Fintech ShareIn launch new Payments Product To Address Gap In The Market
Edinburgh based fintech firm launched a new specialist payment product called ShareInPay for platforms holding ISA money.
ShareIn operate investment platforms for clients such as Triodos Bank, the Dutch Ethical Bank, Crowdlords, Residential Property investments and Energise Africa.
ShareIn has been an Innovative Finance ISA Manager since Dec 2016 and many of their investment platforms offer Innovative Finance ISA products.
CTO and Co-Founder, Andrew Pickett says. “We needed a solution for our platforms to hold Client Money that wasn’t e-money. We searched everywhere and couldn’t find an API driven Client Money solution. So we decided we needed to build this ourselves.”
ShareIn obtained the regulatory permission to hold Client Money from the Financial Conduct Authority earlier this year.
CEO, Cook said “To say holding Client Money is difficult is a little bit of an understatement. There are few things in the Financial Regulatory environment more important than holding other people’s money.”
The launch of ShareInPay marks the start of a modular software approach for ShareIn to enable investment business more generally. Modules that work together or separately with an existing platform.
For more information contact:
Jude Cook, ShareIn Ltd, +44 7956123405, jude@sharein.com
LendingCrowd crowned Best P2P Business Lender
Edinburgh-based fintech lending platform LendingCrowd has been crowned the UK’s Best P2P Business Lender at the first ever Growth Finance Awards, held in London.
LendingCrowd, which is the only SME lender of its kind headquartered in Scotland, was recognised for its “best-in-class digital platform, transparency, as well as ample resources for both borrowers and lenders”.
Founder and CEO Stuart Lunn said: “To be named Best P2P Business Lender is testament to the significant strides we have made since our launch in 2014. LendingCrowd exists to help alleviate the funding gap facing the UK’s vital community of SMEs, and we’re delighted to have received this recognition at the Growth Finance Awards.”
The award was presented to Stuart and LendingCrowd Chief Marketing Officer Darren Cairns by Simon Bonney, partner at category sponsor Quantuma.
The Growth Finance Awards, organised by Intelligent Partnership and hosted by television presenter Claudia Winkleman, were designed to highlight the role of the finance community in supporting the growth ambitions of SMEs across the UK. More than 300 guests attended the black-tie event, which took place on Wednesday 11 September at the Royal Lancaster Hotel in London.
Guy Tolhurst, Managing Director of Intelligent Partnership, said: “Just to be recognised as a finalist is a great achievement in itself, but to take home a prize is a truly impressive accolade. I look forward to next year’s event and continuing to educate growing businesses about the wide variety of financial options that are available to them.”
Since its launch in late 2014, LendingCrowd has facilitated more than 740 loans to SMEs across the UK with a total value of £65 million, with more than £15 million of lending in Scotland.
LendingCrowd has also been named as a finalist in the Impact and Investment category of the Scottish Financial Services Awards, organised by Scottish Financial Enterprise and sponsored by EY. The shortlisting is in recognition of the unique £18.75 million funding partnership that LendingCrowd has created with Scottish Investment Bank and Dutch entrepreneurial bank NIBC to fund the ambitions of SMEs across Scotland and the rest of the UK.
Autorek and the Automation Revolution
AutoRek have just announced that they had partnered with Worldwide Business Research (WBR) to generate an industry report. The report will be focusing the state of automation and data management within the financial services sector.
The survey includes feedback from 100 individuals within the operations, IT, business change, finance and data management business functions. They were asked how automation will affect the financial services industry in the next 5-10 years.
Key findings include:
- The majority of those interviewed are implementing blockchain, semantic data management, machine learning and automation
- Respondents think that AI is likely to impact product development and innovation the most.
- 46% of respondents are looking for new technologies to assist data governance.
Investing in the Automation Revolution’ will launch at Sibos London between 23rd”“ 26thSeptember.
Clearscore announced RomanAgora the User-centric IDV Blockchain Consortium in partnership with Ocyan
Clearscore is announcing the RomanAgora consortium – an Identity Verification (IDV) consortium and data marketplace.
End users will now be even more enabled to use services in a faster and more transparent manner – having more control over their data and when it is being shared. RomanAgora’s mission is to reduce the cost of checks, speed up processing and solve fraud while giving users control over their data.
Previously used applications involve heavy manual operations and multiple checks handling for the same individual. This costs a lot and requires a significant amount of time. Blockchain – a shared ledger of identity data between counterparties – solves this by allowing us to utilise a unique set of data multiple times without the need of identifying the individual continuously.
This partnership is disrupting the fintech space globally by allowing end users, credit bureaus and financial services providers to use a common platform for Identity Verification.
