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EXCLUSIVE: “Reach for the Stars!” – FF Awards 2023 in ‘The Fintech Magazine’
A brilliant – if slightly bonkers! – night marked the third Fintech Finance Awards. Sue Scott was there
The sign of a great party is when nobody wants to leave, right?
And if the company is THIS good, guests can’t be blamed for loitering past the witching hour (which, in London, is when cab fares double for no logical reason).
The theme for the third Fintech Finance Awards, held at Old Billingsgate on the bank of the Thames, was distinctly North American. With JobsOhio, the Buckeye State’s economic development corporation, as its principle sponsor, the event rolled out an Oscar-length red carpet to 650 friends of the industry who almost certainly weren’t expecting the variety performance that the event delivered.
Hosted by Canadian-born ‘queen of comedy’ Katherine Ryan, rocking a lush Great Gatsby-style gown, the slightly bonkers but brilliant tone for the evening was set by her opening remarks: “I don’t know a lot about your industry and I’m not going to pretend I do. But I spend a lot of money – and I love it!”
By this point the audience was well-acquainted, a mix-up in the table plan ensuring that no-one stayed in their comfort zone – although full credit to the catering staff for not poisoning anyone with a nut allergy who’d pre-ordered the safe dessert option. Cash warriors mingled agreeably with digital tech titans as the rollcall of 17 winners and worthy finalists was announced by a fast-paced carousel of fintech personalities and surprise guests.
The former included finfluencer Jim Marous, who soft-shoe-shuffled on to the massive stage in his signature sparkling Lacin Kicks, the custom footwear of choice for West Coast entrepreneurs. Ron Rock, the impeccably attired MD of JobsOhio, Nigel Walsh of Google Insurance, Paolo Sironi from IBM, Steve Clark, MD of Money20/20, Ben Robinson, co-founder of early-stage investor Aperture, and Laura Camplisson from VC Innovations, also bestowed awards.
As to the surprises.. well, where to start? Max Fosh, the terribly-well-spoken YouTuber, who was (briefly) the richest man in the world after registering Unlimited Money Ltd with 10 billion shares and selling one for £50, thereby theoretically giving his company a valuation of £500billion, eyeballed a table of regulators as he quipped: “I thought it was a bit of fun; the FSA thought it was a bit of fraud.”
The incredibly talented singer/songwriter Saint Harrison followed his all-too-brief set with a presentation, in which he fluffed the big reveal for Authentic ESG by announcing the winner before the finalists, but by then we were all well into the sixth bottle of Merlot anyway. And then – pièce de résistance – comedy legend Sue Perkins showed up with a gigantic inflatable hand for a bit of ‘slap’ stick, referencing the legendary Oscar spat between Chris Rock and Will Smith (obvs).
The Awards were established as an antidote to industry gongs. With no table or ticket sales and an open, data-driven judging system (anyone who is a subscriber to Fintech Finance can apply to vote), they are billed as ‘awards worth winning’, celebrating all aspects of digital finance and digital payments.
In his address, Ron Rock saluted everyone in the room that night as ‘the future of financial services’. But as I resigned myself to walking back to Shoreditch in the early morning lamplight, the analogue present made itself keenly felt.
An unmarked cab screeched to a halt. ‘Where you going?’. ‘Brick Lane.’ ‘Twenty.’ ‘Nah. I’ll walk, thanks.’ ‘Ten for cash.’ ‘You’ve got yourself a ride.’
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… EMBEDDED FINANCE
Sprive is a first-of-its-kind mortgage overpayment app that helps homeowners save on interest and become mortgage-free faster. Edenred Payment Solutions worked with the developers to provide payment processing, licensing, compliance and mobile functionality.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… INVISIBLE SECURITY
Bottomline’s suite of software-as-a-service security solutions offers detection, prevention and investigation of external and internal threats. It allows financial institutions to take a proactive approach to risk management while removing complexity and enabling compliance. The Bottomline is you’re safer with it.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… OPEN BANKING
The partnership between NatWest’s Payit open banking payment solution and JS Group’s Aspire Technology Platform, which works with universities to disburse cash to 250,000 students in the UK, demonstrates the real-life impact of open banking technology. Their solution, Aspire Cash, can deliver funds into student bank accounts fast, saving universities work while also giving them insights into how that cash is used. Top marks!
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… BUSINESS BANKING
SMEs make up around 90 per cent of the global business community and provide half of all jobs. So why have they been so poorly served by financial institutions? Finastra asked itself the same question and came up with Fusion: Digital Business, an API-powered solution that’s based on the premise that banks’ business customers thrive when they give them access to technology that helps them run their company. Kerching!
