The Rise of AI and the Role of the Customer in Fintech

The Rise of AI and the Role of the Customer in Fintech

This year, FinovateSpring will feature a special day dedicated to two critical issues in fintech: the rise of AI and the importance of the customer journey.

On May 7th, the day before the conference begins, we’ll host an AI Summit and a Customer Experience Summit that will provide both a broad overview and a deep dive into both timely topics.

Join us Tuesday morning at the Hilton San Francisco Union Square for a day of insightful keynote addresses, fireside chats, strategy roundtables, case studies, and debates.

AI  Summit

In addition to opening and closing remarks from our chair, Ron Shevlin, Head of Research, Cornerstone Advisors, here’s a look at the sessions available in our AI Summit:

  • What Can Artificial Intelligence Do for Your Business? – read more
  • Making AI Walk the Talk – It’s All About the Data – read more
  • Transforming Legacy Businesses with AI – Machine Learning is King Now, But Image, Voice, and Natural Language Processing are Coming Up Fast. What are the Internal Challenges? The Ethical Challenges? And the Business Opportunities? – read more
  • The Rise of Natural Language Processing & How it is Reshaping
    Financial Services – read more
  • AI for Fraud Detection and Risk Management – read more
  • Let’s Chat About Chatbots – read more
  • Six Business Applications Within Investing, Compliance, Credit Scoring, Marketing, and Customer Support – read more
  • Oxygen for AI, How Data Management and Data Governance Can Make or Break Your AI Journey – read more
  • Using AI to Transform Customer Experience – read more
  • Building a Cognitive Bank from the Inside Out – read more
  • AI to Streamline Operational Processes – read more
  • Fintechs and Financial Institutions on the Journey Towards a Productive Partnership in AI – read more

Customer Experience

With opening and closing remarks from Beyond the Arc CEO Steven Ramirez, who will serve as Chair, here’s a look at the sessions being offered in our Customer Experience Summit.

  • The Evolution of Innovation: Build, Buy or Partner? – read more
  • Return on CX – 80% of the Potential ROI is Typically Left Untapped – read more
  • How Can Financial Institutions Transform Customer Experience through Deep Customer Insights? Why Powerful Data Analytics Will Be Critical for Success – read more
  • How to Innovate on Behalf of the Customer and Build a Business Around Customer Needs to Drive Loyalty and Sustained Growth – read more
  • Bridging the Gap Between the Customer Experience Promise and the Customer Experience Reality to Deliver Outstanding CX at Scale – read more
  • How to Align Your Whole Organization to a Common Customer. Purpose and Harness Future Technology to Redraw the Customer Experience Landscape – read more
  • Creating a Seamless Digital Customer Experience – read more
  • How We Are Creating a Seamless Customer Experience – read more
  • Harnessing Disruptive Technologies to Maximize Customer Experience and Loyalty – read more
  • Delivering Outstanding Customer Experience by Harnessing Open APIs – read more
  • Transforming the B2B Customer Experience – read more
  • Fintechs and Financial Institutions On the Journey Towards a Productive Partnership in CX – read more

Tickets to FinovateSpring are available now. Visit our registration page today and save your spot.

Note that registration for Tuesday’s Summit’s is separate from registration to attend the main, three-day FinovateSpring conference beginning on Wednesday, May 8.

Take advantage of our special discount when purchasing your ticket before April 26, or when packaging a Summit Day registration with a registration for the main conference.

Questions about FinovateSpring? Send us an email for more information.

Germany’s aixigo Forges Strategic Partnership with Synpulse

Germany’s aixigo Forges Strategic Partnership with Synpulse

A strategic partnership that combines the digital wealth management and investment advisory platform of aixigo and the implementation expertise of Swiss consulting firm Synpulse is the latest big development on the European wealth management scene.

The two companies announced a strategic partnership this week that will provide financial service providers in Switzerland and beyond with a digital API platform that is fast, flexible, and has what the company called “mass suitability.” aixigo’s platform offers more than 100 API-based services, delivering value-added digital services to branches as well as via mobile devices. The solution can provide large volumes of raw data for legacy systems, and then refine the data quickly at scale without regard for the client’s underlying core banking system.

