FinovateAfrica Sneak Peek: Drive Revenue

FinovateAfrica Sneak Peek: Drive Revenue

A look at the companies demoing live at FinovateAfrica on November 27 and 28, 2018 in Cape Town, South Africa. Register today and save your spot.

Drive Practice, a Drive Revenue Holdings product, provides real-time online accounting and practice management for the legal profession.

Features

  • Instant insight into practice and professional performance
  • Visibility of trust monies held and disbursements incurred
  • Automation created management by exception.

Why it’s great
Legaltech is a buzzword, focused on operational innovation. Drive Practice innovates the strategic management of the business practice, critical for the survival of the #21stCenturyLawyer.

Presenters

Jenny Assheton-Smith, CEO
Assheton-Smith is experienced in Business Process Re-engineering, design and implementation of business systems. She is passionate about automating business processes, strategic alignment, and management by exception.
LinkedIn

 

FinovateAfrica Sneak Peek: RISQ

FinovateAfrica Sneak Peek: RISQ

A look at the companies demoing live at FinovateAfrica on November 27 and 28, 2018 in Cape Town, South Africa. Register today and save your spot.

RISQ empowers corporate/SME banking divisions with a solution that combines an efficient platform with intelligence, data integration, and AI, presented in a radically intuitive user experience.

Features

  • Manages complex credit decisions with ease
  • Provides integrated analytics and AI components to support the process
  • Integrates “out-of-the-box” with multiple external data repositories

Why it’s great
RISQ | corporate lending powered by CRIF puts the business banking user in the driver’s seat, giving them a 360-degree visibility of every credit decision in real-time.

Presenters

Michael Jesse, CEO and Co-Founder
Jesse has met with over 150 banks in 35+ countries as part of various management roles. This unique insight was channeled into RISQ to create a radically new approach to financial software.
LinkedIn

 

Ozan Vakar, CTO and Co-Founder
Vakar, being an entrepreneur for over 25 years in the financial services industry, has the unique capability to transform a business requirement into a software solution that exceeds clients’ expectations.
LinkedIn

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • Thought Machine Announces Strategic Partnership with Lloyds Banking Group.

Around the web

  • OutSystems announces its partner of the year awards.
  • A €5.5 billion independent French bank will deploy Ambit Focus, a regulatory reporting as a service solution from FIS.
  • eToro invests $1 million into cryptocurrency experiment, GoodDollar, designed to reduce wealth inequality.
  • Dell Small Business’ BetaKit interviews Finn.AI co-founder and COO, Natalie Cartwright.
  • Signicat launches new B2B document signing solution, Signicat Business Signature.
  • Backbase names Capgemini its Global Solution Partner of the Year.

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.

Finovate Global: Fintech News from Around the World

As Finovate goes increasingly global, so does our coverage of financial technology. Finovate Global: Fintech News from Around the World is our weekly look at fintech innovation in developing economies in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, and Central and Eastern Europe.

Central and Eastern Europe

  • Tinkoff Bank launches its Tinkoff Mortgage mobile application for its mortgage customers and partners.
  • Emerging Europe looks at the growth potential of the Romanian fintech market.
  • Government of Ukraine announces plans to legalize cryptocurrencies within three years.

Middle East and Northern Africa

  • Emirates NBD launches its API sandbox.
  • Arab Bank for Investment and Foreign Trade (Al Masraf) licenses Temenos‘ Learning Community Engine.
  • Bahrain’s Ahli United Bank (AUB) signs up for merchant acquiring solutions from Arab Financial Services (AFS).
  • Alejma’s Alarabi Bank (AAB) of Libya picks Temenos’ T24 core banking system as part of infrastructure renovation.

Central and South Asia

  • State Bank of India (SBI) to build card acceptance and digital payments platform as part of collaboration with Hitachi Payments.
  • Tajikistan’s first Islamic bank, Sohibkorbank, to deploy Ethix core banking system from International Turnkey Systems.
  • Open Financial Technologies and ICICI Bank of India partner to offer payments platform for micro, small, and medium-sized businesses.

Latin America and the Caribbean

  • Fiserv powers digital banking platform for Bogota Savings Bank.
  • BioCatch partners with 7 tier-one Latin American banks.
  • Visa makes its first investment in Brazil, announcing a minority stake in payment processing platform, Conductor.

