Scotcoin launches carbon offsetting service
The Scotcoin Project (CIC) just launched Scotcoin Carbon Offset which allows individuals and businesses to offset their carbon footprint and support the drive to net zero by providing a discount to those who pay with Scotcoin (SCOT), while also accepting payments in pounds sterling.
People can purchase a single tonne of carbon for £20 (10 tonnes would cover the average carbon consumption for a person each year). Businesses can get in touch with the Scotcoin Project to talk about their specific needs.
2022 saw the Scotcoin Project CIC achieved carbon neutral status by offsetting 100 tonnes of CO2 through investment in a project delivered by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Adaption Fund, which seeks to reduce the emissions of harmful greenhouse gases.
Scotcoin seeks to use crypto as a force for good, supporting a range of charitable and environmental projects that boost Scotland’s ambitions for a greener and fairer society.
Temple Melville, CEO of the Scotcoin Project CIC, said:
“We are using cryptocurrency in a unique way to help Scottish people and businesses make their contribution to the country achieving net zero. While offsetting is not the only answer, carbon emissions are an inevitable result of many of the things people do in day-to-day life and in the way businesses operate. It’s not possible to cut all of that out altogether, but it can at least be offset and we believe crypto can play an important role in making that happen.
“We have the flexibility to sell single tonne quantities, which means even individuals can offset what they produce in a year through activities like sending emails or drinking coffee if they want to proactively do more for the planet. The climate crisis remains the biggest challenge society faces and we hope that our carbon initiative, via Scotcoin Carbon Offset, will incentivise more people and businesses to do as much as they can to help us reach net zero.”
To find out more, please visit: www.scotcoincarbonoffset.com
Fintech docStribute secures listing as G-Cloud 13 supplier
Fintech docStribute, part of the FinTech Scotland community, just announced the signature of a Framework Agreement with the UK Government’s Crown Commercial Service (CCS) to be listed as a G-Cloud 13 supplier hence offering their services to public sector bodies later this autumn.
52,000 public sector and third sector organisations will have access to docStribute via the G-Cloud 13 digital marketplace. This will enable them to use docStribute’s Distributed Ledger Technology to benefit from a secure and sustainable digital solution for distributing highly regulated documents.
Christopher Ansara, CEO & co-founder of docStribute, comments:
“We are thrilled to have been selected as a service on the Digital Marketplace by the Crown Commercial Service. This will enable more public sector organisations to access docStribute’s services and it will be simple for non-profit organisations and public sector bodies to have access to the best product on the market. docStribute has always had productivity and sustainability at heart, and we hope to see our solution help not only reduce the use of paper, but also help organisations become more sustainable, while increasing efficiency.”
Not only does the solution provides better security it also help organisations achieve their Net Zero targets. Indeed, with docStribute they can reduce paper usage by 95% and cut cost by as much as 70%. docStribute uses the Hedera Distributed Network which is significantly more energy-efficient than alternative public networks.
docStribute recently signed a partnership with Salesforce to make its Document Distribution and Digital Signature solutions available to its 150,000+ customers helping Salesforce address three of its six sustainability priorities (emissions reduction, regulation and policy, and innovation).
Lightning Reach and Inbest partner with Fair4All Finance to deliver comprehensive access to financial support
Tech for Good start-up Lightning Reach and benefits platform Inbest have partnered with Fair4All Finance to broaden their coverage of support for individuals on both platforms.
Over 15m people in the UK are in financial hardship with the cost-of-living crisis plunging millions more into poverty. However, whilst there is a vast array of support available, the landscape is fragmented and confusing to navigate resulting in people not knowing what support is available or assuming they are not entitled to any support. This lack of awareness and the complexity of application processes means struggling households miss out on over £15 billion in benefits, discretionary payments and grants.
Lightning Reach and Inbest are excited to start a partnership where they will integrate their respective platforms, broadening their combined coverage of support. This integration will allow Lightning Reach to include benefits, grants and discounted tariffs covered by Inbest in its one-stop support portal, while Inbest will add discretionary schemes and grants available on the Lightning Reach portal to its benefits calculator.
