Fintech 2018 Summit: Connecting the Scottish Financial Technology Community
Scotland is home to a burgeoning financial technology scene; driven by an ecosystem of exciting Fintech start-ups, large FS firms, universities and public sector bodies, it has attracted almost £37 million worth of investment in the past decade.
Fintech is a highly competitive global industry and, although there are numerous challenges to be overcome, we have the right mixture of ingredients for this thriving sector to continue to go from strength to strength.
Heritage, innovation and skills
The country has a rich heritage of financial services and, outside of London, Central-Scotland is seen to have the most well-rounded financial and business services cluster in the UK.
Scotland boasts an impressive track record of innovation and invention, with word-class universities and a diverse skills base across critical related disciplines such as data science, cyber security, software development and entrepreneurialism.
And while the Scottish ecosystem may be dwarfed in scale by larger hubs in the US and China, for many the small size, close proximity of stakeholders and the cohesive nature of the ecosystem is perceived as Scotland’s greatest strength.
Networking and collaboration
Networking and collaboration are key to the continued development of Scotland’s tech industry. That’s why events, such as DIGIT’s fifth annual financial technology summit Fintech 2018are so important.
Fintech 2018 will explore the evolution of the financial services sector, from developments in established tier-1 firms to the disruptive innovators within the start-up community that are reshaping the FS market.
The summit is geared for senior technologists, business leaders, academics and investors from across the financial service landscape. The event will bring these key stakeholders together for knowledge exchange, discussion and cross-pollination.
Hopefully, these kind of events will help the industry to create the open, collaborative ecosystem required to ensure Scotland becomes a leading global Fintech hub.
Fintech 2018 will be held at Edinburgh’s Dynamic Earth on 19th and 20th September. For full conference details, visit https://www.fintech18.com/
AIMday® Fintech: collaboration to tackle real-world problems
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Blockchain
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Cyber security
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Product and service design
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AI and machine learning
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Policy, ethics and regulation
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Big data, analytics and modelling
Innovating with Data in the Financial Industries
Article written by Ian Allaway, Founder and Product Director at Wallscope
Wallscope has been working with Semantic Web Techniques and Machine Learning tools for several years. Their tools and services have been used to support Digital Transformation projects in the NHS and the Scottish Government. Here they explain how their technology can help manage big data across the financial sector.
“Like any large corporate or public sector organisations, the financial industries now have to come to terms with the ever-increasing growth of digital data. Data is typically stored in disparate sources ranging from legacy Content and Document Management Systems to relational databases and other data silos.
Finding information across these multiple sources can be time-consuming and overwhelming. There is a reliance on those who know where the information is stored, or the use of a traditional search engine to retrieve a linear list of documents.
How can a Knowledge Graph help?
A Knowledge Graph differs fundamentally from traditional search. It identifies entities (such as people, places, organisations or concepts) across vast amounts of data and exposes the relationships between them. This allows a dynamic exploration of resources which would otherwise be extremely time-consuming.
In the financial sector the use of this kind of technology has immediate benefits, particularly when combined with Machine Learning models. In the field of due diligence or know your customer, for example, it has many practical applications, allowing you to uncover related people, organisations or indeed financial transactions across multiple documents or data sources. It also makes it easier to collaborate across internal and external data sources, for example when performing credit checks. This has the potential to massively reduce the time spent on such operations.
Ontologies help us to organise complex information and aid the implementation of Knowledge Graphs. In the financial industries, existing ontologies are rapidly being developed and reaching industrial maturity, for example the Financial Industry Business Ontology (FIBO) and the STW Thesaurus for Economics.
Dynamic Data Discovery
Wallscope’s unique technology stack combines an Enterprise Knowledge Graph with Natural Language Processing, Named Entity Recognition engines and Machine Learning models to enhance the interoperability of contextual information.
Our Dynamic Data Discovery platform is currently being used within the Scottish Government and NHS Scotland to help unlock the value of their data. For example, we have developed a tool to help GPs work across disparate information sources, in order to better manage the care of patients recently discharged from hospital. This is a versatile application which could be used in any scenario where information sources are divergent. In professional fields where rapid response is a requirement it saves time and avoids unnecessary complexity.
