The banking landscape of tomorrow

Blog written by Chris Herd, CEO and founder at Nexves

Today, fintech companies are innovating around existing products and services to create a better customer experience, tomorrow they will need to do far more. The first wave of challenger banks has amassed huge user numbers by doing little more than providing a more functional user interface, the next leap forward will come from enabling things which were previously impossible.

The future we imagine is akin to a Netflix of Financial services. Fintechs are on the brink of offering consumers a personalised menu of products instead of one-size-fits-all services.

As innovators and disruptors, we have a window of opportunity afforded to us by a unique confluence of circumstances.

The unlocked door to previously inaccessible data endows customers with the chance to receive insights into their spending habits which could save them a fortune.

The need to focus on the long term

Ultimately if companies like us do our job properly we’ll end up with a win-win situation. The value to the customers will be as a direct result of our ability to deliver simple products which people use and understand. The more money we keep in our users’ pockets, the higher they will value our services, the more they will trust us to deliver services which are of greater financial benefit. That won’t be achieved over night.

At Nexves, there are a number of key innovations that enable us to achieve things that no other company in the world can match. Mostly, this is through our ability to acquire a level of data which is exponentially more granular than our nearest competitors ”” enriching our intelligence and insights to an extent which was previously unimaginable.

How the world is changing

It is always essential to abreast of forthcoming technological developments and trends. They influence people and revolutionise the way we deal with finances.

Our 2018 reading list: https://hackernoon.com/a-cryptopunk-startup-founders-2018-reading-list-a52c7fb6bc0a]

• The internet as it currently exists will capitulate. The revenue model of advertising only will give way to a distributed model of digital taxation. This will take the form of metered-micropayments for all products, services or content you consume online ”” compensating creators equal to your engagement. Where industries have died, digital tokens will enable those things which acquire most attention to thrive. Cryptocurrency has been fascinating but we are currently in the replication phase ”” where people are trying to reinvent what currently exists ”” instead of doing things with blockchain and cryptocurrency which were previously impossible. We hope to imagine then deliver the latter.

• Peer to peer has been awesome for platform creators but terrible for gig economy workers. As Ubers Valuation has skyrocketed into the hundreds of Billions, rewards for drivers have plummeted. In short, the compensation for providing the service and maintaining the platforms are misaligned. This will change. Service providers will be rewarded with equity in the underlying business through new fractional ownership models. Every trip will equate to a higher stake of ownership. Drive more? Own more.

• Last mile delivery is about to explode. It’s relatively cheap to get a large volume of goods from one geographic location to another but It’s ridiculously expensive to get it from one place in that city to a large number of addresses. Look for there to be a number of VC backed players emerge in this space in the next 18 months. They will initially tie together D2C companies and their community, enabling those businesses to leverage the engagement of the crowd to let their customers benefit and lower delivery costs significantly. I guarantee a unicorn emerges in this domain by 2020.

• Crowdfunding is dead, long live crowdfunding. Investing in equity is prehistoric, consumer purchasing behaviour will become a new form of investing. Voting with your wallet will mean owning through your decisions. Buy something, own it, buy more, own more. Instead of purchasing stocks and shares, everyday consumers will accrue ownership of the futures most exciting companies through their existing purchasing behaviour. This means that the can of coke you are drinking would be a tiny fraction of equity in the business, equally the chocolate bar in your pocket or the soap in your bathroom. Wealth will be redistributed. Where in the past the only beneficiaries of our actions were the shareholders in the business which produced the things we consume ”” there will be a mass reaction against this. Technology will enable a swarm of individuals to cohesively act as one for mutual economic benefit. This will give rise to co-operatively owned brands which produce a vast number of the things we consume. People will be incentivised to act as selfishly as possible, benefitting everyone who does so as well.

New solutions needed

That is the world in which we see Nexves playing a central part. In order to participate in this cyclical economy, we need a digital passport which collects our data, protects it, lets you monetise it while enabling the payments alluded to above. We need a mechanism which enables us to hold the equity we earn through our behaviour and access markets to cash out when we desire. We layer on top of any existing bank account and will be the thing which facilitates participation

Strong opinions weakly held is the worst advice we’ve ever heard. Things that are weakly held are cheaply discarded and doing this leads to uncertainty. Instead, continuously challenging the things we believe ”” either destroying or improving them ”” is the framework we operate within. Candour is the most efficient vehicles which enable us to discover things as a startup and challenge conventionally held belief or the dogma which holds others back.

Fortnightly FinTech Fuse ”“ A Festive FinTech for All

With the holiday period fast approaching this last two weeks has certainly been a festive fintech fortnight and there has been much to bring us Christmas cheer.

Such as some terrific announcements of innovative collaborations being led from Scotland’s fintech community with a broad spectrum of large organisations.

For example, Castlight Financials exciting development with Big Issue Invest with their world leading affordability tool, then there is Money Dashboard’s ground breaking collaboration with Go Compare.

