New national hub to turbocharge FinTech growth
The government just launched the national centre for FinTech called the Centre for Finance, Innovation and Technology (CFIT), designed to propel the sector's growth globally.
CFIT is backed by £5.5million of funding from the Treasury and the City of London Corporation and will enhance growth and innovation by promoting businesses and generating job opportunities across the sector.
The hub was unveiled at an event in Leeds yesterday and also intends to publicise the advantages of new and inventive technology that will expand consumer options, decrease costs, and improve efficiencies.
The CFIT is the first of its kind and will facilitate businesses in achieving a truly global presence, supporting approximately 2,500 organisations and tens of thousands of jobs in the UK.
Commenting on the launch, Nicola Anderson, CEO at Fintech Scotland said:
"The CFIT launch is a key milestone in achieving the UK’s fintech ambitions, embracing innovation across all cities and regions. The Centre’s coalition approach very much aligns with the execution of FinTech Scotland’s cluster strategy in advancing fintech growth.
“We are excited to be working with CFIT in leveraging the opportunities in Scotland and the whole of the UK, which will provide further momentum in delivering our ten-year FinTech Research and Innovation Roadmap enabling us all to harness the fintech opportunity across the UK.”
Howard Wimpory, KYC Transformation Director at Encompass Corporation, comments:
“It is encouraging to see the government provide this support to the FinTech industry and, widely, digital transformation, which creates opportunities for growth while also assisting economic recovery. The UK technology sector overall has huge potential, with innovation at a high, and support of this kind can help organisations to harness the solutions within it to their advantage.
“Widespread effort to help organisations truly unlock the potential of digital transformation is how strong, long-term value will be created throughout industries, and particularly financial services. These organisations must now recognise the importance of utilising the new and emerging solutions at their disposal, which not only add business value, but also help to protect the nation against the ever-evolving threat of financial crime.
"Realising these goals requires businesses to embark on or accelerate their digital transformation journeys, embracing state-of-the-art cloud powered technology to overhaul manual processes and instead trust in automation, which brings long-lasting operational benefits to power success."
Charlotte Crosswell OBE, Chair of CFIT, said the launch
“represents a significant moment for the UK’s FinTech sector and our economy more widely. This organisation will enable us to come together as a sector to start breaking down barriers that the FinTech sector is facing while creating a clear path for our homegrown FinTech companies to achieve global scale, impact and success.”
