Fortnightly FinTech Fuse ”“ 100 Days and Counting”¦
Well, that’s nearly one hundred days in the role heading up FinTech Scotland since the start of the year.
Infact, it is a bit more than one hundred if you include the weekend days that have been necessary to keep on top of the high level of engagement email and social media traffic!
This first four months can best be summed up as being positively inspiring and diverse and the last fourteen days have continued along these lines with a broad range of engagements focused on taking forward Scotland’s fintech opportunities.
Innovation Days
Our roundtable meeting in Fife with the local fintech community on Tuesday was a great example of how the innovation heritage in Scotland provides a valuable foundation for future fintech developments.
It was an insightful and engaging session for Mickael and myself in the Glenrothes Enterprise Hub with a good part of the discussion focused on the need to improve skills and talent development in the sector if we are to embrace the payment fintech opportunities ahead.
A big thank you to Iain Shirlaw for his fantastic leadership and energy in making the event happen and it was great to session from the Glenrothes local Ian Cunningham on the brilliant LendingCrowd business.
The previous day it was an opportunity to catch up with Professor Chris Speed and the Edinburgh College of Arts team on how we could work together to help the sector innovate and reimagine a new financial services world. So much potential around using data to drive innovation with a strong social purpose.
Embracing the open banking opportunity is one example of this and I am very excited about our emerging plans for the Centre of Excellence we’ve been developing with Ross Laurie and Gavin Littlejohn. Scotland’s innovative fintech firms are very much embracing this and looking forward to sharing more on this strategy at the Meet Up in a couple of weeks.
Strategic Days
Wednesday was my opportunity to share the open banking and the broader FinTech Scotland strategic plans with the quarterly Financial Services Advisory Board jointly chaired by Scotland’s First Minister and Jim Pettigrew, the chair of SFE and CYBG.
As we reach 100 days since launch, this meeting was an important milestone for FinTech Scotland in sharing the two year strategic plans with Government Ministers and senior figures from across financial services sector.
I came away hugely encouraged by the enthusiastic and collaborative support from all in attendance at the Board, especially for the confirmation of the inaugural chair and strategic partners for FinTech Scotland (See here for more)
There was certainly a commitment to making fintech a major success in Scotland and achieving a top five global status with a focus on data driven innovation combined with strong social purpose and outcomes.
This valuable Scottish Government and industry support was also mirrored in conversations during this last fortnight with very insightful Councilor Lezley Cameron as well as Paul Lawrence at Edinburgh City Council.
Hearing the exciting strategic plans for the City along with the ambition of the University of Edinburgh from Hugh Edmiston and Gordon Donald further demonstrated to me the opportunity for fintech to contribute to a broader thriving economy.
It further highlighted to me that the joint team efforts of the public sector, academia and private sector can really make a difference in making a strategy come alive for all to benefit and a shared focus on inclusive growth initiatives.
Collaboration Days
Of course, this requires everybody being focused on how we improve collaboration, and, in this respect, it was great to host the team from Blenheim Chalcott on how we could work together to create the right innovation environments for fintechs to scale and grow.
Very much looking forward to taking forward the ideas and initiatives that Mark Sanders and the team have to help exciting businesses such as Myles Stephenson’s Modulr continue to expand in Scotland.
This reinforces that collaboration needs to go beyond the financial services sector itself and it was great to catch up last week with Liz McAreavey, Chief Executive at the Edinburgh Chambers of Commerce.
Looking forward to further working with Liz on bringing alive the data driven innovation opportunities across the region through fintech with a diverse range of participants.
During this first one hundred days of FinTech Scotland, the collaborative support from the Scottish Enterprise and Scottish Development International teams has been immensely valuable.
I’ve very much appreciated the ongoing day to day collaboration from Sharon Hamilton, Graeme Rennsion and wider SE team as we consider the practical steps to improve fintech opportunities, for example, by making the network of services more integrated and creating good physical environments for collaboration.
Days talking about collaboration also require a global perspective and so it was wonderful to meet up with David Clarke to talk through the exciting Scottish-Irish Finance Initiative event in June.
Certainly looking forward to this and discussing how it will reinforce the mutual opportunities across the Irish Sea collaboration bridge for fintechs and the wider economy.
People Days
Of course, collaboration is all about people and an exciting part of the role is meeting a diversity of people all with a common bond of wanting to make fintech a success in Scotland and on the global stage.
For example, my regular catch up last Friday with the inspiring David Ferguson, chief executive of Nucleus Financial was as valuable as ever from which I gain a great deal from.
I am absolutely delighted that David has agreed to become the inaugural chair of Fintech Scotland and very much looking forward to his ongoing wide counsel and strategic insights as we execute out plans. See Here for more details
Earlier in the week I had the opportunity to see another of my role models, Judy Wagner of FWB Park Brown who is always so focused on making a difference through inclusive people engagement.
It was really wonderful to see Judy again along with hearing from Susan Murphy, Maeve Gillies and Jacqui Gale to discuss our sessions for the Emerging Women Leader Programme at the University of Edinburgh in June.
This focus on people development was also top of the conversation last week when seeing Maggie Morrison of CGI to share thoughts on initiatives to embrace the breadth and diversity of people skills across Scotland
A point which was also top of mind when talking with Eva Schueckel on my involvement with the Fintech Fellowship programme sponsored by Spotcap, such a critically important initiative in supporting young people in the fintech sector.
The people focus was also very topical at the iMultiply event on the role of humans with artificial intelligence last Thursday.
Very much enjoyed sharing the platform with the innovative Colin Hewitt of Float, the dynamic Melinda Matthews of CodeClan, all expertly hosted by Kirsty Mackenzie and Heather Corcoran. Great engagement from the audience and I think we could have carried on all night!