Other examples include CU Soar new major partnership for a digital platform with Glasgow Credit Union to engage with their 46,000 customers and Wallet Services strategic blockchain innovation with Baillie Gifford.

Festive Awards

Therefore, it was no surprise that fintech firms from Scotland are being recognized through numerous awards.

For example, well done to the Previse team for recognition at the Finastra Universe awards event for their best in class innovative technology addressing slow payments.

Then at the Financial Data and Technology Association (FDATA) Summit last Thursday, the Scottish fintech community scooped up the majority of the highly acclaimed awards.

Big congratulations to the Castlight Financial, Money Dashboard and The ID Co teams for this fantastic recognition which very much highlights their amazing work in improving consumer engagement with financial services.

The recognition from these and other awards for the fintech community is raising awareness amongst the international investment players on the innovative developments across Scotland.

It was good to share these examples of Scottish firms with Vishal Patel of the fintech investor Anthemis this week and looking forward to developing this further in the new year.

The FDATA Global Open Finance Summit over the two days either side of their big award evening was an awesome event in so many ways.

Held at the iconic the University of Edinburgh McEwan Hall, over two hundred people gathered to share latest innovative developments in the world of open banking.

This was a truly international event with entrepreneurs, investors, regulators and major institutions from every corner of the world meeting in Edinburgh to shape the future.

Congratulations must go to the brilliant host Andy McIver, the fabulous FDATA and Message Matters teams, the event crew as well as to the many insightful and thought provoking speakers.

The Summit was great opportunity to catch up with long standing friends such as Brian Costello and make new acquaintances from around the world.

The upmost respect and accolade to Gavin Littlejohn who expertly led the event and inspired the diverse group of people on how open finance can positively change the world, especially as Gavin had only two hours sleep over the 48 hours!

Festive Energy

There was plenty of festive energy at the wonderful fintechmas’ get together at Tontine, Glasgow on Tuesday evening as the fintech community came together to toast 2018 and enter the Christmas spirit.

Organised by John McHugh, one of the most motivating and inspiring fintech entrepreneurs on the planet, and hosted by the super team of Alison, Alex and Harry from the Gigly and Adlantic as well as Pauline and Ewan from Tontine.

Many thanks to fintech friends Hamish, Will and Katrina from the terrific media group FutureScot for their generous support with beer and pizza.

To my surprise I ended up doing a fintech state of the nation’ presentation with a Father Christmas hat on just to add to the fintechmas’ feelgood factor!

Prior to the event it was great to talk through opportunities with Dino and Zoe from Bifrost for their exciting wealth management platform.

Earlier that day Nicola and I also met up with Rod Ashley who is setting a new innovative bank which we are looking forward to supporting in 2019 as part of the fintech community.

Edinburgh held its own fintechmas’ get together the week before and it was fantastic to welcome a number of new fintech entrepreneurs to the community meet up as well as those who have been coming along from when Fintech Scotland started at the beginning of the year.

I must say a big thank you to Shery for making everything come together to make these fintech meet ups a success, Shery you are a fintech star and we’d be lost without your positive energy.

Earlier on in the day on Tuesday last week there was a lot of positive energy at the CanDo Innovation Forum.

It was really enjoyable to join the inspiring Irene McAra-Williams, director of the Glasgow School of Arts in sharing details of our proposed consumer inclusion initiative with the Forum.

This fintech consumer initiative was also top of our agenda for the meeting with Yvonne MacDermid and David from Money Advice Scotland, who do such valuable work across communities and where fintech innovation could play a growing role.

More to come on this early next year and it was also a key theme for the Fintech Scotland board meeting last Monday along with considering the fintech strategy for Scotland beyond 2020.

This conversation continued in the bar for a few joyful festive drinks afterwards to say thank you to the Board members for their valuable strategic insights throughout 2018.

Strategic considerations were very much on the agenda at the inaugural City Deal Regional Enterprise Council meeting last Friday, expertly chaired by Leeann Dempster.

I’m delighted to be invited to join this Council with its diverse group of people to consider the significant strategic investments in the region for the decade ahead.

Fintech collaboration and inclusion can very much play a big part in this, especially in the field of data driven innovation.

At the end of the meeting what a fabulous surprise to talk with fellow Council member Ewan Aitkin and be reminded that our paths crossed more than thirty five years ago at university!

Looking forward to catching up with Ewan in the new year to reminisce about those tough times in the early 1980’s and using the lessons and spirit from those days in today’s world.

Festive Spirit

On Tuesday this week we popped into to see the fantastic Michael Young and Rob Huggins of MBN Solutions who have given FinTech Scotland terrific support throughout 2018 in connecting talent into the world of fintech in Scotland.

Their office was very much in festive spirit and it was wonderful to see how their Christmas appeal will be reaching many children in Glasgow in the days ahead. Brilliant leadership by the Georgia Boyle and the team.

Later that day it was wonderful to catch up with the engaging Angela Pignatelli and Jim Mcallister of West College Scotland to hear about their plans to develop fintech skills in 2019 which we are very excited to support.