Left to right: Marcus Grundler (Head of Portfolio Management Systems) and Mario Alves (Head of Sales & Partner Management) demonstrating aixigo’s Digital Financial Portfolio Management Back Office solution at FinovateFall 2018.

aixigo CEO Erich Borsch underscored the need for speed when it comes to providing services in wealth management. “(The) attention span of clients in the digital age continues to decline,” he said. “So the goal must be to get at least two minutes of attention a day from the client. And you can only do that if you can offer relevant information extremely quickly, digitally, and attractively.”

Banks are as much a beneficiary of faster, more flexible solutions as customers are, Borsch added. And by meeting customer expectations in the digital realm, he said, it is easier “for the bank to become an integral part of daily digital habits.”

Synpulse Managing Partner Raphael Jung explained the importance of aixigo’s technology in a world of open banking and open APIs. He said, “In order to be able to use this potential for digital offers in asset management and investment advisory as well, a system is needed that records all relevant data at high speed and makes it available again in a redefined form – an API platform.”

Headquartered in Aachen, Germany, and founded in 1999, aixigo demonstrated its Digital Financial Portfolio Management Back Office solution at FinovateFall 2018. The technology enables wealth managers to leverage relatively small staffs to manage hundreds of thousands of investment portfolios quickly and efficiently.

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • Germany’s aixigo Forges Strategic Partnership with Synpulse.
  • The Rise of AI and the Role of the Customer in Fintech.

Around the web

  • Payment service provider Truevo to deploy front office and core banking solutions from Temenos.
  • Klarna launches global customer authentication platform for multinational businesses.
  • Fintech OS announces new Chief Revenue Officer Leon Stevens.
  • Best of Show winner Voleo takes home the 2019 Best Stock Trading App award in the Investment category of the FinTech Breakthrough Awards.
  • Trunomi unveils new website, branding.
  • Kony teams up with Okta to provide ID management and MFA.
  • FindBiometrics interviews Jeff Maynard, CEO and Founder of Biometric Signature ID.
  • Tradeshift to power supplier solutions for Axfood.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

Onfido Raises $50 Million in New Capital

Onfido Raises $50 Million in New Capital

A new round of funding led by SBI Investment and Salesforce Ventures has driven identity verification specialist Onfido’s total capital to more than $100 million.

“With this new funding, we can protect more businesses, in more countries – and in more ways – from the effects of fraud,” Onfido co-founder and CEO Husayn Kassai said. “We’ll also be able to expand the reach of our technology, so that people without a credit history can finally access the online services they badly need.”

This week’s $50 million financing, which featured participation from M12 (formerly Microsoft Ventures), FinVC, and other investors, will help Onfido fulfill its goal of leveraging AI to standardize how businesses verify identity. In a statement, the company said the funding would also help it “consolidate its core market in the U.S.” as well as support growth in areas like Europe and Southeast Asia.

As part of the investment, former Chief Sales Officer and Vice Chairman of Salesforce Frank van Veenendaal (pictured right with Onfido CEO Kassai) will join Onfido’s board of directors. “There has never been a more important time for companies to build trust with their customers by showing they are one step ahead of fraudsters,” Veenendaal said.

“I believe Onfido has the unique opportunity to transform the digital identity market and deliver robust and scalable authentication-as-a-service,” he added, “similar to how Salesforce transformed customer relationship management.”

Onfido demonstrated its Facial Check with Video solution at FinovateFall 2018. The technology offers enhanced security during new user onboarding by having users video themselves performing specific actions such as repeating random numbers to ensure liveness. Onfido’s solution then leverages machine learning to compare the facial image in the video to the image on the user’s identity document.

Appointed to the FIDO Alliance Board of Directors in March, Onfido also last month announced a project to help train officials at INTERPOL to better identify fraudulent ID documents. The company has made a number a partnerships in the first few months of the year including teaming up with PensionBee, collaborating with P2P RV rental firm, RVshare, and providing verification services for extended stay marketplace, 2nd Address.

Most recently, Onfido partnered with IDValidation to fight the growing problem synthetic identity fraud in which only a single element of an individual’s identity – rather than the users’s complete identity – is stolen and used to make transactions.