Running Days
I must admit I’m trying to avoid days that turn into late nights at moment as my running days intensify leading up to the Edinburgh marathon at the end of the May.
Before then, this weekend it is a warm up half marathon race at beautiful Loch Leven to test how much speed I have in my legs at the moment
This means another short trip to the Kingdom of Fife, a lovely place to run and, of course, the original home where fintech all started forty years ago as Bill Tennant from the excellent fintech firm Payment Centric rightly pointed out on Tuesday at the Glenrothes Enterprise roundtable.
Until next time.
Fortnightly FinTech Fuse ”“ Purpose Driven FinTech
One thing that has really struck me since taking on the role at the start of the year to lead FinTech Scotland is the real sense of purpose behind the vibrant fintech innovation activity in Scotland
A purpose that goes beyond being commercially successful and creating job opportunities in Scotland but is driven by bigger overarching drive to improve people’s experience of financial services.
A brilliant example of this more significant motivating purpose was very much in evident when I met with the inspiring Phil Grady and the excellent team at Castlight Financial last week in Glasgow.
I was very much struck by Phil’s bold purpose of a “safer financial world for all’ and how this had a powerful meaning for the team members. It is no wonder Castlight Financial is successfully attracting attention in the financial world in Scotland and globally with its bigger purpose.
The same is true of Previse and my meeting with David Brown this week once again reinforced to me how their ambitious purpose of transforming trade finance to improve the well being of small enterprises is so important to all of us.
Collective Purpose
This purpose driven fintech becomes even more powerful when the collective forces of our ecosystem come together in Scotland to make a difference.
This was very much the case on Monday evening at the inaugural Open Banking Centre of Excellence meet up hosted at The ID.Co in Edinburgh with over 80 people from across the ecosystem. Listening to the stories of Colin Hewitt of Float, James Varga of The ID Co, Steve Tigar of Money Dashboard, Manu Peleteiro of InBest and Phil of Castlight showed to me we have the collective purpose in Scotland to make a progressive difference.
Especially when we have globally recognised leaders in the inspiring Gavin Littlejohn and Brian Costello of Yodlee championing how open banking fintech can make a positive contribution to citizens across the land.
Big thanks to Ross Laurie for making this inaugural meeting happen and be something we can build on going forward, more to follow soon.
Thank you also to Mickael, who stepped in for me to share Scotland’s existing fintech activity with the London community along with Paul Christensen of Previse, Kirsten Bennie of RBS and Graham Hatton of Scottish Development International last week. Great feedback on this.
A fabulous example of collaboration around a common purpose in action.
This was also the case at the SFE FinTech Group meeting a couple of weeks ago, thank you to Graeme Jones for the continuing valuable support in getting behind the collective purpose of Fintech Scotland.
Collaborative Purpose
Attending the Can Do Business Innovation Forum chaired by Government Minister Paul Wheelhouse on Tuesday was another example of the power of collective purpose through collaboration. Representatives from all sectors of the economy sharing how innovation can really drive inclusive growth and deliver positive outcomes for people and enterprises. I was particularly inspired when talking to entrepreneur Reemah Shanab and learning about her business Lucidly.
The Can Do meeting reiterated to me the benefits of cross sector collaboration to drive innovation and growth and this was further demonstrated when I met up with Alexander Holt to hear how CivTech is making such a huge difference in the public sector.
I’m sure Alexander won’t mind me saying but for me he is very much role model in driving real practical change with a strong sense of purpose. Alexander and his team have already been working with fintechs such as Wallet Services and there is much we can build on especially in the area of payments. Talking with Colin, Director of Digital at the Scottish Government further showed me we have a huge common purpose around this.
The broader collaborative purpose was very much in evident in my discussions with Maggie Craig at the FCA this last few weeks which is really valuable as the fintech ecosystem develops in Scotland
On Thursday, there was the opportunity to get together with Scotland’s many exciting fintechs enterprises from across the ecosystem at the Practitioners Forum.
The key areas of discussion were growing talent in Scotland and getting the right quality of investment in place and committed investors on board to help scale and grow. Terrific insights (again) from Stuart Lunn of LendingCrowd
My conversation with the impressive Steven Morris of ESM Investments this week was really insightful on how we could take some steps to address some of the funding issues in the fintech ecosystem at the moment.I am hoping to take forward a couple of ideas and they will certainly be forming a key part of the FinTech Scotland strategic plan and will be key if we are to achieve our ambitious goals for fintech in Scotland.
Another aspect I have on our strategic agenda is how to help fintech enterprises navigate the range of funding solutions available to them at present ranging from public funding through the Industrial Strategy Challenge Funds, to the University Innovations Funds to the mix of R&D relief allowances available.
In this respect, very appreciative of the guidance on public funding opportunities by Steve Harrison from Scottish Enterprise a positive change agent who is helping good ideas flourish in across the ecosystem.
Going forward, the focus hear will be to make sure we are much better at connecting the funds available to the innovators and entrepreneurs. In this respect, I’m delighted that Matt Smith, Kent Mackenzie and the Deloitte team will be playing a valuable role in helping us in these areas.
The other hot subject over the last fortnight and from fintech practitioners is finding talented people to support business growth and this is a subject I know Scotland can further excel in.
The visit to the Technology and Innovation Centre of Strathclyde University was a fantastic testament to the strength of the skills development taking place in Scotland at the moment. Wow!
Having a terrific working session with academic leaders from all part of the Strathclyde University highlighted how to me the new opportunities in fintech can be embraced and I am very excited on how we progress on a number of fronts together.
Big thanks to Adrian Gillespie and Team Strathclyde.
