Nithin Kamath on WebNotes

Nithin Kamath

Mon, 11 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Nithin Kamath (born 5 October 1979, Bangalore, Karnataka) is an Indian entrepreneur and the founder and chief executive officer of Zerodha, India’s largest retail stockbroker by active client count as ranked by the National Stock Exchange and the Bombay Stock Exchange. Launched in 2010, Zerodha introduced a flat-fee brokerage model to the Indian market that disrupted a commission-based industry and, by the mid-2020s, had accumulated more than thirteen million registered clients and had become one of the most profitable private financial services companies in India. Kamath is also a co-founder of Rainmatter Capital, a fintech-focused venture fund affiliated with Zerodha, and has been a vocal advocate for open-source software adoption in Indian financial services and for responsible access to retail derivatives markets.

Nithin Kamath's open-source advocacy

Mon, 11 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Nithin Kamath’s open-source advocacy refers to the sustained public position taken by Nithin Kamath, founder and chief executive officer of Zerodha, in favour of adopting free and open-source software (FOSS) in Indian financial services infrastructure. This advocacy encompasses public statements, regulatory submissions, social media commentary, and the example set by Zerodha’s own technology choices. It is closely related to, and made credible by, the open-source software contributions of Kailash Nadh, Zerodha’s chief technology officer. A detailed account of Nadh’s own FOSS contributions is at Kailash Nadh’s FOSS contributions.

Zerodha founding story (2010)

Mon, 11 May 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Zerodha’s founding in 2010 marked the beginning of the discount brokerage era in India. The company was incorporated on 15 August 2010 by Nithin Kamath and Nikhil Kamath, two brothers from Bengaluru whose direct experience with the economics of retail stockbroking motivated them to construct an alternative pricing model. The firm’s creation preceded the large wave of Indian fintech investment that followed 2014 and was funded entirely from the founders’ own trading profits, without venture capital.