New Fintech Fellowship to Address Skills Gap

Online lender Spotcap just announced that applications for their FinTech Fellowship are now open. The lucky postgraduate fintech student will receive a £8,000 award.

The idea behind this fellowship is to raise the awareness of the fintech talent gap and seek involvement from organisations and individuals. Last year, 42 UK universities took part.

“Seeing positive collaboration between groups of talented entrepreneurs and established financial institutions really inspired me to apply”, said Mohammed Hassan, last year's winner.

The fintech talent situation in Scotland

The fintech sector isn't completely centralised in London with Scotland contributing massively to the growth of this sector in the UK.

Universities have been quick at identifying fintech as an area of focus and the University of Strathclyde recently launched the first UK MSc in fintech, rapidly followed by Stirling University. It is highly important when projections show a potential for the creation of over 15,000 new roles overt the next 10 years.

A majority of the companies who took part in the HM Treasury UK FinTech Census 2017 identified skilled talent attraction as one of their top challenges.

The judging panel

Further members of the judging panel include:

Marilena Ioannidou, Director & Team Lead on Fintech Investments, British Business Investment

Elizabeth Lumley, global fintech commentator and advisor

Tanya Andreasyan, Managing Director and Editor, FintechFutures/Banking Technology

Niels Turfboer, Managing Director, Spotcap