Bridging the AI Divide, Highlights from BridgeAI’s Second Year
Artificial Intelligence is transforming industries, and the UK is determined to lead from the front. Innovate UK’s BridgeAI programme is a powerful engine bringing AI to sectors traditionally slower to adopt it.
In its second year, BridgeAI put AI into action. Over 3,400 organisations and 9,000 individuals have engaged with the programme, with over 450 projects funded and more than £120 million combined in grant and co-investment capital.
BridgeAI delivered tangible impact:
- Practical AI Support: AI toolkits and strategic frameworks, accelerators, training and innovation vouchers.
- Real-World Results: Case studies showed AI enhancing farming, pipeline inspections, performance tour logistics, and public transport capacity.
- Skills and Standards: Training, new competency frameworks, and access to AI ethics and governance tools.
BridgeAI connects small businesses, researchers, and start-ups with the resources, funding and knowledge they need to innovate responsibly and confidently.
Advancing ESG
Everyone’s talking about ESG, but how do we move from ambition to meaningful impact?
This new report from the Financial Regulation Innovation Lab (FRIL) unpacks that challenge and points to a clear answer: regulatory innovation.
While ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) principles have risen to the top of board agendas, the path to embedding them meaningfully into financial services is still full of complexity with ambiguous frameworks, inconsistent data, and evolving disclosure standards. But amid that complexity lies an opportunity for change.
This paper flips the conversation. Instead of focusing on ESG as a reporting burden, it highlights how purpose-driven innovation, especially from fintechs, can reframe ESG as a strategic advantage.
Highlights include:
- How fintechs are creating tools that democratise ESG insights, enabling smaller firms to lead, not lag.
- The power of transparency tech, enabling consumers and investors to make informed choices in real time.
- Regulatory leadership as a catalyst—not a constraint—for embedding long-term sustainability in financial decision-making.
Through FRIL’s ESG Innovation Call, the report captures the pulse of the ecosystem: entrepreneurs, regulators, academics, and institutions coming together to explore how data, collaboration, and innovation can unlock the next wave of ESG progress.
Addressing Financial Crime
Financial crime is no longer just a back-office issue, it’s a frontline threat to trust, security, and resilience across the financial system. With scams growing more sophisticated and regulation constantly evolving, simply reacting isn’t enough. The sector needs to outthink and outpace criminal innovation.
Produced through the Financial Regulation Innovation Lab (FRIL) led by FinTech Scotland, the University of Strathclyde, and the University of Glasgow, this report looks into how the UK financial services industry is embracing innovation to meet the challenge head-on.
Rather than listing problems, the focus is on real-world progress:
- Fintechs using AI and privacy-first data sharing to spot fraud faster.
- Financial institutions embedding intentional “friction” into digital journeys to protect vulnerable consumers.
- Regulators promoting sandbox collaboration and cross-sector signal sharing to shift from reactive controls to intelligent, joined-up defences.
What makes this report stand out is the ecosystem it brings together:
15 fintech innovators, banks, telcos, regulators, and academic partners all contributing to one goal: disrupt financial crime before it happens.
Shaping better consumer outcomes
This report explores how the financial services sector can harness innovation to deliver better outcomes for consumers in line with the FCA’s Consumer Duty.
Produced through the Financial Regulation Innovation Lab (FRIL), a collaboration between FinTech Scotland, the University of Strathclyde, and the University of Glasgow, the report outlines a practical and forward-looking roadmap for industry-wide transformation.
The introduction of the Consumer Duty marks a shift from traditional compliance to a proactive, outcomes-based regulatory approach. This paper highlights how fintech innovation, data insights, and collaborative ecosystems can help financial institutions meet evolving regulatory expectations and rising consumer demands.
Key themes include:
- A changing regulatory and consumer landscape, with rising expectations for transparent, inclusive, and adaptive financial services.
- Challenges for financial institutions, such as legacy systems, siloed data, and fragmented compliance efforts.
- Opportunities for innovation, where fintechs play a crucial role in driving consumer understanding, supporting vulnerable customers, and automating compliance.
- A call for ecosystem-wide collaboration, moving beyond isolated efforts to create shared standards, interoperable systems, and seamless consumer experiences.
The report features insights from the FRIL Consumer Duty Innovation Call, showcasing fintech partnerships that are already delivering tangible improvements in customer support, communication clarity, and regulatory monitoring. It concludes with a multi-year roadmap outlining the necessary steps for embedding Consumer Duty principles across the financial ecosystem.
Live podcast episode from Money20/20
A conversation live from Money20/20 2025 in Amsterdam with 4 fintech businesses, part of a Scottish delegation that saw 10 fintechs exhibiting at Europe’s largest fintech conference led by Scottish Development International and FinTech Scotland.
