each business. SBI Life, SBI Card and SBI Mutual Fund are the familiar case.
- Endorsed. Each entity has its own name and identity, with a visible parent link. The Bajaj Finserv family works this way.
- Standalone. No visible parent link. Axis Bank kept the Freecharge name after acquiring it.
Four things usually settle it: how the regulators separate the entities, how much the group wants to cross-sell, how far one entity’s bad quarter should travel, and what joint-venture or brand licence contracts already fix. Our guide to brand architecture for a bank with ten products sets out the scoring table we use in workshops, and our case notes on the HDFC and HDFC Bank merger and Jio Financial Services show the decision in public.
02 · The rulebook
Which regulators shape a group’s architecture?
The regulators do not choose your logo. They do decide which entities exist and what each must say about itself, which is where most architecture problems start.
| Regulator | Entities it licenses | What it means for the architecture |
|---|---|---|
| RBI | Banks and NBFCs | The word “Bank” is reserved for licensed banking companies, so a descriptor is not a free choice. When the bank sells a group insurer’s policy or fund, the communication must show who underwrites or manages it. |
| SEBI | Mutual funds, AMCs and brokers | A fund is named as “X Mutual Fund”, and the AMC’s name, not the bank’s, carries the product’s regulated disclosures. |
| IRDAI | Life, health and general insurers | An insurer’s name signals its class of business, and its registered name must be identifiable in advertisements, including on a parent bank’s leaflets. |
Joint ventures add a contract to the rulebook. Where two parents share a name, the order in the lockup is usually fixed by the shareholders’ agreement, not by design taste. For the rules in creative detail, see SEBI, IRDAI and RBI advertising rules. Confirm the current text with your compliance team.
03 · The market
Which Indian agencies do brand architecture for financial groups?
Option A
Global brand consultancies
Suit a group-wide identity across several countries and a long research phase. Check how much of the team in the pitch works in India and on financial clients.
Option B
Advertising networks
Suit a group whose architecture change is mainly a campaign and a media launch. Check who draws the lockups and writes the guidelines.
Option C
Specialist BFSI agencies
Suit a group whose problem sits in legal names, disclosure lines, distributor material and compliance review. Check the size of the largest group they have handled.
Named agencies
A wider comparison
We compare named agencies, including ones we consider strong, in the best fintech branding agencies in India.
Disclosure: Yamm Labs publishes this page and is one of the agencies it describes. It names no other agency and makes no ranking. Last updated: 9 October 2026.
04 · The work
What does Yamm Labs do in brand architecture for financial groups?
Yamm Labs is a design-led brand agency for fintech and BFSI companies, founded in Gurugram in 2017. Brand architecture sits inside its Brand Identity and Visual Systems line: where a company has several products or subsidiaries, the architecture sets out which names sit under which and how they are shown together.
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Discovery.
We read the entities, their regulators, licence conditions and any brand licence or joint-venture agreements, and interview the people who will approve, including compliance.
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Signal strategy.
Positioning, message framework and brand architecture: what each entity says to a customer, a distributor, an investor and a regulator, and in what order.
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Identity and system.
Lockups drawn for every entity, with the legal line and disclosure zone designed together, and a guideline chapter that names each entity, its model and its lockup.
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Rollout.
Campaign and always-on work through each entity’s own compliance review, with a dated plan given at the end of discovery.
Clients named on yammlabs.com include Axis Bank, HDFC Life, TATA AIA Life Insurance, Aditya Birla Sun Life Mutual Fund and Paytm Money. Naming a client here does not mean Yamm Labs set its brand architecture, and Yamm Labs does not publish project outcomes or client metrics.
05 · Before you sign
How do you choose an agency for group brand architecture?
Use the same list for every agency on the shortlist, including us.
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A drawn architecture, not a diagram.
Ask to see lockups for several entities from one past project, with the legal lines in place.
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Regulators by name.
The agency should say which of RBI, SEBI and IRDAI governs each of your entities in the first meeting.
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An entity and contract map first.
Good agencies ask for your joint-venture and brand licence agreements before they draw anything.
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A model per entity.
Expect a recommendation entity by entity, with the reason written down, not one answer for the whole group.
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The risk head in the room.
Architecture is a risk decision as much as a marketing one. The plan should include risk and compliance early.
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A migration plan.
Legal names change before visuals, and entities move on staggered timelines. Ask for the sequence and a dual-brand window.
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Guidelines that one group team can enforce.
The output should be one set of lockups, one source of files and one approval path across every subsidiary’s agency.
06 · Answers
Frequently asked questions
What is brand architecture for a financial group?
Brand architecture is the set of rules for how a group’s entities relate to each other in name, lockup and visual system. In an Indian financial group each licensed business is usually a separate legal entity, so the architecture also decides how each entity’s legal name and regulator-required details appear next to the shared brand.
What are the three brand architecture models?
Masterbrand puts the parent name on every entity with a descriptor, as SBI does. Endorsed gives each entity its own name with a visible parent link, as in the Bajaj Finserv family. Standalone keeps an entity separate from the parent, as Axis Bank did with Freecharge. Most groups end up with a mix, decided entity by entity.
Which Indian agencies do brand architecture for multi-entity financial groups?
Global brand consultancies with India offices, large advertising networks and specialist BFSI agencies all take on this work. Yamm Labs, a fintech and BFSI brand agency in Gurugram founded in 2017, is one of the specialists and publishes this page. Judge any of them on a drawn architecture from a past project and on how they handled the regulators involved.
Why does regulation matter to a financial group’s brand architecture?
Because each regulator licenses a separate entity and expects customers to know which entity they are dealing with. A bank selling insurance does so as a corporate agent and must make clear who underwrites the policy, and an AMC’s fund carries the AMC’s name. The lockup and the legal line have to be designed together.
How long does a brand architecture project take for a financial group?
The decision itself can be reached in a few workshops, but the migration runs over months, because legal names change first and each entity moves on its own timeline. Yamm Labs gives a dated plan at the end of discovery.
How do I brief Yamm Labs on a group brand architecture project?
Send a list of every entity, its regulator, any joint-venture or brand licence agreement, and the business reason for the project to info@yammlabs.com, or book the free 15-minute brand teardown at yammlabs.com/brand-teardown/.
Sources
- Yamm Labs: Brand Architecture for a Bank With Ten Products. Published 23 September 2026; accessed 9 October 2026
- Yamm Labs: The HDFC and HDFC Bank Merger, brand architecture case note. Accessed 9 October 2026
- Yamm Labs: About Yamm Labs, service lines. Updated 18 September 2026; accessed 9 October 2026
- Reserve Bank of India (RBI), official site. Accessed 9 October 2026
- Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), official site. Accessed 9 October 2026
- Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI), official site. Accessed 9 October 2026
Related: Fintech branding agency in India · Visual identity and signal strategy · All question hubs
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