The bringing together of academia and industry was further brought alive on Thursday evening when I was given the opportunity to join a distinguished speaking panel at the University of Edinburgh Business School event.The subject was Cryptocurrencies and Bitcoin!” Captivating words from amazing Professor Chris Speed of Edinburgh College of Arts and insightful Tim Jones of Tibado meant I only needed to play a small bit part thankfully! Brilliantly chair Bill McCall of Chartered Bankers Institute.
The fintech people skills agenda also presents the opportunity to bring alive our purpose of being more inclusive and I was delighted to catch up with the inspiring leader Promilla Caughey of EY Foundation.
Promilla’s work in creating opportunities for young people from less advantaged background is something we will very much embrace and part of the fintech bigger purpose.
My favourite music has always given me a strong sense of purpose beyond fintech and last Friday I had chance to see live one of my musical hero’s Swill at the Voodoo Rooms in Edinburgh along with the legendary Bobby Valentino.
What a wonderful evening and I can’t wait to see Swill with the rest of the awesome band, The Men They Couldn’t Hang, back together again for the gig in Glasgow at King Tut’s in December, anyone want to join me for probably one of the best bands in the world!This weekend I’ll be running with purpose in a half marathon race, enjoying the beautiful city of Stirling as I prepare for the big Edinburgh marathon in four weeks! Until next time
New Fintech Fellowship to Address Skills Gap
The idea behind this fellowship is to raise the awareness of the fintech talent gap and seek involvement from organisations and individuals. Last year, 42 UK universities took part.
“Seeing positive collaboration between groups of talented entrepreneurs and established financial institutions really inspired me to apply”, said Mohammed Hassan, last year’s winner.
The fintech talent situation in Scotland
The fintech sector isn’t completely centralised in London with Scotland contributing massively to the growth of this sector in the UK.
Universities have been quick at identifying fintech as an area of focus and the University of Strathclyde recently launched the first UK MSc in fintech, rapidly followed by Stirling University. It is highly important when projections show a potential for the creation of over 15,000 new roles overt the next 10 years.
A majority of the companies who took part in the HM Treasury UK FinTech Census 2017 identified skilled talent attraction as one of their top challenges.
The judging panel
Further members of the judging panel include:
Marilena Ioannidou, Director & Team Lead on Fintech Investments, British Business Investment
Elizabeth Lumley, global fintech commentator and advisor
Tanya Andreasyan, Managing Director and Editor, FintechFutures/Banking Technology
Niels Turfboer, Managing Director, Spotcap
Fortnightly FinTech Fuse ”“ Going Global
One of the key objectives for FinTech Scotland is to contribute to putting the country on the global fintech map and this last two weeks has given us the opportunity to build a presence on the international stage.
Collaboration is key when going on the global stage and this is very much reinforced by the fact that Avaloq are one of the founding private sector partners of Fintech Scotland.
With the one hundred strong research and development team based in Edinburgh, Avaloq has built a tremendous reputation as a leading international fintech firm adopting a global footprint and mindset to drive innovation in the financial services sector.
Global Collaboration
Last week we had the opportunity to share Scotland’s global credentials and aspirations with two sets of guests from the Far East.
On Wednesday we met with four very innovative fintech enterprises from Hong Kong who had expressed an interest in expanding in the West and learning about Scotland’s fintech landscape which we were delighted to go into a great amount of depth on.
Then on Friday, with the excellent Graham Hatton and the brilliant Shirin Pang from Scottish Development International, we met with Sopnendu Mohanty, the Chief Fintech Officer from the Monetary Authority of Singapore and his team.
There was much to learn from these meetings and what particularly struck me was the fact the we were very much aligned in emphasising the importance of collaboration and inclusion in our fintech agendas.
Global Events
Earlier in the week Mickael and I had spent a couple of days in London at the Innovation Finance Global Summit sharing Scotland’s fintech strengths with our counterparts from international centres from around the globe, from Bahrain to Holland to USA to China to Africa.
Building these worldwide connections is going to valuable as we seek to encourage more fintech firms to consider Scotland as an ideal place for their international expansion as well as potentially opening doors to our home grown fintech enterprises to expand on the global stage.
The Summit gave us the opportunity to also catch up with Julian Wells and the team from FinTech North, our neighbours from across the border, who are doing a fabulous job in building the profile of the exciting fintech developments across Leeds, Manchester and Liverpool.
We are delighted we will have the opportunity to share the conference platform with the FinTech North team at their Spring events as we look to collaborate on future initiatives .
A big thank you to Kent Mackenzie and the Deloitte team for facilitating our various engagements at the Summit. One of the highlights being of the Summit was to hear Louise Brett give one of the best presentations on the role of fintech as a progressive force for good, especially in improving diversity in the sector.
The value of diversity and inclusion was the key theme for our third Fintech Scotland symposium on Tuesday evening.
Awesome personal leadership stories were told by Jackie Waring of Investing Women, Loral Quinn of Sustainably, June Cook of ShareIn and Yvonne Dunn of Pinsent Masons, all made more special as the session was live streamed around the globe for those who could not join us in Edinburgh
A huge thanks to Yvonne, Hollie and the Pinsent Mason team for their fabulous hospitality for the event
Global Data
On the subject of events, the really big event in the last fortnight was, of course, DataFest which was a wonderful demonstration of how Scotland’s data driven innovation very much shines on the global stage across all sectors of the economy and society.
Thanks to Pardeep Cassells of BNP Paribus and Raymond Wales of Scottish Investment Operations, I had the opportunity to share thoughts on all things fintech and data driven innovation with a broad section of people from the international asset management sector in Scotland
We had a great conversation on the fintech issues ranging from collaboration to skills development and I am looking forward progressing these further in the coming months.