This is an overall greatly innovative platform due to the ability to now verify an individual’s identity a lot faster in a secure and traceable way utilising the latest blockchain technology as well as infrastructure. Blockchain technology and capabilities can play a big role in securing as well as accelerating financial applications.
Ocyan is proud to be the technology partner of choice for Clearscore focusing on cloud-native analytics and infrastructure for enterprise-ready Blockchain applications. By providing the complete End-to-End Cloud Platform for enterprise blockchains, large
organasations can easily innovate, scale and integrate their ventures with their rest of their legacy and cloud applications.
With the automation that Ocyan provides, partners of RomanAgora don’t have to bare the integration or infrastructure cost to join this consortium, making the required network effect of this collaboration much more interesting and less of an effort than anything else similar on the market.
This is a massive leap forward creating the first enterprise grade, scalable and production running consortium. An incredible achievement, one of the very few globally and perhaps the first IDV effort at such scale.
End users are now able to receive responses sooner, more efficiently and with the safety this technology provides as well as impactful innovation by Clearscore and Ocyan.
Gabriele Cacciola, the CTO of Ocyan commented:
“RomanAgora is a totally revolutionary platform that, thanks to the Blockchain features and capabilities, will allow end users to finally have their credit and identity profiles securely stored and get back control of their data.”
Money Dashboard raises £4.6m, the biggest fintech raise on Crowdcube this year
Money Dashboard‘s personal finance management platform that connects to over 70 financial institutions to help users manage all their accounts in one place has just raised £4.6m.
Additionally, existing investors Scottish Investment Bank and Calculus Capital also invested. The initial target was £1.5m, however that number was reached in just 45minutes.
Funds are to be used to build out the market leading personal finance app and triple the company’s Edinburgh-based team from 20 to 60 staff.
Luke Lang, co-founder of Crowdcube, commented:
“Money Dashboard’s vision to help people better manage their money has once again resonated with many of our investors. It’s fantastic to see an innovative business connect their community, fuel their growth and take those investors, in this case, on their journey to create a fairer financial landscape.”
Steve Tigar, CEO said:
“We’re absolutely thrilled to have secured this latest round of funding, particularly with the backing of over 3000 people who share our vision. We are now equipped and ready to help people from every walk of life master their money.”
Kerry Sharp, Director of Scottish Investment Bank said:
“Having supported Money Dashboard from an early stage, it is great to see the business raising the funds required to implement the next stage in its growth. The FinTech sector is a key industry in Scotland’s economy and we look forward to continuing to work with the company, both from an investment perspective and through our account management support, to deliver its long-term growth ambitions.”
Women’s Coin to launch during Scotland’s Fintech Festival
Blog by (Prof) Christine Bamford Founder and CEO Women’s Coin
Exciting news Women’s Coin is now trading!
Women’s Coin digital currency to launch in September at Edinburgh Fintech Festival and internationally at the United Nations, New York Decade of Womenon 18thSeptember
Women’s Coin operates via Bitcoin blockchain platform, using the Counterparty protocol. Blockchain is the power behind behind digital currency enabling storage of digital assets and smart contracts. Women’s Coin is Money Laundering compliant, KYC (know your customer) and ensures total transparency in its financial conduct. In partnership with Zortrex data security company – Women’s Coin intends to secure investments through military grade data security.
Women’s Coin is not just a digital currency it is a coin of value ”“ transferring profits from the currency into humanitarian support. The profit for purpose ethos sets out to build a better world through micro-financing women owned sustainable businesses. Women’s Coin supports United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal 5 ”“ Gender equality
Women’s Coin is not just for women ”“ men are also critical to the movement (He for She)
Together we can use the power of the wallet to deliver social change
If you want to learn more about Women’s Coin’s amazing vision and product, (Prof) Christine Bamford is speaking at:
- International Cyber Security Summit – 4thSeptember Edinburgh Napier University
- United Nations, New York ”“ Decade of Women – 18thSeptember
- Meeting of Coin Networking Event ”“ Virgin Money Lounge – 25thSeptember
- Fintech Summit ”“ DIGIT – 26thSeptember
womenscoin.com
@womenscoin#MorePowerToHer #Fintechscotland @KateForbes
Interview with Revolut – Challenger bank set to disrupt business banking
We spoke with James Gibson, Senior Product Owner at Revolut to speak about how the company is looking at disrupting the business banking sector.
We hear a lot about disruption in banking but that’s very often for consumers, do you expect the same happening to Business Banking?
Consumer experience has always been at the centre of disruption and as long as there are innovations or improvements that can be made to that in any industry – they will continue to be disrupted. Business banking is no different. Rubbish exchange rates, hidden fees and lengthy on-boarding times are issues we’ve already been able to solve and now we’re working on delivering innovative solutions to our business customers.
