Risk detection, blockchain, cognitive computing and new authentication technologies will all come into focus as 15 innovative start-ups descend on London for the FinTech Innovation Lab.
The 12-week course will see entrepreneurs receive mentoring from a range of industry experts, culminating in a finale in April where they will compete for investment.
Interest in fintech is growing by the day as financial institutions try to catch the next wave of technological advancement at the earliest opportunity.
Given the interconnection between capitalist states, the handling and transfer of money – be it standard or cryptocurrency – is bigger business now than it ever was.
Exciting innovations
Thus, programmes like this have emerged, with 17 institutions – led by Accenture – backing it. Seeking out disruptive technologies, Richard Lumb, group chief executive of financial services at Accenture, says banking in the near future will be “better, cheaper and faster”.
“They offer some exciting innovations and have demonstrated exceptional creativity in what has been a record-breaking year for applications from more than 30 countries, confirming that London is very much the centre of Europe’s thriving FinTech community,” he said.
The last few years have seen start-ups emerge across a plethora of different areas of finance.
Things like payments and transactions, mobile banking, commodities, crowdfunding, retail banking, risk, security, cryptocurrencies and insurance are now ripe with fledgling businesses, each seeking to influence proceedings with often one, key USP.
Tremendous honour
The start-ups involved in this FinTech Innovation Lab are: AimBrain; Albert; AlgoDynamix; Clausematch; Contego; Crowdaura; Cutover; PassFort; PayKey; Quotip; SBDA Group; Talent Rank; Undo, Voleo and ZeroDB.
They cover areas from risk analytics to biometric authentication platforms and payment keyboards to machine learning.
Speaking after Canadian company Voleo’s entry was confirmed, CEO Thomas Beattie spoke of his excitement ahead of the programme, calling it a “tremendous honour”.
“[It’s] testament not only to the potential of our intellectual property but to the advancements in the Canadian financial technology landscape,” he said.
The 12-week course is a collaboration between Accenture and 16 other financial institutions, including: Bank of America Merrill Lynch; Barclays; Citi; Credit Suisse; Deutsche Bank; Goldman Sachs; HSBC; Intesa Sanpaolo; JPMorgan; Lloyds Banking Group; Morgan Stanley; Nationwide; RBS; Santander, Societe Generale and UBS.
London image via Shutterstock