Asia-Pacific

  • Temenos partners with Shanghai Pudong Development Bank (SPD Bank) to launch innovation lab.
  • StashAway, a roboadvisor based in Singapore, expands to Malaysia.
  • Australian neobank, Xinja, hires Moven founder Brett King as a permanent advisor.

Sub-Saharan Africa

  • New challenger mutual bank in South Africa, Bank Zero, announces trial run.
  • Core banking software technology startup, Riby, picks up investment from Nigerian firm, Microtraction.
  • First Bank of Nigeria goes live with chat banking on WhatsApp courtesy of partnership with Clickatell.
  • Absa Group collaborates with MTN to support POS payments via mobile wallet in Ghana.

Top image designed by Freepik

TransferWise Teams Up with Dutch Digital Bank bunq

TransferWise Teams Up with Dutch Digital Bank bunq

TransferWise has bunq in the trunk.

International money transfer specialist has a new partner in Dutch challenger bank bunq, which announced today that it is integrating with TransferWise’s API to enable its customers to send money in up to 15 different currencies directly from the bunq app.

“Our mission is to free our users from borders and barriers in traditional banking, such as hidden fees,” bunq CEO Ali Niknam said. “We think TransferWise is a valuable addition to solidify that mission.” Founded in 2015, bunq is headquartered in Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Bunq users will also benefit from access to real exchange rates, TransferWise’s transparent and competitive fees, and fast transfer speeds – the latter courtesy of the instant SEPA payment system that shortens the time it takes EUR to GBR transfers, for example, from days to minutes. “In the future,” TransferWise noted in a blog post announcing the partnership news, “it should only take a few seconds.”

bunq is the second challenger bank that TransferWise has teamed up with this year. In June, the company partnered with Monzo, powering international money transfers for the digital bank’s 750,000 customers. And just weeks before announcing the Monzo partnership, TransferWise reported that it was working with Groupe BPCE, providing money transfer services to the French banking group’s 15 million retail customers.

TransferWise demonstrated its technology at FinovateEurope 2013. Earlier this fall, the company announced its second profitable year and annual revenue growth of 75%. This summer, TransferWise announced the opening of an office in Hong Kong as part of its expansion into Asia. With more than $396 million in funding, TransferWise is one of fintech’s “unicorns” with a valuation in excess of $1.6 billion. The company has more than three million users, and facilitates the transfer of more than $2.65 billion a month. TransferWise was founded by Taavet Hinrikus and Kristo Kaarmann (CEO) in 2011.

CredoLab, GoBear Launch Credit Solution for the Underbanked

CredoLab, GoBear Launch Credit Solution for the Underbanked

A collaboration between alternative credit scoring specialist CredoLab and personal finance comparison site GoBear will make it easier for the underbanked to get access to credit. A new smartphone app, Easy Apply, will leverage CredoLab’s credit assessment technology to serve underbanked markets of Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Easy Apply leverages CredoLab’s predictive credit scorecard solution to the help thin-file applicants access unsecured credit products including credit cards and personal loans. The AI-powered technology extracts and analyzes data from the user’s smartphone to make highly-predictive behavioral insights. These insights are used to build customized credit risk scorecards that are tailor-made for individual lenders and specific products. This enables lenders to benefit from access to creditworthy borrowers who might otherwise be overlooked by traditional credit risk assessment strategies.

“We are excited to be partnering with GoBear to help banks profitably serve their customers including the underbanked,” CredoLab co-founder and CEO Peter Barcak said. “Since our launch in 2016, through our use of non-traditional alternative data points, we have seen a significant drop in cost of risk, helped reduce the time-to-yes to a few seconds, and achieved almost 45% increase in approval rates,” Barcak added. “I am optimistic that we can achieve similar results through this partnership.”

Easy Apply will be integrated as a downloadable app within GoBear’s Easy Choices feature, which gives customers the ability to select products that fit their financial profile. Credit card offerings will be the first products available with personal loans, insurance, and lines of credit to follow.

“There is a massive opportunity here in Southeast Asia to continue improving financial inclusion by constantly innovating solutions,” GoBear CEO Adrian Chng, said. “Our partnership with CredoLab will bridge the divide between the underbanked and financial institutions by giving both parties access to the right technology at the right moment to create better outcomes.”

