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Finovate Blog
Tracking fintech, banking & financial services innovations since 1994
Michigan-based banking solutions provider Bankjoy announced 16 new credit union partners.
Combined, credit unions represent more than 350,000 members and more than $3.3 billion in assets
The partnership news follows the company’s launch of a new small business banking platform.
Digital banking solutions provider Bankjoy has added 16 credit unions to its digital service ecosystem. The new partners combined represent more than 350,000 members and more than $3.3 billion in assets. Additionally, they serve members in states ranging from New Mexico, Texas, and Nevada, to Ohio, Illinois, and Alaska.
The credit unions newly partnering with Bankjoy include:
Cooperative Teachers Credit Union
Directions Credit Union
Elko FCU
Estacado FCU
Firelands FCU
Fremont FCU
Glass City FCU
Impact Credit Union
Las Colinas FCU
Lone Star Credit Union
Midwest Community FCU
OU FCU
Streator Onized Credit Union
Trius FCU
True North FCU
Pyramid FCU
“Credit unions like Estacado, Cooperative Teachers Credit Union and others are partnering with fintechs like Bankjoy to provide modern digital banking platforms that keep pace with members’ needs,” Bankjoy CEO Michael Duncan said. He highlighted growth in deposits in credit unions across the country, adding “as these trends continue, we’re adding more credit unions to our platform and look forward to helping them deliver a superior experience.”
Bankjoy’s partnership news comes in the wake of the company’s addition of a modern business banking platform to its offering. The platform, introduced in December, gives banks the tools its small business customers need and include solutions for invoicing, payroll, company formation, wire transfers, and entitlements.
Headquartered in Detroit, Michigan, and founded in 2015, Bankjoy also reported late last year that it had been chosen as the first official Corelation Certified Partner. The partnership enables credit unions who use Corelation’s Keystone core to efficiently integrate with Bankjoy. It also makes it easy for Bankjoy’s credit union partners to migrate their core to Corelation without disrupting the member experience.
“To support the credit union movement, it is critical for fintechs to partner with likeminded organizations who are committed to a member-centric approach,” Duncan said. “Our collaboration with Corelation has been incredibly successful, delivering tremendous value to credit unions.”
A Finovate alum since 2016, Bankjoy has raised $1.8 million in funding from investors including SixThirty and CheckAlt.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has sent shockwaves around the world – and the fintech industry has not been immune to the reverberations. As Axios noted last week, fintechs such as money transfer giant Wise and financial services company Brex have limited or halted fund transfers altogether to Russia and Ukraine. The reasons given for the service changes have varied, with some organizations emphasizing solidarity with Ukraine and others citing operational challenges. But the fact remains that the Russian invasion of Ukraine has forced many fintechs, in Europe especially, into scramble mode is impossible to deny.
The crisis in Ukraine also has brought renewed interest in the role of cryptocurrencies. As economic sanctions – including the expulsion of a number of Russian banks from global financial messaging service SWIFT – take their toll on the Russian economy, the idea that Russia and the country’s elites could turn to cryptocurrencies to limit the financial damage may be edging from possibility to probability. The Ukrainian government has asked cryptocurrency exchanges to freeze the accounts of Russians and Belarusians and, at this point, it appears that some of the world’s biggest cryptocurrency exchanges are moving in that direction.
Ukrainian fintechs are also committing their technology and talent to the cause of defending their country from Russian aggression. For one, the country’s leading neobank Monobank is accepting SEPA transfers to help fund the Ukrainian army, and announced that it has raised more than 11 million Ukrainian hryvnia ($395,830) to date.
That said, one of the biggest concerns from Ukrainian tech companies in general and fintech companies in specific is panic from these companies’ customers. TechUkraine’s Nataly Veremeeva urged clients of Ukrainian firms to maintain their relationships, noting that the income from these partnerships helps support both the Ukrainian economy and the Ukrainian military. Importantly, the fact that Ukraine has been under threat from Russia for nearly a decade has helped Ukrainian companies develop a resiliency that is being brought to bear today, Veremeeva explained.
