FinTech West celebrates FinTech innovators at Bristol Tech Festival
On Wednesday 13th October FinTech West hosted our first face to face event since early 2020. The full day gathering was part of Bristol Tech Festival, and brought together some of the brightest lights in the regional FinTech community at Engine Shed in Bristol.
The event featured a line up of speakers drawn from across the South West, as well as guest speakers from as far afield as Poland. The agenda covered three areas of focus: the FinTech landscape, South West FinTech developments, and a regional FinTech showcase.
We kicked off with a welcome message from globally acclaimed FinTech author and commentator Chris Skinner, who is perhaps best known for his blog (The Financer). Many thanks to David Henderson, FinTech West’s recently appointed Strategic Adviser and long standing supporter, who arranged this with Chris, who in turn has set us the challenge of inviting him to speak in person at next year’s event!
Julian Wells, Director of Whitecap Consulting and FinTech West, chaired the event and provided an update on recent UK FinTech developments, including an update on activity since the publication of the Kalifa Review in February. Regional FinTech has continued to enjoy a high profile and FinTech West’s involvement in the FinTech National Network creates a link to other regional clusters and national developments.
FinTech continues to thrive amidst the acceleration in digitisation over the last two years, and 2021 has been a strong year for FinTech investment with Innovate Finance reporting that the VC funding in the first half of this year ($5.7bn) had already surpassed the total for the whole of 2020. Last year’s figure of $4.1 was four times the combined total of the next four European countries.
Session 1 – The FinTech Landscape
Opening keynote – Dave Cliff, University of Bristol
Dave Cliff took us on a fascinating journey of the evolution of tech-enabled financial markets, working his way through no fewer than 78 slides in 20 mins in a fast-paced and highly entertaining session which focused on the development of automated trading systems. This is a field Dave has completed numerous prominent pieces of seminal work in.
Dave also told us that when the university launched its MSc in Financial Technology with Data Science that it did not promote the course but received 1000 enquiries. There are currently 32 students on the course, and 170 students on other directly relevant courses. These students are looking for industry placements in data science with relevance to financial technology. They can spend 600 hours on real word problems and real world data, which is an amazing opportunity for businesses seeking these highly sought after skills. Contact us if this is of interest.
TechPassport: Layla White, CEO & Founder
Layla was working in a major retail bank and found it difficult to engage with tech companies due to challenges in procurement and supplier negotiation. She decided to try to solve this problem, and set up TechPassport, building a marketplace where NDAs and supplier agreements could be set up on a platform. There are currently over 100 suppliers registered on the platform and the business plans to expand into financial and credit risk DD. The key benefit TechPassport aims to deliver to FinTechs is to help them engage with established financial institutions more effectively.
Layla’s session was followed by a Q&A where we were also joined by David Henderson and Dave Cliff. Drawing on his experience as Head of Transformation at Hargreaves Lansdown, David advised FinTechs that they need to get their compliance right from the outset, as this is critical to being able to successfully engage with large FS brands.
Session 2 – South West FinTech Developments
From Ecosystem to Cluster - Jon Beaverstock, University of Bristol School of Management
Working with Stuart Harrison, co-founder of FinTech West, Jon recently co-produced a report which identifies the competitive advantages required to promote the future sustainability and clustering dynamics of the Bristol and Bath FinTech ecosystem.
The report found that the Bristol and Bath FinTech ecosystem has the potential to become one of the United Kingdom’s and Europe’s leading innovative and dynamic clusters. Indeed Jon stated that it should aim to evolve into a cluster like Silicon Valley, highlighting the importance of funding, talent, incubators, accelerators, access to market, and connectivity.
Jon also highlighted that the University offers an MSc in data analytics, as well as various courses relating to entrepreneurship and management.
FinTech West Accelerator Launch Announcement
Stuart Harrison (FinTech West) and Marty Reid (SETsquared Bristol) jointly announced an exciting new accelerator, which will carry the FinTech West brand and will be powered by SETsquared Bristol.
This will be a rolling programme suitable for startups or scaleups, and will aim to support FinTech entrepreneurs in key areas such as product, organisation, funding and access to market, as well as providing a community and network, skills and training, and individual coaching.
The benefits the accelerator seeks to deliver include: increasing the number, survival rate and growth of FinTech startups; enhancing inward investment; creating new jobs and diverse talent; and providing solutions for societal and business challenges
The accelerator is expected to launch in Q1 of 2022, once discussions with commercial partners are completed.
Mark Wesker- Partner, Osborne Clarke
Osborne Clarke was founded in Bristol over 200 years ago. It has a strong focus on tech and was the first UK firm to open an office in Silicon Valley. Today the firm has nearly 2000 employees globally and is working with numerous established and early stage FinTech brands.
Mark highlighted some of the key issues in FinTech over the coming years, such as: rapid digitisation, disintermediation, increasingly complex regulatory backdrop, favourable funding market, ESG and international opportunities.
