Terminal V goes cashless with Event Genius Pay
Terminal V, Scotland’s largest electronic music event brand, has joined an ever-growing list and decided to go cashless with Event Genius.
All five of the brand’s UK events are going cashless with Event Genius – this includes four 5000 capacity summer events featuring the most popular names in techno, like Patrick Topping, Floorplan, Adam Beyer and Ben Klock.
Even after the festival taking place in summer, the flagship Terminal V Halloween festival will deploy egPay cashless technology over its two days run on the 30th-31st, with 40,000 fans attending.
Prior to the events, ticket holders can create an online account to pre-purchase credits as a way of replacing cash across the festival sites so that when it comes to attending the festival, the credits are loaded onto an RFID enabled wristband that can be received in exchange for their ticket. With a quick tap, they can use this system to pay for food, drink and more.
What happens when they run out of credits? Fans can top-up credits on-site whenever they run low, and can even reclaim any unspent credits once the event is finished.
Not only will this payment method reduce fan to staff contact points, making it safer, but it will speed up transactions by up to 80%.
Speaking about the partnership, Reshad Hossenally, Event Genius Founder and Festicket CSO commented: “egPay offers a win-win scenario for Terminal V’s fans and organisers. Without having to worry about carrying money or wasting time waiting in line to be served, Terminal V attendees can enjoy more of the events while the Terminal V team can expect a reduction in cash handling, fan to staff contact points and potential virus transmission, as well as a significant boost to their revenues.”
“This will also be our first egPay roll out in Scotland, so we’re extra excited to meet the team, get onsite and help deliver some great events.”
Survey – FinTech Scotland Research & Innovation roadmap
Whitecap Consulting is supporting FinTech Scotland in the development of a ten-year research and innovation roadmap to support the growth of Scotland’s digital economy and the wider development of FinTech innovation across the UK.
This roadmap will build on the work of FinTech Scotland to date, and inform priority focus research themes and the unmet needs of consumers, businesses and society.
This survey will help us identify appropriate opportunities for cross-sector enablement of FinTech innovations to achieve the UK’s overall industrial strategy.
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Thank you for your participation. Any answers you give in this online survey may be attributed to individuals or organisations within the report, however only with your prior approval.
NFP Partners with Fintech Firm Legado
Two fintechs, NFP and Legado, have partnered to digitise the life planning process for NFP clients.
A market leader in corporate benefits, wealth management and commercial insurance, NFP has forged this partnership with Legado, a fintech dedicated to helping consumers prepare for key life moments, as its suite of tools enables the organisation, storage and sharing of personal data with those who choose. Not only this but it is presented and communicated in such a way that makes it easily understandable to the client, enabling them to maintain complete control over everything. Legado’s platform is GDPR-compliant, with consumers safe in the knowledge that their documents are safe and easy to find.
Announced today, the partnership enables NFP clients to use Legado’s life-planning platform, giving them instant access to statements and information, storing them in a secure location – no hassle or fuss.
Richard Basford, Managing Director for NFP Wealth Management, said: “Client engagement and intergenerational planning are emerging as two of the most important considerations in the financial advice sector. Our clients expect us to provide them with more than just financial advice, with an increasing number coming to us about other areas of life planning. We had already been looking to digitise areas of our client experience, with a focus on solutions that would let us work closely with our clients in a secure and simple manner, and that does not add complexity to what can already be highly complex situations.
“When we saw Legado, we knew it was the right solution for our business. Not only does it provide a secure way to exchange key documents, but it provides a relevant and engaging service to help our clients plan for the future and key life events. We hope that by providing this service our clients will recognise the additional value we are providing to them to ensure they are prepared for the future.”
Josif Grace, CEO of Legado, said: “NFP is a great example of a company that is not only looking to digitise their client experience, but modernise and personalise it. By utilising the Legado platform, NFP is creating new opportunities on which they can engage clients, and their families, at key life moments. With Legado’s combination of insight, personal planning tools and technology, clients have a truly holistic view of how prepared they are for the future, while smart, actionable nudges can help people make small changes that can make a big long-term difference. We are delighted to be working with NFP to put them at the forefront of innovation in this space.”
NFP’s Basford added: “Legado gives NFP clients full control over the entire experience, and so puts NFP and its advisers at the forefront of both client experience and safety. This will be the industry standard in a year or two, and we are excited to be leading the way in showing how all professional services businesses will be working in the future.”
The Legado planning API will enable NFP to quickly and easily NFP to integrate the platform into their existing technology estate, and the pilot will initially give NFP’s advisers and clients full access to a co-branded version of Legado’s life planning platform.
“NFP is a leading insurance broker and consultant providing specialised commercial insurance, in-country and global employee benefits, and individual solutions through its licensed subsidiaries and affiliates. NFP enables client success through the expertise of more than 6,000 employees in the UK, Ireland and across the globe. Our professionals support diverse client needs through investments in innovative technologies and enduring relationships with highly rated insurers, vendors and financial institutions. NFP is the 5th largest benefits broker by global revenue (Business Insurance), 10th largest property and casualty agency (Insurance Journal) and 12th largest global insurance broker (Best’s Review).