What a spectacular series of DataFest activities and events across the whole of the country over the week that the truly amazing Gillian Docherty and the DataLab team put on. What an inspiring role model leadership team DataLab are for all of us.
Later that week, meeting with the Sean Harkin to discuss how we can help his new data driven fintech enterprise, Symmetry Analytics, further demonstrated to me very clearly that we have the expertise and leaders in Scotland to use the data explosion in our lives to make a positive difference through value add innovation.
Global Leaders
Talking of global leaders, I’ve had the opportunity in recent weeks to meet with some brilliant people who are helping me think about how Scotland really does put itself on the global map for fintech.
Such as Paul Kiernan who has been terrific to work alongside connecting us with Australian fintech firms who are looking to establish themselves in Europe and Scotland. Thanks Paul you are a star player in the fintech world.
Then, it was absolutely fantastic to meet up last week with the truly inspiring Promilla Caughy from the EY Foundation who was recently recognized on the international stage as an Inspirational Role Model’.
Promilla is very much my international role model with her deep experience of international engagement and cultures as well her people based can do mindset on global collaboration and inclusion.
Then on Monday evening, I was fortunate to have dinner with Parveen Kaur who is responsible for some of RBS major operations in India.
Learning about the huge leaps India is taking in the fintech world from Parveen was very thought provoking and I am hoping we can benefit from Parveen’s expertise as one of our international ambassadors going forward. Thanks Lou Smith for such a super evening of fintech discussion
Great to hear that one of our very own fintech leaders James Varga, chief executive of The ID Co has been selected to go on a trade mission to the USA next month to showcase the firm’s expertise and engage with senior stakeholders.
Global Running
The global theme is going to run on as I have been invited to go to New York to share Scotland’s fintech progress at events next week in the Big Apple. More on this in my next Fuse blog!
In between the various fintech commitments, the trip across the Atlantic will give me the opportunity to join an inspiring global friend of mine, Paul Skinner, for an early morning 6 mile run around Central Park and maybe a longer run at Flushing Meadows!
Before I embark on this global running treat I hope my planned ten mile race at Strathclyde Country Park on Sunday beats the weather and allows me to test out how much pace I have in my legs for the global excursions!
The man behind Open Banking – Interview with Gavin Littlejohn
Open banking is a hot topic at the moment. On 13th January 2018, the second Payment Services Directive (PSD2) came into force, bringing Fintech access to payments and payments data into the scope of regulation in the EU for the first time. This is a major change in the industry, one that will certainly generate a lot more innovation.
One of the people behind the open banking movement is Gavin Littlejohn. We met with Gavin to get his view on what’d been achieved to date in terms of open banking standards but also on the future of the industry.
What got you interested in open banking?
Money Dashboard was my second fintech business and I began working on it in 2005, making it a pioneer of the independent services using an open model of account access. Customers could engage all of their different financial brands in a unified service. At the time and for many years thereafter, banks were strongly discouraging customers from using Money Dashboard and other such services.
Whilst a battle raged on social media between the fintech participants and banks about whether the data belonged to the customer or the institution, and whether the customer had a right to share their financial data with other firms, it was not until in 2012 and 2013 when my own bank provider wrote to me discouraging me from using Money Dashboard and similar services that it became obvious that more fundamental changes were needed.
We engaged with the Office of Fair Trading (now the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) and I also managed to secure UK government cabinet level support through HM Treasury to drive through some changes.
We continue to campaign for all customer financial data to be made available for the customer to share in a safe and helpful way, but at the time the train leaving the station was in payments, with the EU wide PSD2 drafting nearly completed. HMT identified a way to include access to only payment data, rather than all financial data, by coupling account aggregation or data access to PSD2.
This was a late addition to the directive. HMT agreed to push for this change and suggested that I lead the formation of a trade association to give the banks and regulators a party to negotiate with.
That’s why the Financial Data and Technology Association (FDATA) that I’m chairing was created. When I left Money Dashboard in 2015, I was asked by the fintech industry to stay on and lead the campaign for standards through FDATA.
How do you explain the fact that the UK seems to be leading the charge?
PSD2 set the legal and regulatory basis of third party market access, including providing some clarity on the liability model, but did not do as good a job in establishing the technology standards, which was envisaged as more of a competitive market rather than the standards based approach that the UK market sought to achieve.
HM Treasury encouraged the fintech and banking industry to negotiate the design principles of an Open Banking Standard in 2015. FDATA had a significant role in this, with our members co-chairing 4 out of the 6 working groups. It was a key milestone and set the framework for a standards based approach which is now a widely admired concept. The key thing was that it was an inclusive process, with lots of contributions to help shape and refine.
In 2016, the CMA, who had been following the process carefully during their review of effective competition in banking, decided to step in and require that the nine largest UK banks by current account, form an entity to fund and deliver the Open Banking Standard, creating an impetus for execution that is both standardised and delivered earlier than some other countries that are also exploring open banking. I was asked to represent the fintech interest on the steering group of the Open Banking Implementation Entity.
Our fintech firms are already testing APIs from the banks and a lot of attention is being paid on making sure they all conform to the standards. There is much work to do, but we are moving in the right direction.
Where do you see Scotland’s biggest opportunity around Open Banking?
We are lucky in that we have a great concentration of knowledge and talent in this space. Some Scottish companies have mastered the data. Money Dashboard, the ID Co. FreeAgent and Castlight have shown real mastery of the categorisation of customer transaction data and have built some business models on top that customers really value. As a result of that, some Scottish firms are already market leaders in this space.
How do you think Open Banking will benefit society as a whole?
Open Banking will create an environment where the quality of the experience will empower the customer and reduce inertia. Data science will enable innovation to be at the customer level not at the product level. In short, more customers will be on the right products at the right time and at the right price, fraud will be reduced as the standards kick in and financial inclusion will improve for many as data driven innovation solves more customer problems.