A few days before I had the opportunity to catch up with Iain Shirlaw to hear about the great progress with the Fife FinTech Skills Academy and how the fintech community are driving this forward with Fife College.

The topic of people skills dominated the CBI Financial Services breakfast meeting on Thursday and it was great to hear insights from Alison McGregor of HSBC, David Skinn of Aviva and the Scottish Government Minister Ivan Mckee.

Thank you to Tracy Black, Flora Hamilton and Henrietta Jowitt for an engaging event and the opportunity for me to share the examples fintech skills developments in Fife and West Scotland.

Highlighting the fintech people skills opportunities was also a key focus for my catch up with Michael Dickson of FWB Park Brown as we considered an exciting event for 2019.

Then also looking forward to 2019, it was great to meet up with Olga Kozlova of University of Strathclyde and see the new FinTech Scotland Glasgow base in the amazing Technology & Innovation Centre.

Another fintech collaboration I’m looking forward to further progress in 2019 is with the Scottish Government digital transformation team, especially in the area of payments

Great updates from Trish Quinn, Hugh Wallace, Alex Bunch and Martin Sansome at the Steering Board and catch up with Clare Mills along with the team from Hanya, Angela Porte, Paul Gaffney and Martin Ewart.

On a broader digital perspective, it was really interesting to join Rab Campbell, Colin Cook and other distinguished members of the Audit Scotland Digital Advisory Board last week to share insights.

Looking forward to collaborating with Gemma Diamond and Veronica Cameron on this in 2019.

Festive Collaboration

Festive collaboration was very much in the air at the Marketing Edinburgh Christmas get together on Thursday evening.

Absolutely inspiring speeches by chair Gordon Robertson and chief executive John Donnelly all wonderfully hosted at the beautiful Balmoral (many thanks Frances Maurer).

The Marketing Edinburgh team have once again delivered world class achievements for the region in 2018 under the awesome stewardship of John Donnelly which benefits the whole economy.

The event was a chance to catch up with a number of people who have given Marketing Edinburgh and FinTech Scotland such valuable support in 2019 such as the fabulous Rory Archibald of Visit Scotland who is helping us plan for the next fintech festival in the Autumn.

Earlier in the week we caught up with Ray Bugg and Pete Swift of Digit to also start planning the fintech profile and activities for 2019, always great to be working with these guys as we look to put fintech even more on the global map.

On a more specific note, very excited about the growing fintech collaboration between University of Edinburgh, Sopra Steria and Fintech Scotland following some great conversations last week.

This is another exciting area to be progressing with the engaging Craig Wilson, Myron Hrycyk and Colin Carmichael from Sopra Steria in developing emerging fintech innovations.

Festive collaboration opportunities were also on the table along with homemade mince pies for the session with the IBM team on Wednesday.

A constructive conversation with IBM’s Simon Pink, Michael Mauchline and another good friend from the past Mairi Cairney as well as Mark Roger from Vivolution

The collaboration opportunities continue to develop on the global stage too with a valuable catch ups with leading Scottish Development International leading lights Pat Kunz from Switzerland and Alexandra Mulcahy from Germany.

I am very much looking forward to my visits with various firms from the Scottish fintech community to Europe in the early part of 2019 to develop the opportunities further.

Our very good friend, Triinu Hansen of FDATA will be returning home to Estonia at the weekend and although we will very much miss Triinu we know we also have a new fintech ambassador in this lovely part of Eastern Europe.

Scotland continues to be very much part of the Europe.

This has been highlighted in our global fintech work with Kent Mackenzie and the team at Deloitte who have provided really valuable expertise and insights on where to focus our efforts in Europe and worldwide.

These global collaboration ambitions are also shared by the Ethical Finance Hub team based at Heriot Watt University and it was brilliant to share plans with Omar Shaikh and Chris Tait this week.

Similarly, it was fantastic to meet up with Jock Encombe this Thursday to talk through the mutually shared objectives of the Well Being Economy Alliance and Fintech Scotland alongside Edinburgh Futures Institute.

Very excited about the joint innovation initiative for the Spring of 2019 to demonstrate global leadership on reinventing financial services and the wider economy.

Before then we will take some time away over the festive period to recharge the batteries and reflect on the next stage of the Fintech Scotland journey.

Finally, I must finish this last blog of 2018 with a very special thank you for Mickael, Shery and Nicola who have made this a very special fintech year in so many ways.

They have very much put their heart and soul into FinTech Scotland’s drive for innovation, collaboration and inclusion and the journey has been amazing.

Festive Running

We will close for the festive break on Wednesday 19th December and return for our FinTech Scotland one year birthday on 8th January 2019.

In the meantime, I will have time to do plenty of festive running around the wonderful roads and trails of Edinburgh.

And I am in buoyant running mood after completing the challenging Pentland Hills Seven Reservoir half marathon and the Magnificent Water of Leith half marathon in the last two weekends.