Founded in 2016, Singapore-based CredoLab made its Finovate debut earlier this month in Hong Kong as part of FinovateAsia. The company, which was named among Singapore Business Review’s Top 20 Start-Ups at the beginning of the year, has served more than 40 lenders in 12 markets across southeast Asia, China, Africa, and Latin America. With $2.1 million in funding, CredoLab includes Walden International, Reliance Modal Ventura, and Fintonia Group among its investors.

Experian Unveils New Credit Assessment Solution, Experian Credit 3D 

Experian Unveils New Credit Assessment Solution, Experian Credit 3D 

Experian is launching a new range of consumer credit assessment products for lenders, Experian Credit 3D, reports Henry Vilar of Fintech Futures (Finovate’s sister publication).

The product offers a multi-dimensional view of a borrower’s financial health, instead of a consumer’s credit information at a single point in time. The firm aims to deliver “a more granular and predictive insight into a consumer’s payment behavior”.

Business will be able to combine rental, utilities, council tax, property and mobile data, to provide a view of predictive behaviour and affordability.

“A customer’s current credit position only ever tells part of the story. People’s financial circumstances are multidimensional and unique,” said Tom Blacksell, managing director of B2B at Experian. “We are supporting our customers as they look to keep up with a diverse and ever-changing global population.”

The firm that said that moving away from traditional risk scores by augmenting them with a view of detailed consumer behaviors over time is particularly valuable in making decisions on applications which are currently on the margins.

Alternative non-credit data, including subscriptions and utilities data, can support the approval of applications from consumers with ‘thin’ credit files.

Blacksell added: “By combining all this with our global market leading decisioning capabilities in PowerCurve, and our soon-to-be-announced investments in SaaS deployment, we’ll be able to support customers of all sizes to make intelligent decisions in frictionless, digital environments.”

Recently, Experian, FICO and Finicity joined to create a new type of score, named the UltraFICO score. Designed to specifically help serve thin-file customers, the UltraFICO score focuses on how consumers actually manage their personal finances rather than repayment data from previous credit usage.

Experian demonstrated its cloud-based decisioning platform at FinovateFall 2018. Founded in 1996 and headquartered in Costa Mesa, California, Experian was named one of the top most innovative companies in the world by Forbes magazine for five years in a row.

Finovate Alumni News

On Finovate.com

  • Credit Karma Acquires Noddle to Launch in the U.K.

Around the web

  • Moneyhub announces integration with PensionBee API.
  • Outsystems unveils new program, outsystems.ai, to leverage AI and machine learning to improve software development.
  • Finastra introduces Open Banking Readiness Index for Asia Pacific region.
  • Trulioo reports ability to verify five billion people via its identity verification platform, Global Gateway.
  • Wipro collaborates with Check Point Software to offer cloud security services.
  • Unison expands with Goldwater Bank Partnership.
  • Flywire partners with the Dallas-Fort Worth Hospital Council to offer members payment solutions.
  • How I Built This podcast features Betterment founder Jon Stein.
  • Roostify names Courtney Keating Chakarun as new Chief Marketing Officer.

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.

FinovateAsia Best of Show Winners Announced

FinovateAsia Best of Show Winners Announced

Congratulations to the trio of companies that earned Best of Show honors from our FinovateAsia 2018 audience. This year’s selections reflect two key themes in fintech: the importance of enabling banks with the resources they need to empower SMEs to better serve their customers, and the rise of intelligent virtual assistants to improve efficiency and enhance the customer experience.

Arival Bank for its ArivalOS digital banking platform that integrates a full suite of third party fintech products tailored for SMEs, including bank accounts, money transfers, debit cards, mPOS, factoring, and lending. Video.

 

Avaloq for its platform that provides seamless access to fintech solutions via a “double marketplace” that brings the app store concept to banking. Video.

Voca.ai for its human-friendly, virtual intelligent agent for financial services call centers that helps drive lead generation, cross-sales, notifications, scheduling, and more. Video.

To see all the demo videos from FinovateAsia 2018, visit our video archives.