We are now receiving interest from the financial sector which we are looking to expand on in the near future. We are looking forward to taking part in FinTech Scotland’s event on 27 September, exploring opportunities for cross-border collaboration between Scotland and Ireland.
Fortnightly FinTech Fuse ”“ The Home For FinTech
I’ve always been sure that Scotland is a natural home for fintech growth and innovation and my journeys over the last few weeks has reinforced this belief in so many ways.
The home of fintech really came alive for me during the meeting last Friday to discuss the development of the Fife FinTech Academy with Iain Shirlaw, John Mcfarlane, Krystyna Marett and Ann Salt.
Developing the skills for a bright fintech home of the future is crucial and the Academy initiative with an initial focus on financial payments will ensure the Fife region continues to lead the way globally.
You’ll be hearing more details on this following the launch event as a curtain raiser for FinTech Scotland Fortnight in September.
However, in the meantime the fantastic news from the global fintech player Renovite Technologies to expand further is testament to Fife being a key area of Scotland’s fintech home.
Innovation Home
Meeting new and established fintech firms demonstrated that innovation is alive and well in our home. For example, the credentials and track record of Inside Secure were wonderful to hear about when I caught up with Douglas Kinloch and Neal Michie at their Glasgow office one evening.
I’m excited about connecting the Inside Secure team with the fintech payment firms in Fife to take advantage of collaboration opportunities.
Similarly, from our meeting recently with David Eccles from Wallscope we can see potential to drive innovation in the home by making connections with key stakeholders
The value of an innovation led home was very much in abundance when Mickael and I met up with Mark Doherty, Stephen Pollock and Jason at Avaloq yesterday and then had the chance to join their All Hands’ meeting. Fantastic people with a fabulous working environment.
As initial founding partners of FinTech Scotland, Avaloq play a significant role in Scotland and globally and it is exciting working with them to support their growth and people development plans.
During their session, I was asked whether we can measure the real level of innovation taking place in Scorland.
This gave me the opportunity to highlight the innovation audit’ work we have been progressing with the Scottish Government CanDo team along with a couple of other sectors. I’m looking forward to progressing this work with June Love, Joanna McKenzie and the team.
Sharing the exciting innovation happening in our Scotland fintech home is always a privilege and on Wednesday there was the opportunity to do so with Scottish Government Minister Kate Forbes and UK Treasury Minister John Glenn.
Wonderful to hear the broad range of fintech leaders share how they are reinvesting financial services as well as candidly expressed the challenges in driving forward innovation in financial services.
Thank you to all who joined me for the Ministerial visit to Fintech Scotland, you all did the fintech community proud. Big thanks also to Shery, Fiona and Niamh for making everything run so smoothly.
Later that day I ran over Glasgow to join the MBN Solutions and DataLab fabulous event for data scientists to share thoughts on why fintech is a wonderful home to develop a career path in Scotland.
Many thanks to Paul Forrest, Mickael Young, Rob Huggins and their super team, sorry I had to rush off at the end to get back for my daughters 18th birthday!
In a slightly different part of the fintech home, catching up with Suhail Ahmed of Advisory Direct and then later that day with Eleanor Tucker of GangHut at the Product Tank event highlighted to me the power of new collaborations in the fintech home.
Collaboration Home
The subject of collaboration opportunities was very much on the agenda with my catch up with Nucleus Financial chief executive David Fergusson, and of course, chair of FinTech Scotland
David rightly challenged me on whether larger enterprises were genuinely innovating and embracing collaboration opportunities in the market with fintech firms.
There are some terrific examples happening such The ID.Co work with CYBG and the Castlight Financial team with HSBC.
Meeting up with Philip Grant of Lloyds Bank Group and then separately also with Sarah Barry of Sainsbury Bank highlighted that the banking sector is seeing the value in fintech collaboration to strengthen our collective home.