This point was underscored by Senka Hadzimuratovic, spokesperson for one of the more famous Ukraine-founded tech companies, Grammarly. Backup communications and temporarily transferring certain critical business responsibilities to Grammarly team members living outside of the country have been among the precautions taken by the company.
Ivan Kaunov, Head of Growth and co-founder of Finmap.online, a Ukraine-based financial management app for SMEs, spoke for many of his fellow Ukrainians late last week. “Today Russia (has) invaded Ukraine. All our teammates (are) in safe places, We, as a nation, unite(d) and ready to resist.”
A brief primer on fintech in Ukraine
There is a wide variety of fintech companies in the Ukraine. These firms range from neobanks like Monobank, a five year old financial institution with more than four million customers, to payments companies like IBox and EasyPay, to financial services technology companies like Neofin and Wallet Factory, to cryptocurrency exchanges like Kuna. One way to get a broad cross-section of the country’s fintech sector is via the Ukrainian Association of Fintech and Innovation Companies (UAFIC). The organization, founded in 2018, is a membership-based NGO designed to support the development of Ukraine’s fintech industry. Approximately 66% of the association’s members are fintechs, with another 14% representing IT companies and MFOs, and banks making up 6%.
Last fall, the UAFIC announced a collaboration with leading financial sector associations in Ukraine- including the Independent Association of Banks of Ukraine (NABU), the Association of Financial Institutions, the All-Ukrainian Association of Credit Unions, and the Insurance Business Association. The goal of the alliance is to help design legislation to support the development of open banking and payment services in the country.
“Recently, fintech companies and banks have realized that working on the basis of OpenBanking technologies is much more profitable than competing with each other,” UAFIC Board Chairman Rostislav Duke said. “The financial ecosystemn is receiving new signals of openness and willingness to cooperate and partner in the market. Our work will promote greater access to information for all financial market participants.”
Another way to learn more about the Ukraine fintech industry is via TechUkraine, a platform dedicated to supporting the country’s technology ecosystem. A spin-off from the Export Strategy of Ukraine for ICT Sector, TechUkraine is geared toward encouraging what Director Veremeeva called “a great story of government and business working together to achieve a truly significant goal – Ukraine (as) an innovation-driven, universally recognized tech destination that delivers high value for the global economy.”
This week’s Finovate Global takes a look at developments in the Indian fintech industry. Leading off is news that Indian neobank Niyo has secured $100 million in Series C funding. The round was led by Accel and Lightrock India and also featured investment from Beams Fintech Fund, Prime Venture Partners, and JS Capital, among others. Niyo, founded in 2015 by Vinay Bagri and Virender Bisht, will use the capital to support product innovation, marketing, and branding, as well as increasing its distribution footprint and adding talent.
“We have always strived to offer tangible value and a delightful experience to our customers,” Bagri said in a statement. “In the process we are transforming the way India banks.” Co-founder Bisht highlighted the impact of the pandemic on the pace of digitization of financial services in the country. “We are seeing massive tailwinds for digital products since COVID,” he noted.
Niyo collaborates with banks to offer digital savings accounts and other banking services. The neobank serves four million customers via its banking and wealth management operations and says that it is adding customers to its platform at a rate of 10,000 new users a day. With more than $3 billion in transactions, Niyo claims it is the biggest consumer-based neo-banking platform in India.
Earlier this month Niyo introduced the country’s first, fully digital salary account. Over the next three months, the company plans to offer additional banking products including personal loans, credit cards, and integrated forex.
“We can relate to you when you say – Building a crypto exchange is difficult,” WazirX co-founder and COO Siddharth Menon wrote on the company’s blog earlier this week. “While we have learned it the hard way, we want to simplify it for you.”