The partnership is being supported by financial inclusion not-for-profit Fair4All Finance which is making the portal available to the community finance sector as part of its programs to expand the provision of affordable credit and the pilot for the No Interest Loan Scheme.
Senthan Balachandiran, Programme Manager at Fair4All Finance, said:
“One of the core initiatives in our cost of living response is to make available in as many customer journeys as possible a benefit and grant check because we know that awareness is one of the biggest barriers to claiming entitlement. In addition to the No Interest Loan Scheme pilot journey, we are working with credit reference agencies, price comparison websites, loan management systems, and community and mainstream finance to ensure these checks are provided to all their customers.
Ren Hooi, CEO of Lightning Reach, said:
“With over 8 million people estimated to be missing out on benefits, we are keen to help people seeking support through our portal access all the benefits they are entitled to. We’re also delighted to work with Inbest to enable multiple customer journey options for an embedded and seamless experience.”
Manu Peleteiro, CEO of Inbest, said:
“ The Lightning Reach portal is already one of the most popular features in our benefits calculator. Integrating Lightning’s grants engine into our benefits calculator will further increase our leading coverage of benefits and grants, and will also create a seamless signposting experience for customers.”
Scottish fintech Biscuit Tin partners with Age Partnership
Scottish fintech firm Biscuit Tin, is accelerating its growth with a new partnership with the UK’s leading equity release advisory firm, Age Partnership.
The start-up was launched by serial entrepreneur Sheila Hogan in 2020 with the mission to help people organise their life admin. This partnership means that Age Partnership will provide their customers with preferential access to the personalised secure digital vault.
With Biscuit Tin, Age Partnership’s customers will be able to securely store important information, such as account details, documents, wishes and memories all in one place. The solution will guide people on how to plan and what to record within the vault. Biscuit Tin also helps families and next of kins access the relevant information according to the wishes of the individual.
In the last 12 months Biscuit Tin has gone from strength to strength with partnerships and collaborations agreed with other organisations including Scottish Building Society. Biscuit Tin has won several awards and this year the business has been shortlisted for Rising Star, The Scottish Financial Technology Awards; Rising Star and Start-up Business of the Year, Business Women Scotland Awards; Business of the Year, Association of Scottish Businesswomen Awards, and Start-up Entrepreneur of the Year Award, the Great British Entrepreneur Awards.
In February 2022, Sheila appeared in BBC’s Dragon’s Den, significantly raising the profile of the business. Biscuit Tin has been recognised as one of the top twenty Scottish Tech Ecosystem potential growth businesses. Earlier in the year founder Sheila travelled to Silicon Valley with StartUp Grind, a trip that brought together Scotland’s top start-ups and scale ups with more than 3,000 of the world’s best.
Commenting on the new Age Partnership collaboration, Steve Auckland, CEO of Age Partnership said:
“From this month we are providing all our completed equity release customers with access to their own digital secure vault, where they can take control of the documents, memories and personal information that are shared with their loved ones after they pass away. Equity release as a product allows people to take control of their later life finances, it is about enriching people’s lives when they need it most; so, this partnership with Biscuit Tin has perfect synergy.”
Sheila Hogan, founder and CEO of Biscuit Tin said:
“I am delighted to be working with Age Partnership to provide their valued customers with a special opportunity to get organised and plan in advance with Biscuit Tin. Creating a structured digital legacy of our lives means we can feel safe in the knowledge that we are making a difference by taking much of the administrative stress and stain away from our loved ones in the future. Biscuit Tin enables everyone to securely organise all of their life information and create a digital biography of their life to leave as a legacy to hand down the generations.
“I’m delighted with the progress we’re making as a business to achieve our vision of making Biscuit Tin a global household brand in digital legacy within the next five years, in world where planning for end of life is the norm, and where we all have virtual biscuit tins containing our digital legacies to hand down the generations and we make a difference by making life easier at every stage.”
Glasgow based fintech AccessFintech secures $60 million in Series C funding
AccessFintech, the leading Glasgow and London based fintech evolving the capital markets operating model through data and workflow collaboration, recently announced the successful completion of its $60 million Series C funding round.
The funding comes at the heels of rapid growth for the firm. Synergy, AccessFintech’s data collaboration network for global financial institutions, has grown to include over 100 participants and expanded its asset class coverage to include derivatives and syndicated loans. It has also added to its securities offering by extending its lifecycle management through its new claims network and the launch of a ground-breaking predictive fails service.