Meeting Colin Carmichael from our strategic partner Sopra Steria allowed us to develop plans to progress this and, furthermore, identify new emerging collaboration opportunities.
For example, my meeting with the Hymans Robertson team John Taylor, Scott Finnie and Barry Smart made it clear that there are fintech collaboration opportunities very much in the pensions and employee benefits space going forward.
Fintech collaboration can go beyond the various financial services sectors and so it was good to meet up last week with Christian Beveridge and Derek Toal of Virgin Media explore cross sector opportunities. Great to hear about their role at the FinTech Summit in September.
For me one of the exemplars of collaboration is JP Morgan, reinforced in my conversation with Douglas of Inside Secure.
So it was a privilege to plays a role in last weeks JP Morgan FinTech Roundtable with a broad spectrum of guests from the asset management sector. Thank you to Stephen Flaherty, Sandy Brodie and the team, much to take on board on how to unlock the collaboration potential in our home.
In this respect, I am delighted to have worked with Scottish Enterprise to welcome the Vivolution team as the FinTech Scotland Network Integrator and into our home to foster the collaboration and support fintech firms in Scotland with growth.
Home of Excellence
Building a home of excellence for fintech firms is a key objective and the expertise of the Vivolution team will support fintech firms with funding and commercial development.
It was good to talk this all through at the FinTech Practitioners Group Meeting recently and it was terrific to have such a great attendance from the community, even if it was a bit of a squeeze!
Thank you to everyone who came along and your valuable contributions and feedback, next main meetings in October will focus on funding sources and options plus a fintech home social’.
Our appreciation to Anneli Ritari-Stewart and the team from our strategic partner Dentsu Aegis for hosting and making us all feel so much at home in Scotland’s epicentre of digital and marketing. And of course, wonderful to see the Whitespace team now part of the Dentsu Aegis family and in the fintech home.
A few days before the Practitioners Forum, we had the latest Open Banking Excellence meet up, great conversation and super to see even more new faces. Thanks again to James Varga for hosting.
Developing the Open Banking Centre of Excellence continues to be a key priority working with the inspiring Gavin Littlejohn plus a core team from the University of Edinburgh. Thanks again Damien, Douglas, Kevin and Triinu Hansen
Really useful meeting with Colin Garland, director of the Competition and Markets Authority on the subject of the centre of excellence strategy and plans, thanks Colin very much appreciated your enthusiasm for this initiative and great to hear about your expansion plans in Scotland.
Similarly, it was tremendously useful to catch up with Simon Thompson, chief executive of the Chartered Bankers Institute who have a key role to play in the emergence of a global open banking centre of excellence. Very much appreciate your insight and engagement Simon, looking forward to collaborating further on a local and international level.
International Home
Another of our key objectives is to embrace the global fintech opportunities for our home here in Scotland and sharing the story to gain interest in what we are doing is something we always grasp.
So, it was brilliant to be given the opportunity to present to some significant Middle east and Far East sovereign fund and institutional fund investors who were being hosted by the University of Edinburgh
Thank you to The ID.Co, Money Dashboard and Sustainably for supporting me with the conversations as well as George Baxter, chief executive of Edinburgh Innovations for including us in the opportunity.
The recent late Friday afternoon meeting with Kent Mackenzie and Chris Brown from our global professional services partner Deloitte got me excited on how we can develop the fintech home on a international stage going forward.
Reinforced this last two weeks with international conversations on our fintech home stretching from as far away as Rhode Island, USA and as near as Ireland. Thank you Paul Snape and David Clarke I look forward to seeing you both during our Fintech Fortnight with your colleagues.
We are delighted that Scottish International Week led by global leader Russell Dalgleish starting 17th September coincides with Fintech Fortnight and we look forward to welcoming many global guests to our fintech home during this time.
A huge thank you to everyone across the community who is contributing to making FinTech Fortnight happen in a few weeks time and the great support from our friends at Visit Scotland.
On the subject of international themes, many congratulations to my global mentor Promilla Caughey on taking up a new role with the Scottish Government, a fantastic career move and so well deserved.