WazirX’s BUIDL with WazirX program will enable organizations to build their own crypto exchanges leveraging WazirX. The program includes tools, support, guidance, access to angel and VC investors, and more. The exchanges built via WazirX’s new offering will feature access to 300+ of the highest liquidity markets, and the ability to leverage WazirX’s custody and exchange infrastructure for cryptocurrency withdrawals and deposits.
“To be the world leader, we believe that India should build more for Web3,” Menon added. “This is a billion-dollar opportunity, and that is why we at WazirX are here to support you.”
From neobanks to cryptocurrencies to embedded finance, we now turn to news that Google Pay users in India are now able to apply for and receive personal loans in their bank accounts via the Google Pay app. Loans of up to $1,332 (100,000 rupees) are available and can be repaid over a period of as many as 36 months.
The new service is being offered in partnership with India-based digital finance company DMI Finance, who also will determine eligibility for the financing. The loans will be processed in “near real-time” and are geared toward supporting financial inclusion by helping Indian consumers access short-term credit.
“Our teams have worked closely together to bring transparent and seamless credit to millions of Google Pay users,” DMI Finance co-founder and joint Managing Director Shivashish Chatterjee said. “We look forward to scaling this new partnership in the years to come and make the promise of financial inclusion a reality for many millions more.”
FinovateEurope 2022 is less than one month away. If you are an innovative fintech company with new technology to show, then there’s no better time than now and no better forum than FinovateEurope. To learn more about how to demo your latest innovation at FinovateEurope 2022 in London, March 22 and 23, visit our FinovateEurope hub today!
Here is our look at fintech innovation around the world.
New York-based Signal Intent has rebranded as Chimney.
The company won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring last year.
The rebrand announcement accompanied news that Chimney had raised seed funding that “exceeded its investment goals.”
Signal Intent, which won Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateSpring 2021, has rebranded as Chimney. The company develops financial calculators for banks, credit unions, insurers, and mortgage companies that are “built for the digital age.” The New York-based fintech’s rebrand, announced last month, was accompanied by a seed investing round with participation from individual investor Anil Aggarwal, as well as investment firms Fin VC, and Converge.
“Banking is fundamentally changing as consumer behaviors shift,” Chimney CEO Matthew Covi said. “To compete, banks must change their digital strategy. It is no longer about providing outstanding products and services. It’s about the value they provide through digital experiences. As consumers increasingly make financial decisions online, they expect experiences that are embedded in their everyday life. Chimney is committed to delivering not just the products consumers want, but the experiences they expect.”
More than 60 financial institutions in 30 states use Chimney’s financial tools and technology to better engage their customers and fund more loans. The company said that its financial institution clients have experienced a 15% boost in conversions since deploying Chimney’s technology that helps connect customers to the right solution at the right time. Chimney also helps FIs reduce acquisition costs while growing their loan portfolios.
Selected for the 2022 ICBA ThinkTECH Accelerator program, Chimney plans to add to its team, including multiple “key positions” over the next several months. The company’s co-founders include Chief Technology Officer Ryan F. Salerno, former Technical Co-founder of equity management platform Finta (previously Equity Token); and Chief Revenue Officer Chase Neinken, former VP of Global Sales at B2B media company Industry Dive.
“We created Chimney to build the future of financial guidance,” Neinken said. “We believe in a world where people are empowered to make better financial decisions through technology – it’s about confidence and understanding. The demand so far has exceeded expectations and we’re thankful to our clients, partners and investors. Big things are coming ahead.”
FinovateEurope 2022 is less than a month away, and innovative fintechs from all around the world are gearing up to demonstrate their latest technologies live on the Finovate stage. Find out more about our annual European fintech conference, including how to register and save your spot as Finovate returns to live events in Europe for the first time since 2020 next month on March 22 and 23.
One of the goals of every company demoing their solutions at Finovate is to win a coveted Best of Show award. This honor is granted exclusively by our Finovate attendees who evaluate every company on stage and select only those innovators whose technology is most impressive and, potentially, impactful. To give you a sense of the kind of companies to win this award, here’s a look at the FinovateEurope Best of Show winners from the previous two years – as well as an update on what they’ve accomplished since winning their award.