With more than 1,500 customers around the world – including industry leaders like DraftKings, Remitly, and Zipcar – Onfido was founded in 2012. The company is headquartered in London, U.K.

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • Onfido Raises $50 Million in New Capital.
  • Salt Edge Earns Account Information Service Provider License from FCA.

Around the web

  • Tinkoff Group of Russia builds supercomputer dubbed the most powerful in financial sector.
  • PayPal joins Series A round for Cambridge Blockchain.
  • EVRY partners with ACI Worldwide to enhance its mobile payment service in the Nordics and Europe.
  • ProfitStars wins 2019 FinTech Breakthrough Award for Best Business Lending Platform
  • Capsilon expands executive team, forms new product organization to drive mortgage innovation. Check out Capsilon’s newest tech at FinovateSpring in May.
  • SocietyOne launches new investor trust.
  • Portland Business Journal: Tyfone brings credit unions the digital tools members want.
  • Insuritas partners with Nymeo FCU to launch digital insurance agency.
  • NestReady to power integrated homebuying experience for Resource Financial Services.

This post will be updated throughout the day as news and developments emerge. You can also follow all the alumni news headlines on the Finovate Twitter account.

Fintech’s Newest Unicorn Bill.com Raises $88 Million in New Funding

Fintech’s Newest Unicorn Bill.com Raises $88 Million in New Funding

In a round led by Franklin Templeton, business payments innovator Bill.com has raised $88 million in new funding. The investment, which also featured participation from Mastercard, Fidelity Canada, FLEETCOR, Tamasek, and others, takes Bill.com’s total funding to $275 million, and gives the company a valuation of more than $1 billion.

“Bill.com is changing how payments are made in the SMB market by defining an industry leading payment and software platform for SMBs,” company founder and CEO René Lacerte said. “Businesses struggle with conventional payment processes which are complex, manual, paper-based and not always secure. Our cloud payment platform is changing all that. We automate payments and back office business processes resulting in significant efficiencies and cost savings.”

In addition to the funding announcement, Bill.com revealed that it has teamed up with fellow Finovate alum Mastercard to offer its virtual cards as part of Bill.com’s automated AP solution for SMEs. The move is part of Bill.com’s effort to further digitize the payment process, leveraging virtual card technology to make funds more readily available to cardholders and to ensure accurate matches between payments and receivables.

Mastercard Small Business Lead for North America Ginger Siegel highlighted the advantages of virtual cards, and praised the collaboration with Bill.com as a way to increase adoption of the technology. “Virtual cards are more secure and provide transparency into cash in-flows and out-flows, which is critical to the growth of all small businesses,” Siegel said. “With the partnership with Bill.com, we can bring the benefits of virtual cards to hundreds of thousands of smaller enterprises in the United States.”

Bill.com demonstrated the Cashview feature of its platform at FinovateSpring 2012. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, the company made fintech headlines recently when it announced that it was ending wire transfer fees for small businesses using its International Payments technology. Earlier this year, Bill.com announced a partnership with American Express to offer a new solution to streamline vendor payments, Vendor Pay.

Founded in 2006, Bill.com manages $60+ billion in annual payment volume in its three million member network, and includes more than 70 of the top 100 accounting firms in the U.S. among its clients. Bill.com is also partnered with major accounting software providers like QuickBooks and Xero, and is the preferred digital payment solutions provider for CPA.com.

TradeIt To Be Acquired by TradingView

TradeIt To Be Acquired by TradingView

Trading API and app developer TradeIt has agreed to be acquired by long-time partner TradingView. The company will leverage TradeIt’s technology to bring mobile trading to the more than 10 million monthly active retail users in 150+ countries who use its social trading platform. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The acquisition is the latest evolution in a relationship that extends back “several years,” according to TradeIt CEO and founder Nathan Richardson. “TradingView’s vision aligns strongly with our view of the distributed financial networks of the future,” he said. “(We’ve) always felt our complimentary products and shared retail investing users makes us stronger together.”