Running for Homes
I’ll be running for homes on Sunday as I take part in the 15 mile urban rush race from South Queensferry to Holyrood for the charity Shelter Scotland.
The Shelter Scotland fight to address the impact of homelessness has always meant a great deal to me and this is my small way of contributing to their great work. Everyone deserves a home that is safe and secure.
This will be a great practice race ahead of my marathon in two weeks time just prior to the official start of FinTech Fortnight on 17thSeptember. Until then!
FinTech has arrived in Scotland: Investing in skills will make sure it stays
Article written by Jim Tomaney, chief operating officer, Renovite Technologies Inc.
Historically, among the many things Scotland is applauded for, financial services and innovation sit as two of its longest-standingand best-known accomplishments. This week’s visit from Ivan McKee MSP, the Minister for Trade, Investment and Innovation, to several growing FinTech’s in Fife, including our own, demonstrates the extent to which this assertion continues to bear weight; confidence in the sector is high ”“ and for good reason.
For us, Mr McKee’s visit signifies a flagship moment. It recognises Renovite Technologies as an important part of a growing FinTecheco-system that taken together is creating new opportunities for businesses and people up and down the country – whilst positioning Scotland as a central player in the global FinTech market.
New and emerging sectors like financial technology are essential when it comes to planning our economic future. As the Scottish Fiscal Commission’s latest economic forecast showed, we are potentially facing subdued’ economic growth for at least the next five years.Yet, at the same time, it acknowledges that: “The past is an imperfect guide to the future in a rapidly changing global economic, social, political and technological environment.”
To buck this trend and make sure the past does not representthe future, it is imperative that we continue to invest growing sectors andparticularly, in skills and people. As Stephen Ingledew said last year: “In these fast-changingtimes,Scotland punches well above its weight in Fintech. Driven largely by world-renownedexpertisein the use of Data, Scotland is rapidly establishing itself as a significant Fintech hub.”
It is reasons like this ”“ expertise – that we as a company that specialises in payments technology has chosen to invest in Scotland as a base for our operations. Giving people, whether it be through retraining initiatives like CodeClan or through specialist FinTechcourses, the right skills should be an absolute priority in the days ahead.
Today’s consumers continually push for new and innovative products in financial services. Scottish FinTechs have been able to satisfy that demand thanks to a highly skilled and experienced workforce – combined with a supportive business environment.
Remaining agile and responsive to these demands will ensure Scotland continues to enjoy such a strong reputation in the area and its businesses continueto grow.
Thanks to rising demand for better payments software from banks and money management companies, we have grown our team in Scotland by more than three times this year and anticipate tripling this figure again over the next 12-months.
We are only able to do this because we have access to some of the most skilled staff in the global labour market. For this to continue, we must look to grow and develop a workforce that is able to satisfy the market in the future, ensuring Scotland remains a magnet for technology-drivenfinancial services in the future.
Fintech and Gamification
This article was written by Phil Smy from Pocket Sized Hands. Pocket Sized Hands is a software company who have developed games using gamification techniques for St. Andrews University and for other clients.
There’s a consistent theme in the challenges that financial companies face when interacting with existing and new customers, engagement and education. Customers find interacting with financial services to be unengaging due to lack of understanding, complexity and jargon.
Many fintech companies are utilising new ways to tackle this problem, namely gamification. Gamification is the application of game concepts, features and game design principles for non-gaming applications. In practice these techniques come in the form of rewarding good behaviour, implementing interactivity to engage customers or visualising data.
The purpose of this is to engage and inform individuals through novel means. In the past, gamification techniques have been used within various sectors. Education have benefited from gamification to inform and engage students. Fitness companies have used gamification to encourage a healthy lifestyle. For many businesses, gamification has been found to be a cost-effective method of training in comparison to traditional training techniques.
Education
Gamification within education is a growing trend. The basis of using gamification within a teaching context is that if users are engaged with games that communicate lessons through gameplay mechanics or objectives, users can learn without even realizing it. If you give a young person the option to play a mobile game, doing their homework or attending a lecture, most young people will want to play the game.