2021
Dbilia earned a Best of Show in its Finovate debut at FinovateEurope 2021 for its platform that enables creatives and influencers to sell digital memorabilia. The New York-based company was featured in the July edition of MarTech in a look at the rising NFT trend.
Property investment platform Proptee, also a Best of Show winner in its Finovate debut last year at FinovateEurope, raised more than $57,000 in seed funding in December from Lebenheim Capital and Steep VC.
Continuous product design innovator Quantum Metric was among the Finovate newcomers to earn a Best of Show award at FinovateEurope 2021 last March. Since then, the Colorado Springs, Colorado-based company has announced the availability of its solution on Salesforce AppExchange, and forged partnerships with Korea Air, iGaming operator BetVictor, luxury fashion brand La Perla, experience management software company Qualtrics, and video-based human insight innovator UserTesting.
2020
If 2021 was the year Finovate audiences showed their appreciation for conference newcomers, 2020 marked the year when veteran Finovate alums earned their place in the spotlight. Four of the companies that won Best of Show at FinovateEurope in that pre-pandemic year – Dorsum, Glia, iProov, and W.UP – picked up their second awards in a row (or more) having taken home Best of Show honors at the previous year’s conference in 2019.
Digital customer service innovator Glia has been one of Finovate’s most popular demoing companies in recent years, with multiple Best of Show wins in Europe and in the U.S. Earlier this month, the company announced a partnership with insurtech leader Sureify, integrating its capabilities into Sureify’s Lifetime platform. In 2021, Glia reeled in $78 million in funding, and earned recognition from Deloitte with a spot on the firm’s Technology Fast 500 for the second consecutive year. Among the company’s new partnerships forged in 2021 were collaborations with Kasisto, Posh, Apiture, Liberty Bank, fellow Finovate alum Clinc, and Zensar.
Horizn, which specializes in helping financial institutions and their employees maximize and accelerate their digital transformation efforts, earned the first of its Best of Show awards at FinovateEurope in Berlin in 2020. The company announced a partnership with Pacific Western Bank at the beginning of this month, powering the Los Angeles, California-based financial institution’s newly launched digital learning platform.
Biometric authentication company and FinovateEurope veteran iProov earned its third Best of Show award at our European fintech conference in 2020. The company secured $70 million in funding from Sumeru Equity Partners to start this year and, earlier this month, was granted a patent to extend its Genuine Presence technology to include driver’s license and government ID verification. Named to the Deloitte Fast 50 of the fastest growing technology firms in the U.K. last year, iProov reported a record 2021 in which the company achieved revenues that were 3x the previous year’s results.
Sonect demonstrated its global platform for cash transactions during its Finovate debut in Berlin in 2020, winning a Best of Show award. The company, headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland, enables users of its technology to withdraw cash via smartphone at any one of its 2,500 partnering retailers. Last summer, the company announced that its service would be available to customers in the U.K., following its participation in the U.K. Finance Community Access to Cash Pilots Initiative. In October, Sonect announced that it had raised more than $5 million (EUR 4.65 million) in funding from Italian Angels for Growth to bring its cash access solution to Italy.
Budapest, Hungary-based digital banking solution provider W.UP is another FinovateEurope favorite, having been awarded Best of Show in each of the last three FinovateEurope events. The company offers a personalization platform which leverages data to help institutions offer better banking services. In October of 2021, the company merged with BSC of Czechia to form a new company Finshape that is dedicated to driving digital transformation in banking in Europe.
OCR Labs, an identity verification company founded in Australia and headquartered in London, announced a $30 million Series B round.
The funding takes the company’s total capital to $46 million and will be used to help OCR Labs expand further in North America and EMEA.
Making its Finovate debut in 2016, the company won Best of Show at FinovateAsia a year later.