Do you see Open Banking widening its scope to insurance, savings products and other asset classes?
Some of the technical artefacts of Open Banking Implementation Entity ”“ such as the Directory – might be used in other markets. As customers we all have a wide range of financial relationships. They are all part of what is called the “financial self”. To be fully formed you need all your financial data to be enabled so we can empowered to make decisions in full possession of the facts and risks. It would be really strange ”“ in the long term ”“ for customers to be able to access half of their financial data under a legal basis through a tech standard and for the other half to be out with the liability model. It has surely all to be brought into the standard methodology.
Do you think Open Banking will allow for disruption of a scale similar to the one observed in other sector such as hotel, transport and travel?
Providing they can create services, then yes. Both fintechs and banks can position themselves as the 3rd party provider. What I mean is that banks don’t have to be losers here. If they win the customer consent with a strong proposition, they can access data from other banks just as the fintech firms do. Banks who don’t embrace this change might get reduced in their importance. Open Banking will enable people to optimise their financial self (affordability, lending, AML, savings, investment, money management). We’ve only scratched the surface of this. The open banking movement is gaining momentum across the world and the level of innovation will be transformational. FDATA is increasingly a global trade association and is operating now on several continents.
Are you happy with the current standards around Open Banking?
Happy with technical output of the UK Open Banking, yes. The specifications are strong. Banks are now building. We now need to get the other banks to converge as well as credit card issuers and others. A good outcome would be to have an internationalisation of the artefacts to get to a point where standards are the same.
What role do you see FinTech Scotland playing in ensuring Open Banking become an opportunity for the Scottish economy?
FinTech Scotland can help the country position itself as a Global leader in data science with top research coming from universities, some firms, the Data Lab and the Edinburgh Parallel Computing Centre. We have the opportunity to combine data with leading data science skills and deep insight to customer problems in financial services to produce a really strong cluster.
You’re travelling a lot at the moment; can you tell us where you’ll be in the next few months and why?
I’m just back from Singapore and have been working with the North American FDATA group and the Indian Group. Coming up I’ve further work in these markets, plus plans are forming for further visits in the EU, Central and Eastern Europe, South America, China, S.E. Asia, Australia and Russia.
If we don’t deliver standards now it will be very difficult to do it later. Collaboration and sharing of issues and best practise between markets and regulators is a sensible step.
The only chance for convergence to a single standard is now.
Fortnightly FinTech Fuse ”“ FinTech Across Scotland
This has been especially evident in the last two weeks as I have had the opportunity to see, hear and discuss the fintech progress in a number of cities and regions, all of which are advancing Scotland’s global ambitions.
Dundee
Meeting Fraser Edmond, chief executive of the newly formed insurtech enterprise Broker Insights was a fantastic way to start the week and hear how data driven innovation is very much alive in Dundee.
Applying new approaches to the use of data in the traditional world of commercial insurance is already setting Fraser and his team on an exciting path to revolutionise how the sector operates.
Brilliant to see the Broker Insights innovation being led from Dundee and I can see them following in the global footsteps of a more established successful Dundee international fintech, NCR.
Of course, NCR are one of the world leaders in applying new technologies to payments and transactions, something they have been doing in Dundee since the 1940’s!
Mickael and I had a fantastic meeting with the senior team of this very important employer in the area but who are also redesigning the world of payments at a global level.
We are very fortunate to have NCR in the Scottish ecosystem and from our conversations on Monday there is much we can progress together. We have already introduced the NCR team to a couple of new emerging Scottish fintechs to develop collaboration opportunities.
Fife
Just down the road from Dundee is the region of Fife, which has a long track record of using new technology in the financial services space to be at the very forefront of innovation.
Meeting up with the very knowledgable Iain Shirlaw, the economic development adviser of Fife Council along with serial entrepreneur Gordon Povey of Trisent and Euan Stillie IT director of Ingenico (another long standing fintech enterprise) made it a fascinating afternoon.
There was much to learn about the creativity being driven from the Fife region and we got particularly excited about bringing the potential opportunities alive with blockchain as a significant game changer in Scotland and in our global reach.
The opportunity to connect up some of these developments with the wider ecosystem would even further demonstrate that fintech can play a key economic role across all of Scotland and wider afield.
Glasgow
I am certainly seeing a thriving ecosystem in Glasgow and there are numerous people and organisations making fintech happen across the City.
This was very much in evidence at the fintech event on Thursday where I had the privilege to share the platform with the brilliant Callum Murray, the founder and CEO of Amiqus ID , a fantastic enterprise leading the way in addressing some of the regulatory friction in the financial sector.
There was much to learn from the comments of the attendees, particularly in respect of the importance education and skills development. A big well done to Steve Chown and the RBS team for putting on a terrific event and to the great sessions by Juliana and Lal of Whitecap Consulting.
Of course, Glasgow is also the home of some very prominent global financial institutions who have a significant base in the City. For example, really enjoyed meeting up with Khalid Rafiq and Robert Keenan of Morgan Stanley to hear how they are embracing this age of innovation and how we can share insights to put Scotland even more on the global fintech stage, especially back in the USA.
Whilst talking of Glasgow, I must mention the University Of Glasgow FinTech Society team who I met at our event on Thursday evening.
Fantastic to hear how the team had grown the Society to over 100 in a short period and being embraced by students from all disciplines and nationalities. Really motivational to hear and it gives me great optimism about our future on the global fintech stage.
Edinburgh
A massive thank you to David Fergusson and the terrific team at Nucleus Financial for hosting our first ever Fintech Scotland symposium on Wednesday evening.