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… REAL-TIME PAYMENTS
A week before the Awards, the UK-based A2A provider announced that it had been selected by Klarna to provide SEPA Instant, Credit Transfer and Direct Debit connectivity for the platform’s 150 million active customers across more than 500,000 merchants. Form3 was conceived to be a highly scaleably real-time payments platform and Klarna is another ostrich-sized feather in its ever-growing cap.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… TRADING TECHNOLOGY
Our judges added another award to a creaking shelf of gongs for Valantic’s electronic trading and automation systems for capital markets. Its platforms for fixed income trading/eFICC and equities are designed to augment and integrate with existing systems and make building new ones from scratch easy, using modular technology to provide a fully customisable workflow.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… MOBILE PAYMENTS
Airwallex created its global payments and financial platform for ‘borderless businesses’, slashing fees and putting payments, expense management and more in the palm of a business owner’s hand. It partners with local payment rails to get money where it needs to go, faster and cheaper than high street banks, allowing businesses to accept customers’ local payment of choice.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… CROSS-BORDER PAYMENTS
Pay. Accept. Exchange. Comply. It’s that simple! Well for users, yes, but there’s a fiendish amount of work that goes on behind the scenes at Thunes. From mobile wallets to local cards and domestic payment networks, it offers everyone from banks to freelancers a solution to FX and cross-border challenges.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
One of a new breed of as-a-service companies, Jaid automates and integrates customer communications intelligently into existing workflows. From claims processing to sales automation, customer service to payment exception, its AI-powered platform can organise and make sense of a whole host of diverse data.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN…ID VERIFICATION & KYC
Using facial biometrics, image capture technology and ID card verification, Mitek works with a range of companies for whom KYC is critical, including igaming and financial services. Its products power and protect millions of identity evaluations as well as mobile deposits every day, around the world.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… AUTHENTIC ESG
From its inception in 2016, Finland-based payments-processing platform Enfuce has been at the forefront of ESG, whether it’s through promoting financial inclusion for Ukrainian refugees, signing up to the Climate Pledge or offsetting its entire CO2 emissions. A prime example of this is the launch of its First Aid card – a prepaid card (physical or virtual), which can be given to people in need of urgent financial support.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… CRYPTO
Zumo is driven to make digital assets our financial future. It believes a new generation of smart money solutions will deliver a fairer world for all. But it recognises that change will be slow unless the world’s biggest financial players are on board. So it’s focussed on encouraging Institutional adoption by offering enterprise clients enterprise-grade solutions with robust compliance and risk management. Its plug-and-play crypto-as-a-service platform offers a fast, flexible and low-barrier route to an exciting new market.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… INNOVATIVE INSURTECH
McKenzie Intelligence Services stood out, thanks to its geospatial tool, Global Events Observer (GEO). It uses data from space, air and ground to provide real-time, actionable intelligence on losses from catastrophic events on one single platform. This enables insurers to increase efficiencies and reduce costs, whilst creating better outcomes for policyholders. Win-win!
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… DATA INSIGHTS
The data doesn’t lie! So when our data-driven judging came up with a dead-tie, we had to accept it. These two companies both excel (without Excel) at extracting and crunching the information that businesses need to stay ahead. FreedomPay turns electronic transactions over its own commerce platform into priceless
analytics for clients; SmartStream‘s sweetspot is giving actionable insights in post-trade operations.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… BANK BUILDERS
What can we say? Temenos have been in the business of building banks for years. But they are moving with the times. Check out our features on page 12 and 20 to see how with SaaS.
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… CONSUMER BANKING
One of the grandaddies of the industry, G+D has been touching the lives of consumers around the world – through cash, card and now digital banking – for 170 years. They don’t know it, of course, but the company’s succession of groundbreaking solutions has routinely set the bar for a great customer experience, delivered by high street banks and mobile-only operators alike. It might be a grandad, but it’s a super-cool one!
FF AWARDS 2023 WINNERS IN… PARTNERSHIPS
In March 2023, UK-based ethical lender Plend partnered with GoCardless to provide variable recurring payments (VRPs) via the payment fintech’s Instant Bank Pay feature. Since then, Plend customers have been able to use these open banking-powered VRPs to easily make changes to their payments schedules and take advantage of payment holidays and interest rate freezes to suit their circumstances. This partnership has also seen a significant reduction of manual tasks for the operations team.
This article was published in The Fintech Magazine Issue 30, Page 07-10
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