Visit nfp.co.uk to discover how NFP empowers clients to meet their goals.”
Polydigi Tech selected as UK’s Most Innovative Cyber Security SME
Polydigi Tech, the Edinburgh based cybersecurity startup, was selected along with 14 other SMEs as the UK’s Most Innovative Cyber Security SME in the sixth competition held by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS) in collaboration with Inforsecurity Europe.
Polydigi Tech is the only Scottish company among the winners. After ranking 12th in BusinessCloud’s Scotland Tech 50 for 2020, Polydigi Tech is now ready for the UK market.
This year’s record number of applicants were judged by three industry experts: Innovate UK’s Deputy Challenge Director Agata Samojlowicz CISSP, Global Transatlantic CEO Andy Williams, and Infosecurity Magazine Editorial Editor, Eleanor Dalloway.
Polydigi Tech is being offered the chance to exhibit at the DCMS Innovation Zone during Infosecurity Europe 2021 on July 13th-15th in Olympia, London. This opportunity will allow Polydigi Tech to demonstrate its world-class innovation identity authentication solution for EU market expansion.
Paysend Sets Sights on Global Expansion
Paysend, the international payments platform, has announced a $125m Series B funding round, which will help contribute to funding its global expansion plans.
“This $125m B Round investment will allow us to take our platform to the next stage, innovating and expanding geographically to target the $133tn opportunity in cross-border payment flows,” Ronnie Millar, CEO of Paysend said.
“Paysend’s vision is to develop the next generation integrated global payment ecosystem for consumers and SMEs. Our innovative technology is connecting 12bn cards worldwide to pay and send instantly anywhere, anyhow and any currency ”“ we call this Money for the Future.”
Led by One Peak, the funding round had additional input from Infravia Growth Capital, Hermes GPE Innovation Fund and existing Silicon Valley-based investor Plug and Play.
“There remain significant barriers to entry for consumers and SMEs to pay and send money globally; our platform aims to democratise the service by providing a one-stop-shop to pay and send money to families, suppliers, employees and partners in any currency anywhere in the world at a significantly reduced cost,” Millar went on.
It’s Paysend’s global network of banks, international and local payment systems that allows its customers to send money online from any location in any currency.
“We are excited by Paysend’s enormous growth potential in a massive market, benefiting from a rapid acceleration in the adoption of digital payments,” Humbert de Liedekerke, Managing Partner at One Peak, added.
“In particular, we are seeing strong opportunities as Paysend moves beyond consumers to serve business customers and expands its international footprint to address a growing need for fast, easy and low-cost cross border digital payments.”
In the past four years, the payments fintech has grown to more than 3.7 million consumers across 60 countries.
AutoRek nominated for duo of awards
AutoRek, the leading software provider to global financial service firms, has been shortlisted for the Best CASS Solution’ and Best Wealth Management Solution’ categories at the Systems in the City Financial Technology Awards 2021.
This isn’t the first time AutoRek has won the Best CASS Solution award, after winning the title last year – the first time the award ceremony has been held virtually in its 18-year history.
Lyn Canavan, Head of Marketing at AutoRek, commented, “We are delighted to be recognised again as a provider of the Best CASS Solution’, and also in the Best Wealth Management Solution’ category by the Systems in the City Financial Technology Awards judging panel ”“ this is testimony to the team’s continued hard work in consistently striving to offer superior solutions.”
Goodacre, a specialist business and technology consultancy, organised the awards as an endorsement for suppliers of systems and services to the regulated financial services sector, with three independent judges overseeing the selection prciess.
The Awards provide an important point of reference for user firms assessing the suitability of their operational infrastructure
Crypto Wallet and Zumo Launches B2B Offering
Zumo, the crypto wallet and payments Fintech, has announced its Zumokit; crypto as a service platform.
This new B2B product targets Fintechs and other financial institutions that aim to compliantly offer cryptocurrencies to meet the demand of customers to access digital assets.
ZumoKit is a blockchain agnostic, thus enabling companies to connect to any blockchain by adopting any cryptocurrency or using their own stablecoin. This provides businesses to integrate a digital currency, allowing their customers to buy and sell digital currencies as an investment.
Commercial Director at Zumo, Eddie Robb, states that this gives businesses the tools necessary to build cryptocurrency solutions into their platforms, saving them thousands of hours of work.
“We’re working with a number of savings, remittance, and share trading apps to allow them to offer crypto to their customers. ZumoKit is a ready-to-roll solution for fintech companies and other financial institutions that want to bring the benefits of crypto to their customers. It’s a plug and play product that makes it easy to get going with crypto in a safe, secure and compliant way.”
Robb added that such a solution can be beneficial to companies, as it allows them to provide customers with the ability to trade crytocurrencies whilst also shielding the wider business from the ups and downs of the markets.