Applying this to the fintech industry and you can see how young people (or people of all ages) could play gamified applications with rewards and interactions to better engage with their financial future. Through feedback loops, customers can learn to make good choices with their money and stop spending their money recklessly. By utilising these techniques, fintech companies can reward and condition good financial behaviour.
Rewards
Gamification rewards can be divided into two different sections, extrinsic and intrinsic rewards. An example of an extrinsic reward within gamification is the accumulation of points, achievements, places on a high score table etc. For fintech, instead of earning points, the user can be saving money.
For example, if a user saves some money through their pension pot or financial plan, the application would be able to visualise and summarise how much they have saved and reward the user for saving a certain amount, this can also work with real word rewards.
Companies in the past have experimented with real life rewards such as vouchers and money off products and services. In terms of intrinsic rewards, educating users of financial plans and other elements of finance can help financial companies engage and inform their customers.
Conclusion
The overall goal of gamification applications is to change the behaviour of consumers on a wide scale. Gamification does this by educating users of potential bad habits and rewarding users for their good habits. Dr. Iain Donald of Abertay University, the leading games design university in Europe summarises it perfectly.
“The application of game design and technology to engage new audiences has proven to be extremely beneficial, both in the education and entertainment sectors. Increasingly that potential is being harnessed in other industries from medicine through to finance.“
Blockchain Live 2018
On September 26 in London, Europe’s premier blockchain event will bring the latest and greatest in Blockchain, DLT and Smart Contracts. Blockchain Live 2018 will welcome big names such as Bitfury, ConsenSys and EOS.
For the first time, a meeting of some of the greatest experts in blockchain and DLT will be hosted in London. Amongst others, Nick Szabo, the father of smart contracts; Alex Tapscott, Author of the Blockchain Revolution; Blockchain Guru, Oliver Bussmann and the Chamber of Digital Commerce’s Perianne Boring will share their thoughts.
Blockchain Live 2018 will deliver industry inspired content. The conference will help businesses wishing to harness the potential of blockchain. It will look at the full spectrum from pioneering developers to the new generation of investors and entrepreneurs.
The event will contain a mix of free-to-attend and paid-for content. The paid-for events: the Blockchain Leaders’ Summit and C-Suite Stage, are directed at business leaders who want to learn from real life case studies on strategic implications of blockchain.
The C-Suite events will help attendees make the most of a blockchain enabled future.
There are 7 free-to-attend Industry Stages’ around some verticals such Fintech, Govtech, TechDev, Product Journey, Cryptocurrency, Energy Forum and Creatives including gaming, gambling and entertainment.
You’ll be able to listen from BNP Paribas, SWIFT, London Stock Exchange Group, EDF, Coca-Cola, Bupa and HSBC.
On top of all of this the organisers are bringing 2 new events to Blockchain Live 2018:
Blockchain Bust Up: Live debate on the governance and regulation around Blockchain and DLT
Investor Zone featuring The Start-Up Village and Pitch: a hive of blockchain innovators with new and exciting technologies
To read more and register click here
The Herald Intrapreneurial Conference in association with CivTech®
What is Intrapreneurship?
It is an essential part of a nations landscape to encourage, discuss and focus on Intrapreneurship to ensure that a nation’s economy grows.
Internal Entrepreneurship – intrapreneurship – is crucial to companies who wish to keep their competitive edge. It is becoming increasingly important, in such fast-paced times, to encourage and grow those from the inside of a company, where their talent and knowledge lies.
The conference
To help achieve businesses’ ambitions for empowering those with an entrepreneurial spirit, The Herald are holding their first Intrapreneurial Conference to engage, inspire and showcase organisations, companies, workplaces and individuals who are leading the way on their Intrapreneurial journeys.
Intrapreneurship has never been more important to our businesses, our economy and our society in such changing times. This is an event you do not want to miss.
The Intrapreneurial Conference takes place on August 28 at 200 St Vincent Street, Glasgow.