The theme was collaboration and the real value of working together came through in the excellent presentations by David along with Michael Roe of Origo Services, both of which demonstrated the huge role they play in fuelling the innovation of the pensions and investment sector.
It was also great to have expertise of David Dalton Brown from TISA along to share his examples of how the combined effort can help fintech enterprises can address the regulatory and policy challenges our sector sometimes faces.
I came away from this inaugural symposium reflecting on the diverse range of people all committed to making fintech a success across all of Scotland.
My thoughts on this were then reinforced the following night at our second symposium, this time with the theme of innovation. Two fantastic businesses driving change in the lending space, Ultimate Finance and Orca Money. From different start points, Ron and Iain were just brilliant in showing how to use technology and innovative engagement to meet customers needs.
This was vividly brought to life by Anneli Ritari-Stewart , the wonderful director of Dentsu Aegis iPropect and Keira from Ultimate Finance who explained the importance of innovative and data-driven marketing to to really focus on meeting customer.
Global Scotland
Denstu Aegis team were great hosts for this second event. They also bring some excellent international perspectives into the ecosystem that I believe all fintechs, established and emerging, can learn a great deal from.
There has been a strong international element to the conversations and opportunities wherever I have been since being in role and this bodes well as we seek to help fintechs across Scotland grow their global footprint in working with major global players.
Insightful meetings with Mick James of RGAx, one of the world’s largest reinsurance firms, and Yvonne Dunn of Pinsent Masons, the well respected European legal authority on open banking, reinforced this to me.
The international dimension was very much on the agenda last Thursday, 8th March, for International Womens Day. I had the privilege to join the inspiring Jackie Waring for the Investing Women Ambition and Growth conference. What a magnificent way to celebrate the importance of inclusion.
Alloa
After the snow put paid to my first race of 2018 a few weeks back, the Alloa half marathon this Sunday is long anticipated.
I’m far from peak fitness but it will be amazing to be with a couple of thousand runners from across at least twenty different countries on the roads of Clackmannanshire, putting Alloa very much on the international stage.
This will then set me up for the Global Fintech Summit in London with Deloitte on Monday and Tuesday where we’ll be sharing Scotland’s fintech story on the stage. A story I’ll also be sharing with guests from Hong Kong and Singapore later that week when back home in Scotland.
I’ve certainly got lots to say on this global stage about what Scotland can do and is doing in the fast moving fintech world and I’m looking forward to sharing opportunities across other regions of Scotland in the coming months. Until next time.
Stephen
Fortnightly FinTech Fuse – Inspiring FinTech
Inspiring is one of the most frequent words I have used over this last fortnight to describe the wide ranging conversations with people who are making things happen in the Fintech world.
Inspiring because their ideas that are driving innovation across Scotland are in themselves fuelling even more creativity and the possibility of additional new initiatives.
Inspiring Enterprise
Inspiring Talent
Some of our innovative enterprises in Scotland have been demonstrating their inspirational performance for a good number of years, talking with Lorraine Straiton, Commercial Director at FNZ and their twelve year journey is a good example.
The chat with Lorraine was very much on the skills and talent required to help financial and technology enterprises strive forward to create sustainable and inclusive growth.
This is where FinTech Scotland’s bridge’ role with the universities across Scotland is going to be crucial in helping to ensure we have a diversity of talent and expertise to take forward the thriving and innovative ecosystem
So, progressing the development of specific Fintech leadership programmes with Douglas Graham, Frances Green and other key colleagues at the University of Edinburgh is going to be a crucial focus in the coming months.
I’m looking forward to meeting up with the exciting academic teams at Stirling and Strathclyde in the coming weeks to hear how we can also support their valuable work in developing FinTech talent.
To add to this, the brilliant Steve Tigar, CEO of Money Dashboard shared with me some great ideas of how experienced people within some of our larger financial institutions could play an active role with emerging FinTech enterprises. We will look to progress this.
last week, and with the risk of embarrassing them both, they are very much role models to me on how to inspire talent and put it into action.
Inspiring Leaders
On the subject of inspiring leaders, this is an imperative across the whole ecosystem to drive collaborative actions in the FinTech ecosystem.
A great example of inspiring leadership was meeting Graham Smith, from Glasgow City Council this week to talk about his role at Tontine, the incubator and accelerator hub.
My colleague Mickael Paris had the opportunity last week to catch up with the inspirational Steven Morris to hear about how he is working with Stirling Council to establish a digital hub with the support of a new EIS growth fund. Please read more on this terrific initiative
Recent days have also involved conversations with Paul Lawrence of Edinburgh City Council and then with Douglas and Lindsay at PWC, all of whom are quietly but powerfully enabling actions to help a thriving fintech ecosystem.
There is a great deal of inspiring leadership such as by those mentioned that goes on behind the scenes and from people in many different roles that is often underestimated.
This was very evident to me when sharing the emerging plans for Fintech Scotland with the Scottish Enterprise and Scottish Development International teams this week. The wintry journey through the snow to Glasgow was more than worth it and I came away enthused on how we can drive new innovations through collaboation.
Inspiring Meet Up
Thursday was due to be my first FinTech Practitioners Forum and the opportunity to hear from thirty or so entrepreneurs and innovators but unfortunately the blizzard conditions meant it turned more into an inspiring meet up of four.
I was joined at Codebase by Stuart from Wallet Services, Stuart from Comcarde and Stewart from Allatus Unity for a very insightful conversation on what needs to be done to drive better collaboration and business growth.
From my point of view, it was more than worthwhile to brave the wintry conditions and be part of the discussion as well as enjoy the coffee treat that Stewart Pitt brought in to warm us up. Thanks guys for joining me even if the meet up was cut a little bit short so I could go to dentist and get a replacement tooth!!