This holiday I’ll be running everywhere from the Leith Waterfront to Arthurs Seat and across the Forth Bridge to Fife, so many places to enjoy.

My festive running will start with Parkrun this Saturday down at Crammond, a place where our diverse community come together to share a common love of running, always so uplifting.

I’m hoping Scotland’s fintech can emulate the Parkrun pride, passion and community inclusiveness as we continue the journey in 2019.

Until then, wishing you all peace and well being for the holiday period.

Fortnightly FinTech Fuse ”“ FinTech and All That Jazz!!

Friday nights in Glasgow are always special but there was something extra magical a couple of weeks ago with the University of Glasgow FinTech Society awards event.

Even though I had only stepped off the plane from New York 24 hours earlier my jet lag was soon forgotten with the wonderful atmosphere generated by the Society’s student members.

This was no surprise because this energetic and inspiring Society has already established itself as the largest student led fintech society in Europe and the various team presentations demonstrated that they are a world class group.

The vibrant ambience was complemented by a terrific University jazz band who warmed up the audience prior to my presentation for the evening. And yes, fintech and all that jazz do mix extremely well!

This was an ideal fintech Friday evening with brilliant academics such as John Finch, Head of the Adam Smith Business School, awesome leaders Eve Wallace and Keith O’Donnell of Morgan Stanley and fantastic fintech players Iain Niblock and Jordan Stodart of Orca Money and Margery McConnell of Previse.

Massive congratulations to Elisabetta Trasatti, Kamal Chauhan and the whole organizing team, for an amazing evening, Scotland’s fintech future is very bright in your hands.

FinTech Jazz’ Players

The evening in Glasgow also gave me the opportunity to catch up with Dino, Viktor and Antreas from the exciting fintech enterprise Bifrost Wealth.
Very excited about the journey ahead for the Bifrost team with the focus on bringing through the human qualities in using new financial technology to meet customer financial needs.

I was also inspired by the diverse international backgrounds of the team members working together in Scotland to advance their innovative proposition.
This further reflects the global nature of Scotland’s fintech community, something we are very proud of in demonstrating that Scotland is very much open and welcoming to everyone from Europe and the rest of the world.

I’ve mentioned in previous blogs how I feel very privileged in my role to meet so many brilliant fintech leaders and entrepreneurs from a diversity of backgrounds and experiences.

Meeting Christine Bamford and Jane Lewis of Women’s Coin was another great example of this earlier in the day, thank you Maggie Morrison for the introduction.
We are very much looking forward to welcoming the Women’s Coin team to Scotland’s diverse fintech community in the near future.

Then on Thursday it was fabulous to catch up with entrepreneur Alan Moody to learn about the terrific fintech enterprise Avrium, another great firm with a diverse international team spread across all parts of the globe. Brilliant.

Earlier on in the day on Thursday there was an important workshop session with a range of firms from the fintech community to discuss the opportunities to improve the accessibility to investment funding for young and emerging firms.

Big thank you to Mark Roger and Kevin Lonnergan of Vivolution for pulling together the session as well as the insightful Gary Torbett and Paul Funnell of Scottish Investment Bank for leading the engaging discussion.
Really valuable engagement with the fintech community and thank you to everyone who came along.

We look forward to progressing the actions in the coming months in this critical area to support the growth of fintech firms to achieve success at scale.

One fintech firm which is certainly a role model on how to successfully grow to significant scale is FNZ which has transformed how the financial services sector serves people in achieving their financial goals.
Therefore, it was fantastic to catch up with Lorraine Straiton, Richard Bolger and Alasdair Munro on Tuesday to hear the latest on their journey in becoming a fintech unicorn.

The world class FNZ leadership team is using technology to bring market leading engagement in financial services and has been doing so now for over a decade from their Edinburgh base.

I’m really looking forward to FinTech Scotland supporting the FNZ team as it embarks on the next stage of expansion on a global scale. It is wonderful to have FNZ part of Scotland’s fintech community.

Innovative FinTech Jazz’

The FNZ team joined us at the fintech academic and industry workshop this week along with fellow fintech Avaloq and large financial institutions such as Lloyds Bank and RBS as well as the FCA.
This was a fabulous opportunity to bring the professors from the University of Edinburgh together with senior leaders to discuss the latest opportunities with innovative financial technology.

A special thanks to Lorraine from FNZ and Nikita Filippov of Avaloq for putting up with my fintech and running ramblings over dinner!

Thank you also to Alice Dreano and the University team for putting on an engaging fintech event with a great deal to take away and consider.

The event once again highlighted the value of leveraging the innovation strengths of universities to help Scotland achieve the global fintech ambitions.
This is something I discussed with Mike Emmerich of Metro Dynamics and John Reid when we met up last week on how to maximise the opportunities across the fintech ecosystem and beyond.

In this respect, talking with Jarmo Eskelinen on Tuesday about his new role in leading the University of Edinburgh Data Driven Innovation programme gave me a great deal of encouragement.