Bristol & Bath FinTech Cluster Strategy – Tom Slade, Deloitte
Deloitte is currently working with WECA to create a 3 year strategy for the Bristol & Bath cluster, as recommended by the Kalifa review. Tom worked on the project team for the National Connectivity chapter of the Kalifa Review and shared some insights from this work, as well as outlining the work currently underway. The Deloitte team is actively engaging with the FinTech West community as part of the work.
Following the presentations there was a lively Q&A session and the speakers fielded a range of questions about how the region can continue to develop its FinTech capability, and we then broke for lunch, which was sponsored by Osborne Clarke.
Session 3 – Regional FinTech Showcase
Blockchain & VAT settlement
University of the West of England (UWE) is currently undertaking a research project with HMRC, also involving University of Portsmouth. Chris Carr (UWE) and Neil Cartledge (HMRC Innovation) took us through this collaborative project which is part of a programme of activities to look at how HMRC can apply evolving tech to tax settlement.
The team has assessed the benefits of a smart contract platform for VAT, which include allowing for real time accounting and payment, increased transparency, ease of use, and increased data integrity. A proof of concept is currently being developed.
The team would like to hear from SMEs and accountants who have experience with crossing the VAT threshold of £85k income. Contact Chris here.
Stratiphy – Daniel Gold, Founder
Stratiphy is a personal investment management app, launching in the new year. Daniel came up with the concept after he was looking for a tool to help implement a personalised investment strategy. Disappointed with what he found, he created Stratiphy as a consumer app, having originally spotted an opportunity to serve high net worth millennials. Stratify provides tailored trading signals, analysis, and bespoke strategies, with the goal of democratising access to professional investing. The product will launch next year, and there is a waitlist on the website.
Voltric – Julian Mensah, Founder & CEO
Tesla Model 3 is now the best selling car in the UK, but buying an electric car is still expensive so Voltric provides an all inclusive service for buying an electric car, via a monthly subscription. Users are also provided with data insights and integrated mobility services including the ability to pay for parking. Julian explained that in future, the volume of data available about vehicles and rivers can lead to very different ways of delivering products like insurance.
Penny – Josh Stott, Co-Founder & CEO
63% of people don’t know where their pensions are. Penny is an Open Banking provider for pension companies, and links consumers to all their pension providers, also helping them to locate their pensions. Penny is the new name for Sixty, which was pension proposition for freelancers and had featured at previous FinTech West events. Josh explained that the longer term vision is to create what will effectively be a current account for pensions. The team’s development journey can be followed via the #buildinpublic hashtag on Twitter.
Flexys – Jon Hickman, CEO
Flexys provides debt management solutions for large scale B2C organisations.
People don’t want to talk about debt, which is a problem as it hides the issue and creates stress. Flexys connects people in debt with their creditor, in a more transparent and collaborative way. Jon explained that treating people as human beings is at the centre of what Flexys does. The firm has been experiencing strong demand over recent months and expects to expand to 70 employees over the next year.
Roqqett – Glenn Smith, Founder & CEO
Inspired by the new generation of Open Banking, Roqqett is an exciting FinTech startup with a vision to disrupt the world of payments. The first generation of Open Banking FinTechs created the 'plumbing layer'. The second generation is building solutions on top of those foundations for either consumers or merchants. Glenn explained how Roqqett provides a unifying solution that improves the customer experience when checking out with merchants.
For businesses, Roqqett Powered Payments are a third of the cost of other providers, making it the more attractive option. As for consumers, Roqqett allows users to manage all their accounts in one slick app, easily make and take payments, plus get useful insights on their spending. To pull everything together, Roqqett has developed a fast e-commerce checkout solution, which Glenn demo’d publicly for the very first time live at FinTech West!
Closing keynote: Moneyhub – Sam Seaton, CEO
Moneyhub is a Bristol based FinTech which has become one of the best known names in FinTech in the UK, particularly in relation to Open Banking. The firm recently raised $18m of funding and has ambitious growth plans, and is a strong supporter of the tech and FinTech sector in the region.
Sam’s closing address focused on the ‘why’ behind Moneyhub’s story, Sam highlighted that most people who work in FinTech did not start their career in financial services. She also highlighted that while money is an enabler for the life we all choose to live, the majority of people do not fully understand how money works. Moneyhub originally developed an app to enable consumers to see all their finances in one place, but subsequently evolved to offer a B2B service to provide an API-driven infrastructure and services to other companies seeking to offer Open Banking enabled propositions, such as Roqqett.
In respect of the strengths of the region, Sam said that she feels that fairness, transparency and access are things the South West is really passionate about. In a Q&A session that followed, we covered a wide range of topics including the future of Open Banking, Open Finance, and Open Data, and the UK’s leading role in Open Banking globally. When asked for her advice for aspiring entrepreneurs with an idea, Sam’s advice was to be brave and follow your passion.
The event closed with a drink reception, sponsored by Moneyhub, and the majority of attendees stayed to network and reflect on the day.
It was brilliant to get so many people together in person and we will be announcing future event plans over the coming weeks. To get involved in our events or other activity please contact us on info@fintechwest.co.uk