Register on https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-herald-intrapreneurial-conference-in-association-with-civtech-tickets-47350832615
For further information please contact Kirsty Loughlin on 0141 302 6016 or email kirsty.loughlin@newsquest.co.uk
Driving fintech growth in Scotland
FinTech Scotland, in partnership with Scottish Enterprise, has announced today the appointment of corporate innovation firm Vivolution to support the drive of fintech growth in Scotland.
One of FinTech Scotland’s strategic priorities is to support fintech firms’ growth and innovation by enabling access to funding and professional support services.
To deliver this, Vivolution has been appointed to lead a new Fintech Network Integrator service providing take to market and Investment sourcing services to fintech start-ups and scale-ups.
Specifically, Vivolution will be helping fintech firms from across Scotland to accelerate their potential in domestic and international markets as well as encouraging collaborations between financial services, start-ups, investors, regulators, industry and academia.
Commenting on this announcement, Stephen Ingledew said: “Scotland has got everything it takes to be one of the leading fintech hubs in the world and the appointment of Vivolution will further support the collaboration across the sector. We are looking forward to working closely with the team.”
Fintech director at Scottish Enterprise, Danny Cusick, added: “Our Network Integrator is a tried and tested model aimed at supporting the development of emerging or niche sectors. Through innovation and collaboration, Vivolution will work with Scottish Enterprise to help companies to maximise their growth ambitions and position Scotland as the location of choice for future Fintech investment.”
Mark Roger at Vivolution, said: “We are delighted to be working with Fintech Scotland and Scottish Enterprise to help develop the eco system here in Scotland. Through their ongoing work to encourage and support emerging innovation and investment potential, there is a real opportunity to position Scotland as one of the leading centres for Fintech innovation, collaboration and growth ”“ and we’re delighted to be playing a part in this.”
Startup Summit Edinburgh – An Overview
Startup Summit was designed to bring together, inspire and educate entrepreneurs at all levels of business growth. Scotland has a thriving startup scene and a huge amount of enterprise support available; Startup Summit brings all the knowledge and connections under one roof.
At Assembly Rooms in Edinburgh, this year’s summit will host over 30 world-class speakers across three themed stages: the Main Stage, the Business Builder Stage and the Impact Stage. Over 1,000 attendees are invited to join in with discussion panels, workshops and the interactive exhibition space. For business leaders at all stages, Startup Summit is an opportunity to engage with experts, build a network and gain valuable tools for long-term success. There are also 30 exhibitor spaces at each summit, which allow entrepreneurs to meet similar business, mentorship enterprises and potential corporate connections.
The theme for this year’s Startup Summit is the power of company culture.’ Experts will be looking at the growing values-led mentality of both consumers and employees, as well as addressing recent controversies and issues such as the gender pay gap results and the gig economy.
Previous years have seen a variety of high-profile speakers and entrepreneurs attend Startup Summit. In 2017 alone, the event hosted James Watt, Founder of Brewdog, Josh Littlejohn, Founder of Social Bite, Chris van der Kuyl, Founder of 4J Studios, Mary Owen, Founder of Ellis Productions and Scottish First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon (who launched the Unlocking Ambition initiative). This year, confirmed speakers include:
Alan Mahon, Founder of Brewgooder
Mike Atterley, Founder of BlackCircles.com and CEO of Atterly.
Over the past seven years, Startup Summit has grown exponentially and is now recognised as one of the leading events for entrepreneurship in the UK. Startup Summit has been organised by WeAreTheFuture since 2011, which underwent a merge and is now part of FutureX. The team at FutureX believe that values-driven entrepreneurship is the key towards a more virtuous economy for all. Through unique events, programmes and partnerships, FutureX educate and inspire the next wave of business leaders to grow their organisations with a purpose greater than profit.
Each year, FutureX run a Startup Summit Competition, which will see one UK-based tech entrepreneur awarded a top prize, including a free place on the Silicon Valley Accelerate Programme in Spring 2019. Three finalists will pitch head to head on the main stage at Startup Summit for this unique opportunity. Previous winners include Christopher McCann, Founder of Snap40 and Tarryn Gorre, Founder of Kafoodle.