How would you rate the state of business banking at the moment in terms of experience and offering?
Products and services can always be better. What we can comment on is the surge of start-ups in the space – that just means there’s so much work to be done. Everyone is working to solve fundamental problems and deliver the basic solutions but soon we’ll see start-ups experiment with niche features and thats what will be exciting to watch.
How do you hope to change this at Revolut?
We’ve already impacted thousands of businesses across Europe by helping them with massive savings on exchange rates and avoiding any hidden or confusing fees. We’re now looking at building a one stop shop so that businesses can do almost everything in one place. For example, expense management with even more accounting tools to add to Xero and FreeAgent and even looking into launching acquiring in the near future.
Are there other examples around the world of companies who got it right according to you?
There are a lot of start-ups around the world disrupting industries and changing the way businesses and consumers think about product experiences. Companies like Uber, AirBnB, Apple have customer experience at the core of what they do and that’s a philosophy that we share as well. Of course, it is difficult to pin-point any companies that are doing everything perfectly which is great because it shows that even these established companies recognise the importance of continued progression and disrupting their own processes.
What does the future look like for business banking?
Bright and with lots of Revolut cards! Our vision remains similar to the quest we embarked on 4 years ago: ease of use for clients, automated processes where possible, fair and transparent pricing and technological developments that directly impact the finances of any business in any industry. We’ve done well on all of these points so far but we have much more to do!
What’s the next functionality you’re exciting about pushing to the market?
We’re super excited about the work that we’re doing around acquiring and we’re hopefully going to make some major announcements in the next year. We also listen closely to the feedback of our existing 100k+ businesses clients and it’s clear that UI and even more control over company spending are key topics so we will have some exciting updates on this area soon!
LendingCrowd and Brismo to enter partnership
Scottish fintech LendingCrowd, has just announced a partnership with Brismo to provide detailed and independently verified investment performance metrics.
Brismo provides lending performance data using sophisticated loan information to analyse and verify returns. Investors are able to access like-for-like analysis. This is a fantastic addition to the LendingCrowd platform which will allow investors to compare the performance of the LendingCrowd loan book alongside other fintech lending platforms.
Commenting on the partnership, Mike Allan, Director of Operations, LendingCrowd, said: “We are proud of our track record and believe in enabling transparency so that investors can compare performance across the lending sector. LendingCrowd has made great strides in scaling the business while remaining committed to robust credit processes and responsible lending.”
Rupert Taylor, founder and CEO, Brismo, added: “We are delighted that LendingCrowd is the latest leading platform to join Brismo and we look forward to helping illustrate the company’s impressive track record to investors. LendingCrowd is scaling its operations and diversifying its funding base at an impressive rate, so we are confident that this new partnership is a win-win for all parties.”
Brismo’s platform provides detailed loan book analysis, including loan origination figures, risk bands of borrowers, term and interest rate of outstanding principle and independently verified data on the arrears and default rate. Brismo data on LendingCrowd can be segmented and downloaded easily by investors.
Scottish fintech Sustainably launches a new way giving
Sustainably is launching today at the Fundraising Convention in London.
The company offers a new way of giving to charities they care about without having to think about it, just by living their lives.
Sustainably is rounding up its users’ cashless transactions. The spare change is donating to the causes they care about, aligned to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. In an increasingly cashless society, it will unlock a new income stream for charities and enable supporters to see the difference they’re making instantly.
Inspired by Tom’s Shoes, Pokemon Go and Acorns Investing, Sustainably won the WeWork Creator Awards and is a top 10 Virgin Startup, with both global brands set to help Sustainably’s growth.
Speaking of Sustainably, Richard Branson said: “Sustainably is so simple, but effective, which most of the good ideas are. I loved the simple idea of rounding up everyday transactions and giving your spare change to chosen good causes. Sustainably is a great example of why I wanted to start Virgin StartUp in the first place – I knew there were entrepreneurs with good ideas who just needed a little support who could go on to achieve incredible things and have a positive impact on the world.”
Sustainably launches connected to 10 local and national charities, including British Heart Foundation, and will be adding new charities daily when it officially launches on 1 July.
Speaking of Sustainably, Simon Gillespie, CEO of British Heart Foundation said: “At the BHF, we’re continuously innovating to ensure our supporters have opportunities to donate to us in ways that fit in with their busy everyday lives. Innovation and the use of technology has been core to many of the breakthroughs we’ve made to improve treatments for heart and circulatory diseases, and we need to take this same cutting-edge approach to raising funds and building relationships with our supporters.