Notes on methodology:
1. Only audience members NOT associated with demoing companies were eligible to vote. Finovate employees did not vote.
2. Attendees were encouraged to note their favorites during each day. At the end of the last demo, they chose their three favorites.
3. The exact written instructions given to attendees: “Please rate (the companies) on the basis of demo quality and potential impact of the innovation demoed.”
4. The three companies appearing on the highest percentage of submitted ballots were named “Best of Show.”
5. Go here for a list of previous Best of Show winners through 2014. Best of Show winners from our 2015 through 2018 conferences are below:
FinovateEurope 2015
FinovateSpring 2015
FinovateFall 2015
FinovateEurope 2016
FinovateSpring 2016
FinovateFall 2016
FinovateAsia 2016
FinovateEurope 2017
FinovateSpring 2017
FinovateFall 2017
FinovateAsia 2017
FinovateMiddleEast 2018
FinovateEurope 2018
FinovateSpring 2018
FinovateFall 2018

Welcome to Wan Chai: FinovateAsia Kicks Off Hong Kong FinTech Week

Welcome to Wan Chai: FinovateAsia Kicks Off Hong Kong FinTech Week

Rehearsal day is underway here at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center in Wan Chai. With FinovateAsia 2018 starting Monday morning, our demoing companies are busy practicing their pitches in preparation for two days of live fintech demonstrations.

That said, FinovateAsia is more than just fintech demos. As part of Hong Kong FinTech Week, FinovateAsia will also host a variety of in-depth presentations – from keynote addresses and expert briefings to breakout tracks on topics such as AI and blockchain technology, open banking, insurtech, payments, digital transformation, lending, and more.

And in addition to Analyst All-Star panels and our Accelerator/Incubator Showcase, FinovateAsia will also feature an “off the record” session with global regulators, a conversation among VCs on where the smart money is investing in fintech, and a special breakout track focusing on fintech opportunities on mainland China.

More detailed information about our agenda is available on our FinovateAsia event page.

We’re looking forward to seeing you this week. The Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center is located at 1 Expo Drive, Wan Chai, Hong Kong. Once you arrive at the venue, please follow the signs to rooms S221s on Level 2. The Center is readily accessible by Mass Transit Railway (MTR), bus, train, tram, ferry, and taxi.

The conference begins Monday, October 29th, and continues through Tuesday, October 30th. Registration opens at 8am, with continental breakfast and networking, and our program begins with Welcoming Remarks at 8:45am and our Keynote Address at 8:50am. Live demos on Monday will take place between 9:35am and 10:25am, and between 11:15am and 12:05pm. Monday will also feature two Analyst All-Star panels – one in the morning and one in the afternoon – as well as breakout tracks on AI and blockchain technology, open banking and the API economy, and insurance and payments.

Tuesday will run similarly to Monday, with registration at 8am, Welcoming Remarks at 8:45am, and our Keynote at 8:50am. Tuesday will also feature morning and afternoon Analyst All-Star panels, and our two live demo sessions are scheduled to start at 9:25am and 11:10am, respectively. As on Monday, our breakout tracks on Tuesday will begin after lunch and will focus on digital transformation, lending, and fintech innovation on mainland China. Tuesday will also feature our investors debate, our Best of Show awards, and our accelerator/incubator showcase.

As you can see, this year’s FinovateAsia is an action-packed affair. Be sure to check out our agenda for more details on our demoing companies, our speakers and panelists, and our breakout tracks, summits, and expert briefings.

And once you’re here, be sure to join the FinovateAsia community on our Knect365 event app. Search for “FinovateAsia 2018” once you are in the app to access Sli.do, Best of Show voting, our networking platform Brella, our attendee list, agenda, floorplan, and more. If you have any difficulty with the app, please contact us at info@finovate.com for assistance.

Remember that tickets to FinovateAsia are still available. If you are interested in attending, please visit our FinovateAsia registration page and save your spot. We’ll see you in Wan Chai!

OnDeck Partners with PNC Bank to Streamline SME Financing

OnDeck Partners with PNC Bank to Streamline SME Financing

Starting in 2019, PNC Bank will offer digital business lines of credit up to $100,000 within one to three business days. This expansion of its current online lending business comes courtesy of a partnership with OnDeck, whose OnDeck Platform-as-a-Service (ODX) solution – launched earlier this month – will simplify and speed up the loan origination process for PNC Bank’s SME customers.

“Small and medium-sized business owners are continually searching for simpler, easier and quicker means to apply for and receive funding and to that end, PNC is investing in this new avenue to find solutions that work for them,” Head of Retail Lending at PNC Bank Lakhbir Lamba said. “Our relationship with OnDeck is PNC’s first opportunity to leverage the services of a fintech company in a platform-as-a-service model that will make it easier for businesses to borrow from us in order to support their growth.”