TradeIt’s API infrastructure connects to more than $70 billion in actively traded assets at top U.S. brokerages. Its technology enables financial publishers and app developers to link users’ brokerage and investment accounts, and provides support for transactions in most asset classes, including stocks, ETFs, options, and currencies. TradeIt’s solutions include Trading Ticket,  an order management tool; PortfolioView, which links and provides access to account balances and positions; and Account Opening, which enables customers to open new brokerage accounts in less than two minutes.

TradeIt noted in its statement that brokers have seen a 10x increase in activity among active traders and a 5x gain in account funding when linked to TradeIt’s platform. The company’s partners include Bloomberg, Business Insider, as well as fellow Finovate alums TipRanks and Divy.

In the announcement, TradeIt and TradingView quoted Insight Venture Partners’ Paul Szurek who express optimism about the new, combined entity. “The product pipeline of account opening and messaging services being delivered by TradeIt makes TradingView an essential retail investors service,” he said. Insight Venture Partners led a Series B round for TradingView last year.

TradingView CEO and founder Denis Globa added the combination will help make his company “part of the backbone of the investing ecosystem.” He said that TradingView also will add to TradeIt’s ecosystem with new account opening and messaging solutions. TradeIt users will gain access to TradingView’s charting and quoting functionality.

TradeIt demonstrated its technology at FinovateFall 2015. Founded in 2014, the company is headquartered in New York City.

Finn AI Brings Conversational Banking to South Africa’s TymeBank

Finn AI Brings Conversational Banking to South Africa’s TymeBank

Conversational banking technology innovator, Finn AI, will bring the benefits of AI-powered financial assistance to South Africa’s TymeBank. The partnership, announced this week, will help South Africa’s first digital bank develop Max, a virtual assistant dedicated to improving financial literacy.

“Emerging markets are frontrunners in the digital banking race,” Finn AI CEO Jake Tyler said. “TymeBank is one example of a new challenger bank that is changing the face of banking.”

A digital, mobile-first financial institution, TymeBank has no branches and charges lower fees than its brick and mortar rivals. Customers can set up accounts with TymeBank at any one of nearly 700 automated kiosks at Pick n Pay and Boxer supermarkets. More than 100,000 South Africans have opened accounts with the bank since it opened for business in February.

Coenraad Jonker, TymeBank CEO, called the partnership with Finn AI “absolutely instrumental” to the neobank’s early success. “By partnering with Finn AI, TymeBank can offer highly personalized services to our customers,” Jonker said. “We’re working closely on integrating their technology in new ways, such as using AI to simplify account creation.”

With Max, TymeBank seeks to meet consumer expectations for more customized, self-service, digital engagement. The conversational assistant will help bank customers improve their financial lives through better understanding of their credit scores, and provides goal-based savings strategies to help users meet their financial objectives. Max will be available from within the bank’s TymeCoach app.

“We broke the banking mold because it didn’t fit our market – so we built our own,” Jonker said. “It’s customer-centric, intelligent, and it’s helping South Africans enhance their financial well-being.”

Finn demonstrated its virtual banking assistant at FinovateFall 2017, winning Best of Show honors for the second time. Earlier this year, the company announced a partnership with IDaaS specialist, Auth0, that will help banks more readily adopt conversational AI technology. Finn.ai also teamed up with fellow Finovate alum Fidor Bank to help the innovative digital banking group deploy its AI-powered chatbot.

Founded in 2014 and headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, Finn AI has raised $13.7 million in funding. The company’s investors include Flying Fish Partners, Yaletown Partners, and angel investor John Livingston.

Virtual Banks Launch in Hong Kong; Can Bitcoin Save Argentina?

Finovate Global is our weekly look at fintech innovation in developing economies in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, and Central and Eastern Europe.

Sub-Saharan Africa

  • Nigerian payments company Amplify has been acquired by OneFinance (OneFi). Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
  • Tech in Africa profiles Kenyan fintech Branch.
  • Compelo features insurtechs and savings platforms in its presentation of African tech startups “looking to go global.”

Central and Eastern Europe

  • Bank 131, Russia’s first new bank in four years, to specialize in serving online businesses.
  • Estonian cryptocurrency exchange Jubiter launches debit card.
  • Business Review looks at opportunities for Romanian entrepreneurs in the fintech market in the CEE region.