As did the discussions last week with Gordon Donald of the University and Mark Sanders and Greg Whiting of Accelerate Places on the potential development of an exciting new innovation hub in Edinburgh.

Emerging new places for fintech collaboration working with the universities across Scotland is a terrific opportunity to enable more innovation, for example following the model of Strathclyde University

I was excited to hear from Adrian Gillespie and Olga Kozlova this week on the FinTech Scotland space in the University of Strathclyde’s exciting Technology and Innovation Centre from next year.

FinTech Collaboration Jazz’

The growing collaboration opportunities with universities to support fintech development was very much on the agenda for the SFE Fintech Development Group last Friday afternoon.

It was a wonderful way to finish of fintech Friday’ and Graeme Jones, Lou Smith and myself very much valued the engagement from the broad spectrum of financial services leaders.

It was really encourgaging to hear the interest to get involved in the various priority areas of collaboration next year which will be crucial if we are to achieve our ambitions. Many thanks to Murdo of KPMG and Clare of EY for making it a very useful session.

My apologies for my disco’ and marriage’ analogies throughout the Friday afternoon in seeking to articulate the value of fintech collaboration!

Creating a collaborative environment was a key part of the conversation with Andrea Young from the Govt. Department for Digital and Culture and Mike Jackson of Tech Nation as we considered the opportunities of working more closely together.

Mickael and I very much welcomed the opportunity to share our progress and considering how this could have a wider application to facilitate innovative collaboration across the ecosystem in Scotland and beyond.

The introduction of the new Fintech Scotland digital platform in the next week or so will be a key part of this and Mickael has been working flat out night and day as always to ensure the next stage of the implementation is ready to go.

The digital platform will help us highlight how collaboration also stretches into cross sector themes such as cyber and I was delighted to hear from Nicola about the wonderful Scottish Cyber Awards evening on Wednesday.
Martin Beaton and the team should be very proud of their Trailblazer recognition, very much deserved.

Mickael is working closely with the Dentsu Aegis steam on the digital platform and so it was good to catch up with Anneli Ritari-Stewart and Chris Marsh last week on how we utilise their expertise even more with the fintech community in 2019.

Similarly with IBM and it was good to meet up with Simon Pink this week to discuss building closer links between the innovations across the fintech community and the new technologies such as AI.

In recent weeks I’ve been very much encouraged by the collaborative discussions with larger technology organisations seeking to help the development of innovative enterprises in the fintech ecosystem.

For example, on Monday the meeting with Douglas Adam, Mike Foster and Anthony Burgess of DXC Technology, a major employer in Scotland with whom there a number of mutual areas for development as we go into 2019

Then on Wednesday, catching up with Murray Farquharson of Salesforce, it was very clear that there was much we could potentially do together to in working together to benefit fintech enterprises.

For example, with their Ventures and Fintech Accelertor programmes, both of which align with our strategic collaboration plans and it will be great to progress with Murray and colleague Vicki Lintern.

Of course, it’s not just about technology and we had a great catch up to plan areas of 2019 strategic collaboration focus with Yvonne Dunn from the leading fintech lawyers Pinsent Masons last week.

Strategic FinTech Jazz’

Talking strategic fintech was very much on the agenda at the KPMG 30 Voices in Edinburgh last Wednesday evening with a wide ranging conversation.
I was delighted to join a very distinguished panel of Melissa Kidd-Davies from Redburn, David Duffy from CYBG, Andrew Freeley from Computershare, Blair Turnball of Aviva, all expertly charied by KPMG’s Anton Ruddenklau.

Thank you to Catherine Burnet, Penny McLoughlin and the team for an enjoyable where the focus consistently came back to the need for financial services to better serve consumers.

The customer focus was also central to the meeting with David Macmillan, Managing Director of Prudential, last week as we talked though the various strategic initiatives of working together next year.

Then on a more global scale, it has been extremely beneficial and insightful meeting up with Kent Mackenzie and Chris Brown of Deloitte this last few weeks to consider the strategic priorities for global strategic fintech collaboration.
Massive thanks to Kent and Chris as always and looking forward to progress with Sharon, Graham and Fraser at Scottish Development International as they continue their valuable broader work on global financial services opportunities.

This was also the topic of my train journey meeting with my international mentor Promilla Caughey from the First Ministers Policy Unit.
We spent the 50 minute journey to Glasgow putting the world to right and being excited about how the Scotland is Now’ international message can be leveraged to build global trade on a bigger scale.
Thank you as always Promilla for your ongoing counsel and guidance.

On a more specific part of the world, it was really useful to meet up with Lan-Ling of PA Consulting to hear about fintech lessons from the Nordics as well as seeing the ever youthful old colleague Gavin Neilson.

The developing role of Scotland in the global fintech ecosystem was the focus of conversations with the Morgan Stanley senior leaders on Monday evening and their opportunity to work closely with the innovative fintech enterprises in Scotland.

Very much enjoyed the discussion with Megan Brewer, who was over from New York, along with Roland Fejfar and Keith O’Donnell and looking forward to taking forward to mutual areas for development.