In a round led by Equable Capital, a New York-based family office, identity verification specialist OCR Labs has raised $30 million in a Series B round. The investment will be used to help the London, U.K.-based company grow its team in North America and EMEA, and gives the firm $46 million in total capital.
“2021 was an incredible year for OCR Labs, with continued validation from customers who have chosen us as their provider for online digital identity verification,” OCR Labs CEO John Myers said in a statement. “This investment provides us with the capital to continue our growth while bringing a value-added investor on to our board.”
Boasting a 5x increase in new clients and 3x growth in the size of its team over the past 12 months, OCR Labs offers automated identity verification via ID document validation, facial biometrics and other techniques. OCR Labs’ approach removes the need for human intervention in the customer identification process, and gives companies the tools they need to meet AML and KYC requirements and reduce fraud.
The company made its Finovate debut at our developers conference FinDEVr Silicon Valley in 2016 and returned one year later to win Best of Show at FinovateAsia in Hong Kong. Securing Series A funding last year, OCR Labs also recently opened a new office in North America, added a direct sales force, and hired a global Chief Revenue Officer.
“Our vision remains unchanged,” Myers said, “we strive to be the leading technology provider of digital identity verification, globally. The market opportunity continues to grow, and with our expansion in the U.S., and investment in our global sales effort, we’re in a phenomenal position to grow our customer base.”
The first private company to earn accreditation as an identity provider under the Trusted Digital Identity Framework (TDIF) of the Australian government, OCR Labs serves customers in a wide variety of verticals including financial services companies, brokerages, insurers, telecoms, and gaming companies.
If making a great first impression is important, then Virgin Money’s decision to partner with customer onboarding and KYC technology specialist HooYu should make a pretty good impression of its own.
“Our smart digital tools put our customers in control and the HooYu journey helps our customers to successfully pass KYC where traditional name and address checks fail,” Virgin Money Head of Digital Customer Experience Linda Robertson said. “We chose to work with a regtech partner like HooYu because their platform enables us to easily build a range of digital onboarding journeys that are simple for our new customers to complete.”
A two-time FinovateEurope alum, HooYu combines a variety of KYC tools and technologies to ensure the success of the customer onboarding journey. This includes giving companies confidence that their customers are who they say they are. HooYu’s identity verification service leverages selfie capture, liveness detection, ID document capture and validation, facial biometrics, address proofing, and geolocation in a seamless process that reduces abandonment and increases conversions. Features such as dynamic customer prompts, white label customization, and flexible customer journeys help reduce friction and streamline the account opening experience.
Calling the emphasis on the digital customer experience an “obsession” with banks like Virgin Money,” HooYu Marketing Director David Pope said it was HooYu’s role to help these institutions “refine their new account journeys and achieve the origination goals.”
Virgin Money serves 6.5 million customers in the U.K. A full-service digital bank, the institution offers current, savings, and business accounts; credit cards and insurance; mortgages and personal loans; as well as pensions and investments. Originally launched as Virgin Direct in 1995, the company secured its banking license 2010 and rebranded as Virgin Money two years later.
“It’s our job to help banks like Virgin Money to orchestrate KYC services and easily configure and deploy with a great customer journey,” Pope said.
Founded in 2015 and headquartered in London, U.K., HooYu began the year by leveraging open banking to support identity and affordability checks. The new offering, Bank Connect, enables users to establish their identity or affordability by logging into their bank account during the KYC process. With the user’s consent, Bank Connect provides identity, account overview, transaction, and card data. This information is analyzed, scored, and presented in a HooYu report. HooYu deletes all the user’s Bank Connect data once the client has reviewed the results of the report.
The technology is currently being rolled out to gaming operators, who benefit from the insights into customer affordability and use the information to make more accurate customer risk assessments. In fact, one month after announcing Bank Connect, HooYu introduced new partner MrQ, one of the U.K.’s growing number of online casinos.