Dan from CreditNature, David from BigSpark, Jamie from Aveni and Michael from Transwap offer their views on the conversations they’ve had, the speakers they’ve listened to and reflect on the impact that Money20/20 can have for their business.
Bringing Cash Closer to Digital: OneBanx Integrates Cash Access into Banking Apps
Scottish fintech OneBanx is launching a strategic initiative to ensure cash access doesn’t get left behind by working with partner banks to embed cash withdrawal and deposit functionality directly into mobile banking apps.
This new integration means customers will soon be able to use their bank’s app to initiate transactions at OneBanx kiosks, without needing a physical card or third-party wallet. It’s a move designed to enhance customer experience while making in-person cash services more accessible through digital channels.
While digital wallets have simplified spending, OneBanx aims to complement this trend by boosting the utility of banks’ own apps. The company’s joint white paper with Enryo, “Cash as Payments Infrastructure,” reinforces the point: most people in the UK still use cash occasionally, even in an increasingly cashless society.
The integration also offers tangible benefits for banks:
- A seamless customer journey within their existing app;
- Greater engagement with less digitally-active customers;
- And a cost-effective way to extend reach without reopening branches.
Pilots with partner banks are underway, with full deployment expected later this year.
“Our goal is to create real-world utility for digital banking while still supporting essential in-person needs,” said Javed Anjum, CEO of OneBanx. “This initiative helps banks stay connected to communities in a way that’s sustainable and scalable.”
FinTech Scotland and TSB Launch latest Innovation Labs programme to Combat Fraud and Enhance Trust in Digital Banking
FinTech Scotland unveiled today the latest innovation programme in collaboration with TSB Labs at Money20/20, Europe’s largest fintech conference.
TSB Labs, the award-winning fintech accelerator, is once again partnering with FinTech Scotland to identify, support and scale innovative solutions tackling some of the most urgent challenges in banking. This year, the focus is on preventing one of the nation’s most prevalent crimes – fraud, while delivering a seamless customer journey.
The programme builds on the success of previous cohorts, which resulted in several pilot projects as well as being recognised at the Scottish Financial Technology Awards for Best Financial Services Innovation..
The 2025 innovation programme is now open to fintechs from across the globe who are ready to deploy real-world solutions in a live retail banking environment. Interested parties can apply here.
Nicola Anderson, Chief Executive of FinTech Scotland, commented:
“We are delighted to be partnering once more with TSB and announce this innovation programme at Money20/20. TSB Labs is a powerful example of how established financial institutions can partner with fintechs to deliver real impact for customers. Thanks to our work on the topic of fraud as part of the Financial Regulation Innovation Lab, we’ll be bringing a significant amount of knowledge, expertise and connections to this programme from across the Scottish Fintech Cluster.”
The Lab’s three challenge statements invite creative, practical solutions in:
- Smart Messaging and Education: improving fraud detection through timely, trusted, and effective customer communication.
- Empowered Customer Controls: making faster decisions about authorised payments by giving customers more control and clarity.
- Seamless Resolution: transforming fraud reporting and resolution into a streamlined, customer-centric journey.
Richard Daniels, Fraud and Financial Crime Operations Director at TSB, said:
“Fraud is constantly evolving, and so must we. The TSB Labs programme is a brilliant opportunity for us to work shoulder-to-shoulder with innovative fintechs to find smarter, faster and more effective ways to continue protecting our customers.”
The programme offers two phases of structured engagement, culminating in a final pitch to TSB decision-makers and the opportunity to progress to pilot deployment.
Full details and the short application form can be found on FinTech Scotland’s website . Applications close on 25 June 2025.
Turning the Tide: How SensFish Is Powering Better Maritime Investment and ESG Decisions
Financial institutions are sharpening their focus on climate risk, ESG disclosures, and sustainable investment. At the same time supply chains, shipping emissions and biodiversity-linked investment products, are increasingly on the balance sheet but reliable, decision-ready data has been hard to come by.
The Challenge: Ocean Impact, Low Visibility
Financial stakeholders are under pressure to assess the environmental impact and transition readiness of companies operating in ocean-related sectors. Yet data on maritime carbon emissions, biodiversity, and regulatory compliance remains fragmented, inconsistent, or inaccessible, making it difficult to price risk accurately, validate sustainability claims, or identify new opportunities.
The Solution: Ocean Intelligence for Finance
SensFish delivers a scenario-led analytics platform that turns open, maritime-specific data into actionable intelligence. The solution integrates historical, real-time, and predictive datasets such as satellite tracking, vessel surveillance, and ecosystem modelling. By doing so, SensFish enables users to:
- Quantify and forecast carbon impact across maritime supply chains (including sequestration potential and emissions),
- Verify compliance with sustainability standards (e.g. reducing IUU fishing via vessel monitoring),
- Support biodiversity-linked investments through monitoring of wild fish stocks and aquaculture patterns,
- De-risk projects by modelling scenarios for ESG outcomes, operational constraints, and regulatory exposure.