The end of the week gave me the opportunity to meet up with David Fergusson, the Chair of FinTech Scotland and, of course, chief executive of Nucleus Financial, another of the bright shining stars of the fintech ecosystem.

As always, valuable insight and counsel from David as we reflected on a fast moving first year for Fintech Scotland and a magnificent and successful year of delivery by the Nucleus Financial team. Wow, just amazing.

Running And All That Jazz

Delighted with my recovery from the USA marathon a couple of weeks ago and now ready to take on one of the toughest and most exhilarating half marathon races there is!.

This Sunday it is the Pentland Seven Resevoirs Half Marathon and yes it is as brutal as it sounds for those of you who know the Pentland Hills!!
Despite this, it will be my third time for this special race which only allows just over 100 runners!

This will be a good warm up for the Water of Leith Half marathon the following Saturday which Shery managed to get me admitted to, which I am even more excited by as a new race for me. Looking forward to seeing running buddy Angus McLean on the start line for this one.

Such a fabulous couple of races in the run up to the festive season alongside some very exciting meetings as we sprint to the end of the fintech year with jazz very much still in my ears from that Friday night in Glasgow!!. Until next time

Fortnightly FinTech Fuse ”“ The Buzz from a New York Fintech Mission!

Much of this last fortnight has been across the North Atlantic on a fintech mission to one of the world’s largest fintech centres, New York.

An action packed mission of meetups, presentations and conversations sharing examples on how Scotland’s fintech innovation is positively reshaping the financial sector has left me buzzing.

As I reflect on this buzz and start to write this fortnight’s blog on the plane journey home, I am struggling a bit on how best to share so many insights in a few hundred words. But here goes!

FinTech Meetup Buzz

Last Thursday it was straight of the plane and onto a one of New York’s major monthly fintech meet up events with Kevin Reynolds from SDI and Mark Roger from Vivolution.

The place was buzzing and we were made most welcome by Empire Starts Up team and engaging people from fintech firms such as Henry O’Brien from Quovo and Kim Lytle from Socure as well as larger firms such as Iris Otano from Bank of America.

The event focused around a fascinating fireside chat’ with Brandon Krieg one of the founders of fast growing fintech firm Stash Invest.
Brandon’s insights very much reminded me of many of Scottish fintech firms who are also focused on improving people financial well being.
We did not hesitate in suggesting to Brandon that the Stash fintech philopshy would be very much at home in Scotland when they were ready to expand to Europe.

The meet up buzz continued early the next morning at the Citi bank fintech event aptly named politely confidential’.
Thank you to Maria Deam, the leader of Citi’s significant fintech developments, for inviting us to be part of the event

Terrific buzz from several hundred people and it was great to talk with leaders from exciting firms such as Gene Vayngib of Tradle and Joyce Fecci from FIS (a global fintech with a base in Fife).

From the stage much of the discussion centered around Open Banking and it was interesting to get the US perspective from Citi’s Andres Wolberg-Stok, a conversation that can continue at the Global Open Banking Summit in Edinburgh this coming December.

The buzz carried over to the fintech dinner on Monday evening that I was delighted to jointly host with Peter Mathieson, Principal of the University of Edinburgh and George Baxter, chief executive of Edinburgh Innovations.
A wonderful group of senior leaders from diverse backgrounds kept a lively conversation going throughout the evening with topics ranging from fintech skills to the importance of fintech ethics.

It was a great opportunity for George and myself to share how Scotland is driving innovation through academia and industry collaboration.
Our guests for the evening provided us with terrific constructive feedback, especially on being much bolder in our ambition to be the top country for data driven fintech innovation!

Thank you to everyone for joining us for the dinner and we will take on board your valuable insights, especially in how we promote Scotland’s fintech buzz to the world.

FinTech Innovation Buzz

Promoting the virtues of the growing fintech community in Scotland was on the agenda for the meeting we had with Paul Barnes-Hoggett, Co-Founder of Alice, the rapidly expanding fintech helping customers with their regular spending commitments.

The innovative Alice story is hugely inspiring and their enterprise would be a wonderful addition to the Scottish fintech community when the time is right, hopefully in the near future.

Similarly, for Intenta, the early stage data analytics enterprise which already has a global reach through its founder Gudmundur Kristjansson.
Thank you to Robert Patrick of Citi for the introduction and an enjoyable discussion with George, Kevin and myself at the buzzing Roxy.

I’m looking forward to expanding the conversation with Gudmundur’s Icelandic fintech colleagues to develop mutual grounds for fintech collaboration and innovation.

On the subject of innovative use of data, it was great to catch up with the brilliant Peter Avery on 5thAvenue on Monday morning to hear about his exciting new venture Kalpada.

Knowing Peter for a few years I know his innovative approach to customer decisioning in financial services, will be destined for big success. I hope we can bring the buzz of Kalpada to Scotland soon.