Want to meet companies like FinovateEurope alum HooYu? Check out our FinovateEurope 2022 Sneak Peek series and learn more about the companies demoing their latest technologies next month at FinovateEurope in London, March 22 and 23.
Savings app Plinqit has raised $5 million in Series A funding, bringing its total capital to nearly $10 million.
The technology helps users save safely and efficiently, and offers rewards for users who improve their financial literacy by engaging in educational content via the app.
Plinqit was founded in 2015 by CEO Kathleen Craig
Michigan-based savings app Plinqit has secured $5 million in funding this week. The company, which made its Finovate debut in 2019 at FinovateFall in New York, will use the new capital to help scale the business to meet growing demand. The Series A round brings Plinqit’s total capital to just under $10 million.
“Financial wellness is crucial for all of us in financial services,” Plinqit founder and CEO Kathleen Craig said. “We created Plinqit to help builders create solutions that truly help people in a way that is engaging and rewarding. It was critical for us that it was technology that they would want to use – and they are.”
The round was led by Nashville, Tennessee-based Fintop Capital and New York’s JAM FINTOP. Also participating in the investment were Invest Detroit, Michigan Rise, and Michigan’s 4Front Credit Union.
Plinqit is a brandable, mobile-first savings app – built by Millennials for Millennials. The platform empowers users to create up to five savings goals, and begin setting aside funds for each goal while earning rewards. The app’s Build Skills feature not only helps users develop financial literacy, it also pays them for doing so, rewarding users for engaging with content which boosts user engagement for financial institutions that offer the technology. Plinqit also offers a virtual account management system – Vi.Ledger – which enables financial institutions to build their own custom savings programs using virtual accounts within the app.
Launched in 2015, Plinqit is one of the leading solutions offered by app development company, HT Mobile Apps (HTMA). The technology has been adopted in recent years by a number of community financial institutions including The Milford Bank ($482 million in assets), ChoiceOne Bank ($244 million in assets), and First Arkansas Bank & Trust ($760 million in assets). “We created Plinqit as a tool to not only help customers safely and securely meet their savings goals, but to also help financial institutions compete for deposits and develop deeper relationships with their customers,” Craig said when the partnership with First Arkansas Bank & Trust was announced in the summer of 2020.
Last fall, Plinqit announced an integration with the digital banking platform of fellow Finovate alum Q2. Funds saved on the Plinqit app are FDIC- or NCUA-insured, and the service is free to users.
The partnership marks the first time that an Israel-based fintech company has teamed up with a financial institution from the UAE. The collaboration was made possible by the historic Abraham Accords, signed in the fall of 2020, which normalized relations between Israel and the UAE, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco.
“Mashreq Bank is our first customer in the UAE,” ThetaRay CEO Mark Gazit said. “We look forward to accelerating collaboration with additional financial institutions in the UAE and the entire Middle East, as part of the continued expansion of ThetaRay’s global reach.”
Making its Finovate debut in 2015, ThetaRay offers banks and financial payment providers the ability to detect anomalies in multiple data sets, regardless of size or source. This makes the company’s cloud-based, SaaS AI analytics platform is especially effective in monitoring cross-border payments, an area that has become increasingly vulnerable to financial crime – including money laundering – in recent years. ThetaRay estimates that the cross-border payments market will grow from $37.15 trillion in 2020 to nearly $40 trillion by 2026, potentially attracting an even greater number of fraudsters and thieves.
“ThetaRay’s technology, underpinned by advanced machine-learning based models complementing rules, sets the foundation for next-generation transaction monitoring,” Mashreq Bank’s Group Head of Compliance and Bank MLRO Scott Ramsay said. “By combining speed and agility with efficiency, it allows banks to effectively thwart financial crime risks in the increasingly complex space of cross-border payments.”