Middle East and Northern Africa

  • Etihad Credit Insurance teams up with First Abu Dhabi Bank to help UAE companies manage trade finance.
  • Egyptian cloud-based payroll service Dopay picks up €1 million line of credit from the Massif Fund.
  • Emirates NBD and Fintech Hive announced launch of API sandbox.

Central and South Asia

  • Pakistan’s first microfinance bank, Khushhali Bank, goes live with Temenos’ T24 core banking system.
  • Google Play to launch gold-backed investment plans in India.
  • Indian core banking system provider Nelito Systems inks deal with Myanmar’s Alliance for Microfinance.

Latin America and the Caribbean

  • Mexico-based lender Credijuto announces $100 million credit facility courtesy of Goldman Sachs.
  • Investor Tim Draper makes the case for Argentina to embrace bitcoin.
  • T13 considers the slow progress of fintech regulation in Chile. In Spanish.

Asia-Pacific

  • ZhongAn earns virtual banking license from Hong Kong Monetary Authority.
  • ING and Bank of Beijing invest $447 million in a new digital bank in China.
  • Standard Chartered partners with Ctrip Finance to launch virtual bank in Hong Kong.

Top image designed by Freepik

Klarna Launches Open Banking Platform

Klarna Launches Open Banking Platform

 

Klarna is the latest fintech to embrace the open banking revolution. The payments company has announced the launch of its own Open Banking Platform, which will enable access to more than 4,300 banks in 14 different markets across Europe via a single Access to Account (XS2A) API – all in accordance with PSD2 guidelines.

Klarna’s offering will feature both account information services (AIS) for consolidated data on payment accounts, and payment initiation services (PIS) to support PSD2-licensed, account-to-account direct bank transfers. In a statement, the company noted that its XS2A PIS technology transferred more than €10 billion in volume and completed more than 100 million transactions last year alone.

“Our technology allows us to offer an ecosystem of services not only to consumers but also to businesses – whether that’s in retail, financial services, or technology,” Klarna CTO Koen Koppen explained. “We look forward to seeing all (the) new solutions and products that will grow out of this, creating a consumer centric financial services industry in Europe.”

Klarna’s Open Banking Platform also gives developers the tools they need to handle the compliance and user experience of credentials management. At the same time, the platform helps them get new products – from payment initiation and credit solutions to roboadvisory and PFM – to market faster and with less cost.

“We can offer the leading technology, quality, knowledge and market presence to help other players develop even better services and products for their consumers,” Klarna Open Banking Platform Manager George Parks Davie said. “Klarna’s XS2A API opens up a range of opportunities and through developer-friendly infrastructure it also empowers innovators.”

Klarna demonstrated its flagship platform at FinovateSpring 2012. Headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden, the company announced a partnership with Canadian e-commerce and in-store point-of-sale financing specialist PayBright earlier this month. In February, Klarna extended its Pay Later service to Gymshark customers in the U.K. and the Nordics. At the beginning of the year, the company announced collaborations with both rapper Snoop Dogg and watchmaker Daniel Wellington.

Founded in 2005, Klarna has raised more than $681 million in funding. The company includes Sequoia Capital, General Atlantic, Creandum, Visa, and Permira among its investors.

FICO and Equifax Forge Strategic Partnership

FICO and Equifax Forge Strategic Partnership

A new strategic partnership between FICO and Equifax will help financial institutions better manage risk, marketing, and fraud. The two companies have introduced the Data Decisions Cloud: an end-to-end data and analytics suite that integrates Equifax Ignite, a data and analytics management solution, with FICO Cloud applications and Decision Management Suite, FICO’s digital decisioning platform.

“Our common mission is to empower financial institutions to leverage data-driven decisioning in all their customer interactions,” FICO CEO William J. Lansing said. “With this strategic partnership, FICO and Equifax will help organizations operationalize the best data with unparalleled predictive analytics and applied AI, and do so in a streamlined and cost-effective way.”