All this is delivered in a user-friendly platform that simplifies complex data and aligns with global Net Zero and ocean disclosure frameworks, turning compliance into strategy and reporting into opportunity.
SensFish’s traction is growing. In the past year, the company has:
- Been selected for the European Space Agency Business Incubation Programme,
- Partnered with UNCTAD and presented at the Monaco Ocean Finance Forum, part of the UN Ocean Conference,
- Joined the Innovate UK InvestAbility programme and Converge Net Zero cohort,
- Secured support from Glasgow City Council and received international investor interest,
- Onboarded a publicly listed UK client with global operations.
These milestones reflect a rising demand for deeper ocean intelligence among forward-looking financial institutions and corporates alike.
Discover more about SensFish
Supporting Scale: Addleshaw Goddard Opens Applications for 2025 AG Elevate Accelerator
Addleshaw Goddard has launched the latest edition of AG Elevate, its accelerator programme aimed at supporting ambitious tech scale-ups with legal expertise, strategic mentorship, and industry connections.
Now in its eighth year, the ten-month programme is designed for businesses with growth ambitions and existing funding in place, offering them legal insight, access to industry events, and monthly one-on-one guidance from AG’s senior legal professionals.
A Track Record of Impact
Since its inception in 2017, AG Elevate has worked with more than 60 companies across fintech, clean-tech, prop-tech, and beyond. Notable alumni include Tumelo, Amiqus, Finance Unlocked, and Fuuse. Several participants have gone on to raise significant funding or complete acquisitions, such as SymPhysis Medical and EpiCapture.
Scottish representation in the 2024 cohort included CataNiTek (specialist chemical manufacturing), Coastr (vehicle rental technology), and Frontier Robotics (autonomous underwater exploration) highlighting the programme’s commitment to fostering innovation across the UK’s regions.
What’s on Offer
Participants in AG Elevate receive:
- A dedicated legal mentor with monthly strategy sessions
- 25 hours of complimentary legal support
- Access to AG seminars, insight sessions, and networking events
- Legal publications and updates from AG’s sector experts
- A 30% discount on any further legal work during the programme
David Anderson, Partner at Addleshaw Goddard, said:
“Early-stage and scale-up companies often face legal challenges that can delay growth or investment. AG Elevate is about addressing those challenges early with the right support. We’re particularly keen to hear from businesses in fintech and digital assets this year—areas where we’ve built deep capability.”
Eligibility and How to Apply
AG Elevate is open to tech businesses based in the UK, Ireland, France, Spain, or Germany that have received seed or later-stage investment and have clear plans for rapid growth.
Applications are open now and will close at the end of July 2025.
Apply here
Applications Open for the JPMorganChase Fintech Forward Programme
Applications are now open for the JPMorganChase Fintech Forward Programme, a new 12 week in-person and virtual accelerator designed to help fintech leaders realise their business vision.
Backed by JPMorganChase’s extensive network, the programme offers tailored support to help scale high-potential fintech companies across the UK.
Selected fintech leaders will gain access to a suite of resources designed to drive sustainable business growth. These include:
- Executive sponsorship for a senior JPMorganChase leader
- Mentorship from an experienced advisory team
- A customised programme focused on strengthening a founder’s network and impact
- Opportunities to present to JPMorganChase stakeholders, external investors and partners
- A sponsored trip to Slush, one of Europe’s leading startup events, held in Helsinki
To reduce barriers to participation, travel, accommodation and other reasonable costs for in-person events will be covered by JPMorganChase if required.
The programme begins with two days at JPMorganChase’s Glasgow Technology Centre on 10th and 11th September 2025 with full-day in-person sessions in London every two weeks. Virtual sessions every other week for between 3-4 hours per week. The trip to Slush 2025 takes place between 18th November and 21st November 2025.
Who should apply?
We are seeking applications from businesses that:
- Apply technology to create scalable solutions within financial services.
- Have a live product demonstrating market traction, with annual revenues not exceeding £1 million.
- Show a commitment to making a positive impact on individuals and/or businesses in the UK.
- Are dedicated to active participation in the programme.
We are actively encouraging applications from founders or business leaders who have encountered obstacles to growing their business, including a lack of proximity to funding and networks, and/or those addressing the needs of underserved consumers, businesses or communities.
Applications are assessed on a rolling basis, and early submission is encouraged. The deadline for applications is 27 June 2025.