Inspiring at Scale
One of the key objectives of Fintech Scotland is to facilitate productive collaborations across the Fintech eco systems, particularly in bringing together developing Fintech enterprises and established firms.
I have been encouraged by the opportunities on how we can do this following very constructive discussions with organisations such as IBM, Atos, Sopra Steria who have the capabilities and scale to help Scotland develop innovative environments to help small and large firms grow.
Alongside this, my meetings with global professional services players such as Deloitte, EY and Accenture gave me some very helpful insight on how we could learn from others around the world to develop fintech in Scotland
Innovation can be done at scale over time, as mentioned earlier FNZ have demonstrated this in Scotland and over a longer period and also the global player NCR with its important Scotland presence showed me how innovation through technology is an ongoing journey, or should I say an endless marathon!
Inspiring Running
Talking of marathons, it is due to be my first running race of 2018 this weekend, a half marathon round the Meadows in Edinburgh organised by the University’s students. I’m hoping the snow will have cleared to some extent to allow a safe and inspiring run!!
This will be the first of eight races leading up to the Edinburgh marathon in May and I am hoping to build up the pace over this coming months, I guess just like my ambition for the fintech pace in Scotland.
The next four weeks is going to be about starting to prioritise where the focus of activity and pace with stakeholders from across the ecosystem. More on that to come
Keep warm and keep inspiring!
Fortnightly FinTech Fuse – getting started
Welcome to the first Fortnightly Fintech Fuse!
This will be my regular blog sharing some of the insights, learnings and engagement with people form the diverse range of fintech participants across Scotland and globally.
To Fuse’ means to bring together and blend two or more things. This is exactly what FinTech Scotland is seeking to do with the aim of driving growth and creating jobs, hence the name for this blog.
The fusion arising from the changing world of financial services and technology presents enormous opportunities and through this blog I hope to share how Scotland is advancing on these.
The blog will be a cross between an open diary and informal ramblings that hopefully highlight the progress being made in fusing together the skills, resources and capabilities that make the potential fintech growth and job opportunities come alive.
The style will be chatty and quick read. It is not intended to be a formal report nor exhaustive of everything happening in our dynamic and thriving Scottish fintech environment.
Hopefully it will be a catalyst to the many people directly engaged or looking to be involved in delivering the enormous benefits for all of fintech developments.
Engaging Response
The start of the new role in January can be best described as a whirlwind of activity, with the announcement sparking a very positive response from the diverse range of fintech participants. I’ve very much appreciated all the feedback and comments in these early days and the task has been to get out to see as many people as possible to hear thoughts and share insights.
During this initial three weeks, I’ve clocked up over 70 actual face to face meetings with over 160 people in total as I have sought to immerse myself in understanding the needs of different stakeholders. This is in addition to being involved in four workshops and participated in a couple of local events.
The overwhelming enthusiasm and commitment to creating growth and jobs through fintech developments is very powerful, going forward I am hoping we can channel this high energy into productive results and outcomes.
Big thanks to everyone who has been in touch and reached out in since the start of the year, there has been a hugely enthusiastic response from all quarters of Scotland as well as all corners of the world, from New Zealand to Africa to Europe and the USA.
During this early flurry of activity, I am endeavouring to keep up to date with the positive flow of engagement and arrange the meeting and call requests as they come in!
Although managing the diary to meet and talk to as many people as possible has, I must admit, been a challenge and will be as I embrace the strong appetite for people to be involved.
Thankfully, I’ve only missed one appointment so far, with my dentist for a checkup!
Key Foundations
Amongst the many meetings, I have had very constructive discussions with key people from Avaloq, Lloyds Banking Group, HSBC, University of Edinburgh and Scottish Enterprise who have already strategically committed to getting FinTech Scotland of the ground.
This enables FinTech Scotland to start on a journey with confidence, which was very much reinforced when meeting Paul Wheelhouse, Minister for Business,
Innovation and Energy.
The Scottish Government’s very real and practical commitment to creating a thriving fintech environment in Scotland was a key factor for me in taking on this new challenge.
I must add that this fast start could not have been achieved without some key foundations being in place.
In this respect, an enormous thank you to the Edinburgh Innovation (EI) team at the University of Edinburgh, who have provided invaluable support in these early days of establishing FinTech Scotland’s operations.
It is fantastic to be working with the EI team to ensure we put the right foundations in place for the FinTech Scotland enterprise in order that we can maximize the
emerging opportunities.
Opportunity Knocks
One thing that has been really encouraging in these early days, is the contact from half a dozen fintech enterprises who are looking to move to Scotland, either from other parts of the UK or wider afield.
These entrepreneurial firms are all at various stages of their growth and scaling up but they all share a common interest in being part of Scotland’s fintech environment to take their innovative enterprises to the next level.
Explaining to the various firms how we and others in Scotland can support them in their growth and job creation aspirations is hugely motivating and something we will be building on in the coming months.
Running Around
I am hoping that scribbling this blog over the coming weeks will give me the opportunity to reflect on whether I have been focusing on the right priorities for FinTech Scotland and consider whether upcoming actions will enable us to make progress.
My other way of finding reflection time is to just get out and run, whatever the weather! Running is my other passion, alongside fintech, being a wonderful way take time out from the fast moving working life to consider the journey ahead and what can be achieved. More on this to come.
This fintech journey is going to be a marathon’ rather than a sprint and I am looking forward to sharing the experience with you through FinTech Fuse!
Previse’s expansion in Scotland. Interview with the Chief Product Officer
Earlier this month we received some great news from Previse. The B2B payment decisions start-up managed to secure £800k R&D grant from Scottish Enterprise in order to to set up an new development centre in Glasgow, creating 37 new data science jobs.