The Data Decisions Cloud will enable institutions to better navigate differentiated data to find insights and build highly-predictive models that add greater personalization and protection to the customer experience. For FIs in particular, the solution aims to accelerate the pace of innovation around data and decisioning by helping them take advantage of technologies like explainable AI and neural networks.

Via the partnership, the two companies plan to launch additional joint initiatives later in 2019. Among the upcoming products are a connected system that promotes data science collaboration by providing real-time access to raw and trended data, and an AML/KYC compliance-as-a-service solution. FICO and Equifax also plan to introduce an integrated, pre-screen marketing automation solution that creates FCRA-compliant, customer acquisition and retention campaigns.

“We are energized about this broad partnership between Equifax and FICO,” Equifax CEO Mark W. Begor said. “Two industry leaders are joining forces to help financial institutions better meet the needs of consumers and improve business agility.”

FICO (which stands for Fair Isaac Corporation) participated in our developers conference, FinDEVr NewYork in 2016, with a presentation called Rapidly Deliver Contextually-Powered Stream Processing. Members of the company’s product management and product engineering teams discussed how its Decision Management Platform transformed data “from raw to decision-ready” to help companies better manage risk, fraud, marketing, and customer service.

The company began the year with news of a partnership with electronics payments specialist Conductor to fight payment card fraud in Brazil. Also this year, FICO announced winning five new patents for fraud prevention, AI, and advanced analytics technologies. Founded in 1956 and headquartered in San Jose, California, FICO trades on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker FICO, and has a market capitalization of $7 billion.

Atlanta, Georgia-based Equifax demonstrated its mobile app at FinovateFall 2011. More recently, the company introduced its Ignite solution in the U.K., and teamed up with fellow Finovate alum Experian to provide free credit monitoring via its TrustedID Premier service.

The global data analytics and technology company is active in 24 countries in the Americas, Europe, and the Asia Pacific region, and employs 11,000 workers around the world. With a market capitalization of $14 billion, Equifax trades on the NYSE under the ticker EFX.

YellowDog Raises $3.3 Million in Series A

YellowDog Raises $3.3 Million in Series A

In a round led by Bloc Ventures, cloud computing scheduling and orchestration management platform YellowDog announced securing an additional $3.3 million (£2.5 million) in Series A funding. The investment brings the total raised for the company’s Series A to more than $5.5 million (the company raised $2.2 million – £1.7 million – in March of last year.)

The financing also featured participation from Vodafone and ARM Holdings. YellowDog said that it will use the additional capital to scale its business and continue its successful expansion into financial services.

The company also announced that Reid Downey, an executive with 10 years’ experience leading software and cloud enterprise sales of Microsoft Azure and Office365 to Fortune 500 firms, will join YellowDog’s board of directors.

Left to right: CEO and founder Gareth Williams and CTO Simon Ponsford demonstrating YellowDog for Financial Services at FinovateEurope 2019.

“We are excited to welcome Reid to the Board and to secure this further funding given our tremendous year of growth ahead,” YellowDog CEO Gareth Williams said. “With our recent wins in the financial services market and more in the pipeline this year, we are only at the tip of the iceberg in this market.”

“The funding will enable us to support our global customer base and extend our technology into new markets such as aerospace,” he added.

YellowDog demonstrated its technology at FinovateEurope 2019. With more than 1,500 customers in 42 countries around the world, YellowDog leverages high performance cloud compute orchestration technology to enable businesses to accurately anticipate the computing resources required to complete complex computational workloads.

With customers in a wide variety of verticals – from entertainment studios to financial services, YellowDog helps companies not only use computing resources more efficiently, they also save significantly on the cost of connectivity – which can be significant when it comes to cloud-based high performance computing.

And in addition to providing intelligent, optimized orchestration, YellowDog’s technology also functions across multi-vendor cloud fabric, providing the high level of compute resilience that some firms, especially those in financial services, require.

Founded in 2015 and headquartered in Bristol, U.K., the company was shortlisted for the Tech Company of the Year award at the U.K. Business Tech Awards in 2018. Also last year, YellowDog won the Business Innovation Award at the inaugural Best New Business Awards. U.K.-based Business Leader magazine identified the company among its 32 South West Tech Businesses That Are Shaping the Future profile.