AccessFintech has a growing presence in Scotland, employing 25 people since February 2020. The funding will help secure further growth in the office over the next period.
The Glasgow office is headed by Pardeep “Par” Cassells, Head of Securities and Claims Products. Par is responsible for opening and growing AccessFintech’s office in Glasgow, where she has purposefully built a diverse team which includes 50% women (compared to an industry average of 12-14%) and 17% people with BAME background. Recruitment encourages both new graduates and women returning to their careers after a prolonged absence.
Par serves as a board member of Fintech Scotland. She leads the organization’s next-generation outreach and has given numerous talks to schools and universities, participated in panels, and worked to promote fintech in Scotland.
On the funding news, Par said, “Our funding is fantastic for AccessFintech and its growth trajectory in Scotland. The funding round will fuel our next stage of growth. Our vision is that data is the catalyst for innovation and growth, and we believe AccessFintech plays a critical role as an essential provider of trusted data governance infrastructure.”
Zumo joins World Economic Forum Crypto Sustainability Coalition
Scottish fintech Zumo, has become the latest member of the World Economic Forum’s Crypto Sustainability Coalition.
This coalition will explore how blockchain solutions can be use to contribute to meaningful progress toward positive climate action. Zumo’s contribution will be around developing the guiding principles and toolkits for companies, regulators and start-ups to leverage the potential of blockchain to reach energy goals.
Particular areas of focus include:
- assessment of crypto sector energy usage
- examination of the potential of web3 technology to facilitate positive climate action
- investigation of the usage of blockchain-based carbon credits.
Nick Jones, Zumo CEO, commented:
“It’s extremely encouraging to see the level of coordinated activity that has emerged in this area since we started our own crypto decarbonisation journey.”
“As we all know, there’s a lot left to do and a long way to go; what we’re seeing, however, is the strands of this work in the crypto ESG space really coming together ”“ and, perhaps, the beginnings of a shift in the narrative and the ability to see this technology not just as a problem, but as a potential force multiplier for good.”
“Making sure crypto and blockchain more generally develops in a way that caters to the needs of people and the planet is critical to Zumo and what we’re doing. We’re delighted to be invited to participate in this worthy World Economic Forum initiative, and to continue to build and collaborate with our fellow actors in the space.”
Find out more about the Crypto Sustainability Coalition at weforum.org
Learn more about Zumo’s own industry-leading work to date at zumo.tech
Got Capital selects directID To Digitise SME Funding Process
Scottish fintech and global credit risk platform DirectID, have just announced a partnership with SME capital provider Got Capital.
From now on, SMEs applying for financing will be able to use the power of Open Banking within the application journey, letting agents at Got Capital quickly categorise and determine businesses’ true revenue without the need for PDF or paper bank statements. This new solution will allow for a much faster and accurate process, de-risking the financing whilst providing a better experience for SMEs.
Nicola Dunn, Business Development Manager, DirectID said:
“Small businesses are the backbone of any economy, they are continuously struggling to get access to affordable financing. Traditional lenders find it difficult to ensure fast and safe underwriting processes for SMEs. Existing and traditional credit reports lack sufficient credit history information such as bank account information or bank statement data. On the other hand, SMEs often cannot provide any collateral to mitigate this information gap and ensure financing.
This information gap can be filled by open banking data which is highly in demand in the market. DirectID are delighted to be the chosen open banking partner of Got Capital and we are very much and looking forward to working with Got Capital on a variety of use cases in the future.”
Mr. Alex Afek, Managing Director, Got Capital Officer said:
“We are very excited to get on board the DirectID platform. Got Capital is funding businesses across the UK and we require a very good e-banking coverage. It simplifies the process for our applicants and customers and reduces the time to funding decisioning. Got Capital’s Royalties based investment is a timely instrument and”¯is used by many different types of businesses when they need cash at hand yesterday.”
AutoRek to hire a further 30 positions
Scottish fintech Autorek, is growing its team to cope with an unprecedented level of demand for it financial control and regulatory reporting solutions. The company has already recruited 40 people in 2022 and is looking at filling 30 more positions across the U.K.