I met Peter initially when he helped me deploy innovative IBM technology to improve customer financial engagement a few years back and it was IBM in New York I returned to on Friday afternoon.
Mark Roger and I had the opportunity to catch up with Stephen Leonard, General Manager for IBM North America, who has been hugely supportive of FinTech Scotland.

This was followed by an afternoon immersion in the latest IBM Watson developments at the impressive Astor Place centre.
Thank you Susan McLardy and team for setting up, we came away buzzing on the potential of how AI can fuel fintech innovations in Scotland at scale. We’re looking forward to progressing with Simon Pink and the IBM team.

Fintech Scale Buzz

The mission to New York provided the opportunity to learn how fintech is being applied at scale with some of the larger financial institutions.

It was great to catch up with Camilla Garcia, Francesca Lorenzini and Maksim Malukoff at the UK Dept of International Trade to share how we can connect more Scottish fintech firms into the New York buzz.

Kevin and I look forward to working with you in developing the two way fintech mission opportunities as well as the potential investment avenues.

I was hugely impressed to learn about global leaders Franklin Templeton approach to embracing fintech innovation through enterprise wide collaboration.
It was brilliant to hear engaging leaders Cihan Kasikara and Ed McGraw explain their model of innovation which positively engages all parts of the vast Franklin Templeton business.

We’re looking forward to welcoming Cihan and Ed over to Edinburgh soon when visiting their Edinburgh office.

We also hope to meet up with Remzil Kulkarni of Barclays over in Scotland soon as well with much excitement about the expansion plans in Glasgow announced recently.
Great to catch up with Remzil in New York and hear about the scale of the Barlcays data operations.

On the subject of data, it was really useful to catch up with Quinten Fourie of Thomas Reuters to explore how we could work together in supporting fintech firms through a data sandbox similar to the one they have helped develop in Boston.

The scale of the data opportunity for fintech innovation in a broad range of areas is enormous and the meeting with the terrific Morgan Stanley leaders Khalid Rafiq, Keith O’Donnell, Eve Wallace and Robert Keenan before I set off for New York very much highlighted this.

Thank you to the brilliant Morgan Stanley team for the opportunity to share the Fintech Scotland plans with your teams at your fantastic new offices in Glasgow. I look forward to supporting your plans both sides of the Atlantic.

I also look forward to seeing Eve Wallace, the Orca team and Chris Brown of Deloitte this Friday night at the Glasgow University FinTech Society event on, a great example of collaboration which is creating a big buzz in Scotland.

Futures Institute Buzz

Scotland’s world leading universities play an ever growing role in developing the fintech opportunities, from skills development to collaborative innovation through to inspiring new start up enterprises.

Therefore, a key reason for the mission to New York this last couple of weeks was to support the wider programme of University of Edinburgh events and specifically the development of the Edinburgh Future Institute.

For example, on Monday it was exciting to participate in the Global Change Forum workshop session at the Tata Innovation Centre bringing together academia and industry.

The engaging presentations from Dr Karen Gregory and Professor Sian Bayne on the visionary role of the new Edinburgh Future Institute created a terrific buzz
This is very exciting that fintech is a key area of this development and talking this through with a wide range of people such as Jillian Powers and Frank Cogliano.

The following morning a breakfast event with the Global Scot community in New York expanded on the important role EFI will play, with the inspiring Professor Melissa Terras bringing alive the potential of the initiative to be based at the Old Royal Infirmary in Edinburgh.

Then an evening reception organized by Grant Spence and Rachelle Norry later that day with the University’s significant alumni group in New York provided the opportunity to share the buzz with an even broader audience.
Our inclusion in the strategic EFI development is a big statement in how fintech can play a major role in the economy and society, as well as contribute to the global fintech ambitions.

The significant role of universities in demonstrating the global role of fintech was also a key part of the discussions I had with Adrian Gillespie of Strathclyde University on progressing joint initiatives.
The exciting initiatives will further reinforce Strathclyde University along with Edinburgh as major driving forces, especially with the increasing engagement of larger enterprises.

Similarly, with Heriot Watt University, another highly respected University who focused their Edinburgh Business event on fintech the weekend before I set off for New York.

It was a privilege to join David Richardson of the University, Colin Garland of Competitions & Markets Authority and Stephen Flaherty of JP Morgan on the Friday evening to present to students at the restored Panmure House home of Adam Smith.

Wonderful to see the high levels of engagement in fintech and diversity of international students from all parts of the world and Scotland. Nicola, who participated in the judging on Saturday, and I were hugely impressed.

Massive congratulations to Elisabeth Wold, Lucy Patton and Eoin Spence and colleagues for brilliant leadership in running the very successful event and well done to the winning team.

Heriot Watt University are also leading on the Ethical Finance Initiative and it was through their conference a few weeks ago I met Gail Hurley from the United Nations Development Programme.

To continue our conversation on the potential role of fintech with the UNDP programme, Gail arranged for us to meet up at the New York HQ along with inspiring colleagues Malika Bhandarkar and Martin Sommerschuh.
Fabulous conversation on areas where we could potentially collaborate and build on their exciting developments with Karen Rodgers and the Scottish Government team.