FinTech Scotland spoke with David Brown, Previse’s Chief Product Officer to understand the decision process that lead to the firm’s move this side of the border.
How did Previse come about?
We identified that current solutions to financing trade finance assets involved too much process change and this change more often than not would lead to the demise of payments in the supply chain as most focused on the Top suppliers i.e. the 80/20 rule. The majority of any major corporate spend is with the top 100-200 suppliers, the remainder [referred to as tail spend] can involve thousands of smaller suppliers more often than not most SME’s would fall within this segment. Previse identified a huge gap in the current market offerings and their failure to address this segment and have now developed a solution specifically to address SME payments within the Global Supply chain using, with virtually no process change to deploy.
Why did you choose Scotland to establish your new base?
After meeting with the Scottish Enterprise, Datalabs and the university professors, we came to the conclusion that the right building blocks are being put in place to address the skills gap that is required to enable a digital world and from there a fintech solution.
And why did you choose Glasgow specifically?
This was perhaps the hardest of the decisions but based on the fact the JPM, Barclays and MS have their operations in Glasgow, helped in our final decision.
Where would you like to see improvements in the Scottish fintech proposition?
Fintech in our opinion involves several key ingredients; technology, liquidity and legal without this it could become just tech. It is important that whilst we challenge the use of new technologies, we also challenge our legal frameworks and boundaries to ensure the asset is attractive for finance. Active collaboration between all parties is necessary and should be without conflict as the outcome benefits all.
In your opinion what is the biggest challenge Scotland is facing when it comes to becoming one of the leading fintech hubs?
References. We need strong case studies as change is hard but once you get through the inertia of change it becomes the norm. Scotland must collaborate, promote and get behind platforms, to generate the need and desire for talent, after all this is a new world with new challenges but also amazing opportunities to build world class talent and present a showcase of successful reference accounts to build upon.
Can you tell us about some exciting developments at Previse?
We are in the final stages of some major announcements both in partnerships and in client adoption and are busy hiring in Glasgow to support our growth. Partnering is key to Previse as we have built an enabler and each partnership we announce confirms our strategy and validates our vision.
You told us previously you’d like to spend more time in Scotland. What are the thing you enjoy doing/visiting when you’re up here?
Now I am here after working away for close to 30 years, I am looking up and finding everyone that meant something to my life and growing up, so catching up with neighbours, school and work friends and ex work colleges etc. is top on my agenda.
Are you planning on moving permanently to Scotland?
You never say never and I would like to think that is possible at some stage, I may need help with my Wife Sammi.
You told us previously you’d like to spend more time in Scotland. What are the thing you enjoy doing/visiting when you’re up here?
One of my best friends is Colin Barr who happens to own the Bierhall in Gordon Street so it would have to be that one.
What’s your favourite place in Scotland?
Loch Lomond, I have fond memories of my childhood and swimming there and also my big sister Ireney had her ashes spread there so it is now a very special place for all of us.
Edinburgh Hosts Event On Personal Data And Open Banking
New rules demanding a new approach
The EU’s PSD2 legislation that is closely aligned with the work of the Open Banking Working Group is going to make a significant difference to the operation of financial services both in Britain and in Europe, effecting far-reaching changes for years to come.
As of 18 January, consumers, SMEs and even corporates will be offered the opportunity to consent to having their personal data shared securely with financial institutions other than their own bank, with the option of choosing new products and services.
If this were not enough, the General Data Protection Regulation that comes into force across Europe in May will place far greater demands on companies to protect their customers’ data than at present and gradually raise customers’ attitudes towards the management of their personal information.
It would seem that the traditional and emerging finance communities as well as consumers are going to have varying expectations on how the new rules and ways of operating are going to work.
Why do Open Banking and GDPR matter now?
The urgency for innovation has rarely been more felt and is going to become a pressing need, if it isn’t already.
The good news this week at least is that Edinburgh, where much of this disruption is going to have significant impact, will be discussing these issues and more in a one-day event hosted by the Trust in Digital Life association, The ID Co. and the School of Informatics University of Edinburgh.
The objective of Whose Data Is It Anyway? is to achieve a fresh perspective on how potential conflicts of interest can be avoided in the future, particularly in the context of open banking, and what the landscape might look like in a few years’ time for banks, businesses, SMEs and the rest of us.
Whose Data is it Anyway? takes place at the Informatics Forum, University of Edinburgh, starting with breakfast from 08.30 to 09:30 and finishing at 15.15 on Thursday 14th December 2017. Attendance is free when you register in advance.
(Once you’ve registered, tweet to #whosedata)
About TDL
The Trust in Digital Life (TDL) community comprises leading industry partners and knowledge institutes that hold trust and trustworthy services to be an essential ingredient of the digital economy.
TDL members are committed to enabling a trustworthy ecosystem that protects the rights of citizens while creating new business opportunities. To this end, TDL researches, pilots and incubates trustworthy ICT services and technologies in an innovative environment.
TDL forms the bridge between citizens entitled to the best possible services and an industry that develops devices, applications and services that protect them from Internet threats and provides them at an affordable price. A major focus is on the research and business agenda of the European Union.
From banking to healthcare, driverless cars to online shopping, every aspect of our 21st century digital world is dependent on varying degrees of trust between consumers and suppliers, governments and their citizens.
The continual threat of cyber-attacks has the potential to undermine our confidence in taking full advantage of the opportunities available to grow the digital economy, not only in Europe but across the world.
The objective of this community of industrialists, entrepreneurs and academics is to provide the tools and awareness that the wider community can benefit from in their daily digital lives. Their mission is to create a trusted ecosystem based on innovative and trustworthy ICT products and solutions that protects the data and assets of European citizens and enterprises.
www.trustindigitallife.eu