This rise in demand can be attributed to a need for more integrity and accountability across the financial services sector, leading to increased regulation, especially across the payments and asset management industries. The FCA’s new Consumer Duty, which was introduced on 27th July, is the most recent example of this market shift.
AutoRek’s CEO, Gordon McHarg comments:
“We currently have 140 employees, and we’re projecting this number to rise to 170 by the end of the year to keep up with the demand from clients and prospects. We’re extremely proud that the average tenure of employees is currently four years – more than double the sector norm for most fintechs, with almost 40% of these employees playing a huge part in the growth journey with four years or more as part of the AutoRek team.”
He continued,
“The demand for greater automation is at the centre of our need to continue hiring. Within the payments, asset management and insurance sectors, the increasingly complex regulatory landscape is forcing firms to automate to keep pace with their competitors and their own customers’ expectations. Therefore, we have a particular focus on hiring SMEs in each of our sectors, with a number of positions available in insurance. As we look to expand our services internationally and focus on growing software engineering, professional services and sales, we expect this growth to continue as the global business world embraces the benefits of automation.”
Encompass Wins Best KYC/KYB Innovation
Scotland-based fintech, Encompass Corporation, just announced that Aite-Novarica Group, a global advisory firm, has awarded them the winner of the 2022 Fraud & AML Impact Awards’ Best Know Your Customer/Business (KYC/KYB) Innovation.
The award recognises the fintech for its capacity to combine a huge number data sources, technology and expertise to deliver best in class corporate KYC due diligence with automation.
Alex Ford, President, North America at Encompass, said:
“By automating the KYC process, financial institutions can pursue aggressive growth agendas and scale while avoiding additional compliance costs. Our platform is used by banks across the globe to significantly improve the onboarding experience of their clients while also future-proofing technology and processes. We’re grateful to be recognized by Aite-Novarica Group for our innovative approach, which brings speed, accuracy and control.”
Encompass’ platform gives financial institutions access to real-time to global public and premium data sources, enabling:
- Search based on pre-defined policy using only bank-approved sources;
- Mapping of ultimate beneficial ownership and corporate hierarchy;
- Screening of entities for PEPs, sanctions and adverse media;
- Cross-checking documents, matching and merging data;
- And the automatic creation of a complete audit trail in real time.
Winners were selected by a global panel of experts on fraud and AML.
Encompass will be presented with the AML Impact Award at the fifth annual Financial Crime Forum, taking place from September 18-19 2022 in Charlotte, North Carolina, USA.
BR-DGE announces partnership with leading travel organisation, Travel Counsellors
Payment orchestration scale-up, BR-DGE, has announced a new merchant partnership with leading independent travel company, Travel Counsellors.
This partnership will provide the business with access to a multitude of payment providers and alternative payment methods, from Open Banking to eWallets, via BR-DGE’s market-leading orchestration platform, ensuring a streamlined booking experience for all global customers. This will enable Travel Counsellors to utilise BR-DGE’s dynamic rules engine to build a multi acquirer strategy across its global business operations.
Jacob Spencer, Head of Commercial at BR-DGE, said
“We are excited to be working with Travel Counsellors to revolutionise its payments infrastructure with considerable benefits for its customers and business.
We have seen that the sector is on track for a strong recovery; Travel Counsellors was well placed to bounce back and has had a tremendous last six months with record bookings in FY22 as sales levels reach 140% of FY19.
Our research has shown that over 8% of online transactions in the travel sector fail. As demand returns, with consumers expecting a seamless booking experience and merchants aiming to lift margins, payment orchestration is vital to boosting the sector’s resilience and increasing conversion rates.”
Travel Counsellors is a global travel business, turning over £700m per annum and serving over 600,000 customers worldwide by booking over 300,000 itineraries each year.
Mat Hanson, Chief Financial Officer at Travel Counsellors added
“Our core strategic focus of continued growth and delivering a personalised service to all of our customers remains unchanged. Working with BR-DGE is another example of how we’re continuing to enhance our customers’ experience though the use of new technology. Continuing to provide a seamless booking experience remains pivotal and especially at a time when many of our Travel Counsellors are so very busy.”