Scotland’s Buzz

On Thursday it was straight off the return flight in Edinburgh and onto the Thrive in a Digital Age conference and the excellent RBS conference centre.
It was a privilege to be invited to share insights on career opportunities to several hundred attendees and along with John McKinley of DLA, Jenny Wood of RBS and Hugo Pinto of Accenture.

Tammy Hu, Aramide Akinkugbe, Mat Del Percio and the team did a magnificent job in leading the fabulous and buzzing event, all big stars for the future and you should all be very proud.

Unfortunately, I could not stay for the networking as I had to speed off to the Dentsu Aegis Whitespace offices for the Building Scotland Brand’ event with creative community.

Once again, the atmosphere was buzzing following excellent sessions by Cat Leaver, Charlie Smith and Stef Calcraft bringing alive Scotland Is Now’.
It was great to join the panel with Iain Valentine, Cat, Margaret Gibson , all expertly chaired by Chris Marsh

Adding to the positive buzz with feedback fresh from New York was a terrific way to finish off the day, even if my body clock could not quite work out what time it was!
On the way home, I reflected on how the buzzing fortnight had started in catching up with the awesome Rab Campbell from the wonderful Wallet Services team. Thanks Rab, lots to follow up on.

Catching up on my emails, it was inspiring to hear about the fantastic success of the Money Matix financial hackathon last weekend at the University of Edinburgh.
Looking forward to hearing more from Tynah, Helene and Mickael.

Marathon Buzz

When over in New York my buzz was maintained over the weekend by squeezing in a marathon on the Sunday in Harrisburg, a three hour journey from the east coast.
With only 1500 runners it was not quite the size of the New York marathon but the buzzing atmosphere and support from the super people of Pennsylvania was just fantastic.

Infact, at times, the buzz of the event made it quite emotional as I paced through the 26.2 miles, coming in fourth in the old persons’ age category and the number one international runner!!

The buzz and adrenalin from the marathon fueled me for the marathon’ of meetings and events which then continued in New York from Monday morning.

Finally, then, a massive thank you to Kevin Reynolds from Scottish Development International for joining me on this marathon mission’ and to Scott McQuarrie for fantastic leadership in making the University events a very big success.
Brilliant working with you in sharing the buzz of Scotland’s fintech ambitions. Until next time..

The E-waste Problem and How The Blockchain Could Solve It

The Problem

Using the blockchain to improve access to financial advice

This article was written by Suhail Ahmad, Founder and CEO of AdviserDirect.co.uk, a digital platform connecting small-medium enterprise with qualified business and financial advisers 24/7 to help solve money, management and growth challenges.

There is no shortage of business “experts” offering advice and services to small-medium enterprises (SME) across the UK. So why is it that in a recent survey of over one million SME’S, 49% said they avoid hiring advisers or consultants due to the costs. With 40% of all businesses stating they find fixed fees to be inefficient and the main reason for their dissatisfaction with the service they received. They don’t feel their getting value for money despite spending over £60 billion annually on external advisory and consultancy services.

When making a big financial decision is to seek expert advice from various sources in order to make the most informed decision. A good business or financial adviser can be an invaluable resource helping business owners avoid pitfalls and overcome roadblocks. Being an adviser myself for over a decade, I could sympathise with the pain and frustration faced by entrepreneurs and small-medium business owners. Many of whom simply can’t afford the time and cost of evaluating adviser or getting the most important second opinion. Often resulting in them making poor financial or as we would say “less optimal” decisions that have real consequences on the success of their businesses.

In addition to cost, trust and confidence in the ability of the advisers is key determining factor in choosing an an adviser. Connecting businesses with trusted and suitable advisers in a digital marketplace enables lower costs and improved speed of service. But how do you accelerate the speed of trust when advisers won’t necessarily meet in person and could be across the country or the world?
This is where blockchain technology has the potential for solving the trust issue by helping develop a secure trusted mechanism. Blockchain, originally developed as the accounting method for the virtual currency Bitcoin, uses distributed ledger technology (DLT) to verify transactions and is now being used in a variety of commercial applications worldwide. It’s ability to provide authentication and security could be a fast adoption and use of digital platforms for the delivery of advice.

AdviserDirect is launching a feasibility study to help evaluate the transitioning of its existing advisory platform on to the blockchain. Incorporating it’s existing AI research on to help businesses more seamlessly search, compare and access advisers most suitable for their requirements. Using smart contracts and smart identity can help build a more transparent reputation system providing businesses unparalleled confidence in the advisers, their experience and credentials. The blockchain will also enable peer-to-peer transactions and low cost micropayments so businesses can pay for advice by the minute and advisers can access their funds instantaneously.

To learn more about the blockchain and AdviserDirect initiative, please contact Suhail Ahmad at +44 (0)131 208 2786 or email suhail@adviserdirect.co.uk