Founded in Edinburgh in 2018 by Nick Jones and Paul Roach, Zumo is available for download on both iOS and Android app stores.
Tindeco: One of the top 100 WealthTechs
For the second year in a row, Tindeco has been announced as one of the world’s 100 most innovative WealthTech companies. Tindeco VISION enables investment managers to efficiently provide customised investment solutions through the execution of highly scalable operating models.
Their featured article teaches you how they can help when it comes to implementing your investment process, as well as providing you with customised solutions just for your clients.
Fintech Innovation Roadmap to drive a digital enabled net zero economic recovery
FinTech Scotland is developing a ten-year business-led research and innovation roadmap which will support the growth of Scotland’s digital economy and development of fintech innovation across the UK.
This implements one of the recommendations highlighted in the recent Kalifa FinTech Sector Review which referenced Scotland as the second largest fintech cluster in the UK and the opportunity to build on this position through strategic research and innovation.
The roadmap will advance the FinTech Scotland Cluster in a number of ways, including
- Develop priority innovation themes such as financial inclusion, net zero and well-being
- Align research strengths and capabilities with innovation priorities and drive efficiencies
- Enhance Scotland’s national and global reputation for fintech innovation
- Shape innovation challenges and influence future Government Innovation strategies
The roadmap is being developed in collaboration with the Global Open Finance Centre of Excellence (GOFCoE) and together they have appointed Whitecap Consulting to progress the initiative. The work builds on the FinTech Scotland “Research and Innovation for UK FinTech” report published in January 2021 as well as the academic-led research and innovation roadmap recently developed by the Edinburgh Futures Institute at the University of Edinburgh in collaboration with regional Universities.
Nicola Anderson chief executive of FinTech Scotland said
“The roadmap will further advance and grow Scotland’s fintech Cluster and it will bring insight and specific focus to accelerate fintech Innovation. Working with Whitecap consulting and across the Cluster we will identify a suite of progressive actions that will enable positive economic outcomes”.
Kevin Collins, chief executive of the Global Open Finance Centre of Excellence said
“We’re delighted to be working with FinTech Scotland and Whitecap Consulting on this roadmap and is essential to ensuring we prioritise the needs of financial and fintech businesses, including key skills gaps as well as provide an opportunity to align businesses and academics effectively.”
Richard Coates, Managing Director of Whitecap Consulting, says:
“We are thrilled to have the opportunity to work alongside FinTech Scotland and the GOFCoE team on this interesting project. The development of FinTech Scotland’s Research & Innovation roadmap calls for us to utilise a combination of our core strength in strategy and planning, our extensive work across the UK’s regional FinTech ecosystems, and our experience working with and connecting key stakeholders across public, private and higher education organisations.”
MBN Launches Data Science Podcast, AI Right?
MBN Solutions has today launched a new data science podcast. AI Right? is a monthly podcast exploring industry news and how this impacts data scientists.
Kris McFadyen, MBN’s Associate Director, Andy McMahon and Megan Stamper, data science experts, will be hosting the podcast with the ambition to make data science more accessible.
“With AI Right? we hope to create a show that’s easily accessible to anyone that wants to join the data science industry, while still informing industry veterans,” says McFadyen. “The industry expertise of Andy and Megan brings an extra layer to the show ”“ they’re on the frontlines and know the impacts and benefits of the topics we discuss.”
With its first episode premiering in April, the show’s roundtable format aims to be the first of its kind within the UK by bringing together both recruitment and industry expertise to aid data scientists (and anyone with interest in careers within the space) with engaging more easily within the field.
“We have an opportunity here to bring data science insight and expertise not just to industry veterans but to Scotland as a whole,” says Stamper, who has a PhD in oceanographic fluid mechanics and works as Principal Data Scientist on recommendation engines and conversational AI in media.
“Data science is thriving in Scotland,” Stamper continues, “and it has an opportunity to become a leading industry that helps put Scotland on the map as a technology and science driven nation.”
Co-host Andy McMahon, a machine learning engineer with a PhD in condensed matter physics, states that the trio wants to make the podcast as accessible as possible, to as many people as possible despite the nature and complexity of data science.
“The three of us know how complicated data science can be and with AI Right? we really focus on giving people information and commentary that’s relevant and easy to understand. We’re confident that the podcast will be as useful for chief data scientists as it will be for students and hobbyists, because the information is relevant to the whole industry, but given in a way that makes it accessible.”
Agreeing with Andy, McFadyen adds that he hopes that AI Right? will act as an encouragement for more people to join the field.
“At MBN we’re closer to the market than perhaps anyone else and what we see is a huge data science skills shortage. The industry is full of incredible people doing some extraordinary work but unless we can help and encourage more talent into the industry, Scotland is going to struggle. MBN’s MSc Placement Programme, in partnership with the Data Lab, and AI Right? are just two parts of making the industry more accessible.”
The first episode of AI Right? is available now on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts and all other major podcast platforms. You can also watch episodes of AI Right? on the MBN Solutions website.