“Mashreq’s advanced digital transformation program has continued to deliver outstanding service to customers throughout the nine months ending 30th September 2021,” Group CEO Ahmed Abdelaal said. He highlighted the role of digital platforms in supporting the bank’s growth, and embraced the “development of a diverse, inclusive, and enabling working environment” courtesy of Mashreq’s adoption of a “work from anywhere culture.”
FinovateEurope 2022 is just one month away. If you are an innovative fintech company with new technology to show, then there’s no better time than now and no better forum than FinovateEurope. To learn more about how to demo your latest innovation at FinovateEurope 2022 in London, March 22 and 23, visit our FinovateEurope hub today!
Here is our look at fintech innovation around the world.
Thailand’s central bank will let banks increase the amount they are allowed to invest in fintech – but investing digital assets was excluded from the new higher funding limits.
Backbase has forged a new partnership with New England-area financial institution, Eastern Bank.
Eastern Bank will leverage Backbase-as-a-Service and Backbase Digital Sales technology to streamline its new account opening process, as well as create and release new financial products and services.
With $24 billion in assets and more than 120 locations, Eastern Bank serves customers in eastern Massachusetts, southern and coastal New Hampshire, and Rhode Island.
A new partnership between engagement banking innovator Backbase and Eastern Bank will bring a fully digital account opening experience to the Boston-based financial institution’s customers. Eastern Bank ($24 billion in assets) will deploy both Backbase-as-a-Service and Backbase’s Digital Sales solutions, which will give Eastern the technical infrastructure it needs to create and deliver new products and services faster.
The deployment of Backbase’s Digital Sales solution will enable Eastern Bank to combine Backbase’s out-of-the-box accelerators and integrations with solutions from third-party fintechs to offer their customers personalized digital banking services – as well as remove much of the complexity customers encounter when opening new accounts. Eastern Bank expects to offer Backbase’s Digital Sales capabilities in the first half of this year to new retail customers. The bank’s new commercial and business banking customers can expect a similar offering later in 2022.
“We are thrilled Eastern Bank chose to collaborate with us around this commitment to technology and innovation,” SVP of Americas at Backbase Vincent Bezemer said. “Like us, they are passionate about delivering the best digital experience possible for customers.” Bezemer complimented Eastern Bank’s team as “agile and digitally-focused” as well as having a “human-centered approach” to collecting and incorporating customer feedback to ensure high-quality customer experiences.
Founded in 1818, Eastern Bank offers banking, investment, and insurance products and services for retail consumers and businesses in parts of Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island. The bank earned the 2021 Impact Innovation Award for Artificial Intelligence and Advanced Analytics by Aite-Novarica Group and was a finalist in the Best Small Business Banking Solution category at the 2021 Finovate Awards.
A multiple-time Finovate Best of Show winner, Backbase is one of Finovate’s oldest alums, having made its debut on the Finovate stage in 2009. More recently, the company participated in Finovate’s return to live events last September as part of FinovateFall in New York. At the conference, Backbase demonstrated its complete customer onboarding technology that consolidates customer finances via direct deposit, billpay auto linking, and debit card account opening.
Founded in 2003 and headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, Backbase was named “Best in Class” among digital banking platform vendors in Javelin’s 2021 Digital Banking Platform Scorecard. In addition to its partnership with Eastern Bank, Backbase has collaborated in recent months with Wyoming-based Blue Federal Credit Union and St. Louis, Missouri-based, family-owned First Bank.
A week before FinovateEurope’s in-person event begins on March 22nd, our annual Europe-based fintech conference will feature a special Digital Kick Off. This afternoon session on March 15 is accessible from anywhere and 100% virtual. The day will feature a mastermind keynote, a fireside chat, a set of digital demos from fintech innovators, and a power panel on the future of fintech.
Here, we will introduce two of our Digital Kick Off speakers – Zennon Kapron, founder and director, Kapronasia; and Malin Lignell, VP of Digitalization & Innovation, Handelsbanken. For more information on FinovateEurope, including both the Digital Kick Off on March 15 and the in-person event on March 22 and 23, visit our FinovateEurope hub.