PNC Bank, National Association, is a member of The PNC Financial Services Group, one of the largest diversified financial services institutions in the U.S. PNC Bank has more than eight million retail and small business customers who use its deposit, lending, credit card, cash management, and investment services. With branches and ATMs in 19 states plus the District of Columbia, PNC Bank provides a variety of asset management and corporate/institutional banking services, and is a minority owner in investment management firm, BlackRock.

Headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and founded more than 160 years ago, PNC Bank has $293 billion of assets under administration.

Since inception in 2006, OnDeck has delivered more than $10 billion in loans to small business borrowers in 700 different industries throughout the U.S., Canada, and Australia. The company leverages its advanced technology and underwriting platform to help SMEs get the “responsibly-priced and right-sized” short-term financing they need to grow. OnDeck estimates that its support of small businesses has helped create 74,000 jobs across the U.S. And via its newly-launched subsidiary, ODX, OnDeck offers banks a new way to better service their SME customers and encourage even more economic activity

“ODX is the next generation service provider for the digital lending era,” OnDeck chairman and CEO Noah Breslow said earlier this month when ODX launched. He added, “(ODX offers) a bank-ready origination platform, analytic support, and implementation services that speed product and process transformation to help banks better meet the evolving needs of their customers.”

One of Finovate’s earliest alums, OnDeck most recently participated in our developers conference, FinDEVr New York 2016. At the event, OnDeck SVP for Technology Pamela Rice discussed how the company’s engineering team and engineering-driven culture were “key differentiators” in OnDeck’s ability to innovate.

This summer, OnDeck announced closing two revolving credit facilities totaling $93 million to help fund small businesses in both Australia and Canada. This spring, the company appointed Kenneth Brause as its new CFO, replacing long-time financial chief Howard Katzenberg. Brause was previously EVP and treasurer at CIT Group.

OnDeck is a publicly-traded company on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol “ONDK.” The company has a market capitalization of $500 million. Noah Breslow is CEO.

Finovate Global: Fintech News from Around the World

As Finovate goes increasingly global, so does our coverage of financial technology. Finovate Global: Fintech News from Around the World 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 online accounting services specialist Accounteer announces plans to open new office in Nairobi, Kenya.
  • First Bank of Nigeria awards more than $14,000 in cash prizes to winners of its hackathon competition.
  • Absa Group of South Africa adds new functionality to its mobile app.

Central and Eastern Europe

  • Tinkoff Bank launches Tinkoff Junior mobile app for children and teenagers.
  • Sberbank unveils its new Payment Schedules solution, enabling users to configure the interface of Sberbank Business Online into an event feed format.
  • Top ten Ukrainian bank, First Ukrainian International Bank (FUIB) to offer banking services via messaging apps Viber and Telegram – with Facebook Messenger to be added by the end of the year.
  • Emerging Europe features Lithuania as “China’s fintech gateway to Europe.”
  • Polish vendor finance specialist LeaseLink joins loan syndication platform, Mintos.

Middle East and Northern Africa

  • The UAE’s Anglo-Gulf Trade Bank, a digitally-enabled trade bank, is announced, with operations to begin in early 2019.
  • TradeArabia looks at how fintech can help enhance trade in the Middle East.
  • Bahrain Fintech Bay launches Global Islamic & Sustainable Fintech Center (GISFC).

Central and South Asia

  • Bengaluru-based ClearTax India raises $54.6 million ($4 billion INR) in new funding.
  • Tez Financial Services, Pakistan’s first fully digital non-bank microfinance company, announces picking up $1.1 million in seed funding in a round led by Omidyar Network.
  • India’s Utkarsh Small Finance Bank (USFB) goes live with UP Retail Payments from ACI Worldwide.

Latin America and the Caribbean

  • PayStand expands operations to Mexico, forms regional partnership with StartupGDL.
  • Fidor and GFT extend partnership to the Americas markets.
  • Argentine fintech Ualá picks up $34 million investment from Goldman Sachs.

Asia-Pacific

  • Hong Kong-based mobile current account solution for the underbanked, Neat, raises $3 million in funding.
  • Accenture partners with Siam Commercial Bank’s fintech subsidiary, Digital Ventures, to co-launch blockchain trade solution. See Siam Commercial Bank at FinovateAsia in Hong Kong next week.
  • Indonesia’s OnlinePajak, a tax app provider, announced a $25 million investment in a round led by Warburg Pincus.
  • Fintech Futures takes a look at the “fintech battle” between China and the West.

Top image designed by Freepik