“Our partnership with Sustainably is a fantastic example of this approach in action. It will make supporting our research possible in the swipe of a finger as part of millions of transactions ”“ something that’s completely new. While the individual amounts might not seem like much, many small donations could add up to big breakthroughs in finding new treatments for conditions including heart disease, stroke and vascular dementia. We’re excited to see what this new way of fundraising has in store.”
Loral Quinn, co-founder and CEO of Sustainably explains: “We’re excited to launch our technology that makes doing good something you can do easily, everyday.”
Sustainably links to people’s bank card rounding up on their behalf. It’s also very easy easy to see impact of donations thanks to a new form of impact messaging between charities and supporters to help inspire engagement and trust, by providing an instant impact update.
The team at Sustainably is 8 staff strong with plan to grow in the next year as they target business donations.
The charity donations market is estimated at more than £12 billion in the UK per year.
Founded by mother and daughter team, Loral and Eishel Quinn, Loral, CEO, was head of digital marketing and strategy for Aberdeen Asset Management, where she set up the global digital team and helped scale the business from 6 to 30 countries in 10 years. Eishel, Chief Product Officer, has a background in ethical retail, working with Neal’s Yard Remedies. Eishel was recently named one of Digital Leaders top 10 Young Digital Leaders.
Fintech Origo launches new transfer tracking service
Transfer Tracking, a new service from Fintech Origo, has already saved one firm 60% of its calls to financial services providers, says Anthony Rafferty, MD of Edinburgh-based company
Origo was established 30 years ago this year by a number of pensions and life insurance companies to help the financial services industry to make best use of technology to become more efficient and cost effective and thereby improve outcomes for people using the industry’s services.
Over the years, through the technology we have built, the standards we have introduced, and working collaboratively with industry participants, we have helped financial services to significantly improve its systems, processes and procedures, to the benefit of both the industry and consumers.
One significant achievement was the introduction of our Transfer Service, which was instrumental in reducing the time taken to transfer someone’s pension from over 50 workingdays to c.11 calendardays. Over 120 financial services brands now use the Transfer Service for its operational efficiencies.
One of our most recent builds is the Origo Integration Hub. This technology enables financial services companies working in the financial advice space to connect easily and efficiently with one another through a central hub rather than undertake costly and time-consuming single integrations with each individual firm with which they want to do business.
The Hub enables a number of services to be automated between provider platforms and software and digital tool suppliers. For example, it supports the setting up of new accounts, secure delivery of portfolio valuations from providers to financial advisers and the tracking of asset transfers, such as pensions.
Origo recently worked with Legal and General to adapt the Hub’s Transfer Tracking capability into a bespoke service for the company, called Track My Apps’. This enables real-time, online tracking of pension transfer applications to Legal and General. Origo’s Transfer Service supplies the data to the Integration Hub and the extracted tracking data is integrated straight to the company requesting the data via an API.
60% reduction in follow up calls
Specialist retirement firm Retirement Line says using the Track My Apps’ transfer tracking service has seen its administration team cut the number of calls it has to make following up on customer applications by 60%.
Commenting on the application of Track My Apps by Retirement Line, Mark Ormston, IT and Administration Manager at the company, said that digital responses had literally removed hours of phone calls previously required to provide updates to advisers and their customers on cases, thereby improving both the firm’s own efficiencies as well as streamlining and improving the service to customers.
He said: “Thanks to Transfer Tracking we’ve already reduced the phone calls we make by 60%. If all platforms committed to using this service we would save around 90% of the time we spend making phone calls ”“ imagine what that would mean for our industry, and importantly, the customer.”
Jon Scannell, Distribution Director, Retirement Income at Legal and General also commented. He said: “Through Track My Apps’ Legal & General provides transfer tracking as part of our digital suite to enable [financial] advisers’ access to real-time information on their applications, saving all parties significant time and money. Crucially, Track My Apps’ has enhanced Legal & General’s customer-centric proposition, helping to keep the adviser and their client informed of progress.”
The Integration Hub is the result of considerable consultation and collaboration with the industry. It is increasing in traction in the market with 15 providers, platforms, digital tools and practice management systems now signed-up ”“ including big names in financial services like Legal and General, Standard Life, Prudential and LV= ”“ with many more in the pipeline. Once a company is on the Hub, linking to partnering systems is simple and easy ”“ Legal and General, for example, were able to implement Transfer Tracking in a matter of just six steps.
This is the kind of achievement that has enabled Origo to grow our services and our team to c. 70 people, working primarily from our offices on Edinburgh Park, and in the past six months, to have seen visits from two of Scotland’s Ministers ”“ Ivan McKee, Minister for Trade, Investment and Innovation and Kate Forbes, Minister for Public Finance and Digital Economy ”“ to see what we do and to talk about the future of Fintech in Scotland.