Zennon Kapron
Founder and Director of Kapronasia, Zennon Kapron will lead a Mastermind Keynote on our Digital Kick Off day titled The Trends & Opportunities Shaping Fintech in Asia. Kapronasia provides research and consulting services with a focus on financial and blockchain technology.
Previous to Kapronasia, Kapron was Intel’s Global Banking Industry Manager and, before that, CIO for Citigroup Portugal. He has extensive experience with fintech and Asia, currently serving as an instructor in fintech at the Singapore Management University, an ambassador with the Emerging Payments Association of Asia, and founder and director of China Fintech, which works with startups, financial institutions, and investors to build an ecosystem that develops innovative solutions for China’s financial industry.
Kapron is also the author of Chomping at the Bitcoin: The History and Future of Bitcoin in China. He earned a B.S. in Computer Science from Syracuse and an MBA from INSEAD.
Malin Lignell
Vice President of Digitalization & Innovation with Sweden’s Handelsbanken, Lignell will provide a Fireside Chat as part of our Digital Kick Off event on March 15th. A 20+ year veteran of the Swedish bank – the oldest company on the Swedish stock exchange – Lignell has served in leadership roles, including as Deputy Branch Manager, for more than half of her tenure at Handelsbanken. She joined the Digitalization and Innovation team at the bank in the fall of 2019, where she works at both the strategic and operational level to help drive the institution toward greater innovation as it pursues its digitization objectives.
With a special focus on the way that emerging technologies shape and change customer behavior and business models, Lignell has spoken frequently on the challenges that financial institutions face as they undertake digitization. She has noted that while behavioral changes are often the most difficult component of technological transformation, often the forces that help propel change (for example, the global pandemic) nevertheless serve as a powerful and effective incentives to solve new problems in new and creative ways.
Lignell is an alum of the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) where she received a diploma in Accounting and Finance. She also earned a Master of Science in International Business Studies and Economics from Ekonomihögskolan i Växjö, and a degree in Business Administration and Economics from The University of Graz.
Leading market data API company Xignite launched its cryptocurrency API, XigniteCrypto API, this week.
The new offering helps wealth managers and brokers serve clients interested in trading or investing in digital assets.
The XigniteCrypto API provides real-time and historical data on more than 900 different cryptocurrencies.
Market data API provider Xignite has launched a new solution to help its broker and wealth management customers take advantage of the cryptocurrency revolution. This week, the San Mateo, California-based fintech introduced the XigniteCrypto API, the first API of its kind to combine the large and growing universe of cryptocurrency information with the stock, exchange-traded fund (ETF), and options data that brokers and wealth managers rely upon to serve their clients.
Xignite CEO and founder Stephane Dubois highlighted the challenge of working with cryptocurrencies for the average broker or wealth manager. “Cryptocurrencies tend to operate in their own world,” he explained. “This means that if you want to offer integrated equity, option, and crypto trading or analytics for your clients, you are going to have to cobble up a lot of heterogeneous data from many disparate sources, and that’s a pain.”
The new cryptocurrency API provides real-time and historical quotes for more than 900 different cryptocurrencies, including coins and tokens. The solution features unique API endpoints to help brokers and wealth managers engage digital traders and investors, and provides data and tools such as price alerts, historical charting, currency conversion, and news to help customers make sound trading and investing decisions using cryptocurrencies.
“With our new crypto API, you get the depth of coverage, the quality, and the reliability across all asset classes you need to grow your business – all in one integrated solution,” Dubois said.
A market data innovator for nearly two decades, Xignite launched the first commercial REST API and has since grown into one of the leading providers of market data API solutions to brokers, wealth managers, and fintechs. Today, the company’s APIs are used by 700+ companies more than 500 billion times a month to serve their digital investing clients. A Finovate alum since 2014, Xignite has raised more than $37 million in funding from investors including StarVest Partners and Japan-based QUICK.
