New Economist Intelligence Unit Report: Capturing Value In The Cloud

The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), supported by Temenos, surveyed over 200 global banking IT executives, to understand their experiences with cloud. Download the report today for insights on the state of cloud-based banking and its future.

Cloud adoption by banks has accelerated since the start of the pandemic, as banks seek to cut costs and ramp up digital transformation projects. But challenges around security, governance and skills remain. What is the state of cloud-based banking in 2021? What are banks’ drivers and strategy for cloud adoption and what barriers do they still need to overcome?

Temenos and the Economist Intelligence Unit have sought the answers to these questions and more in a new report: Capturing Value in the Cloud, incorporating data from over 200 global banking IT executives.

Key Findings

 

  1. 72% of IT executives at banks report that incorporating the cloud into their organisation’s products and services will help them to achieve their business priorities, with nearly half (47% saying it will do so “to a great extent”).
  2. Business agility, elasticity and scalability are together cited by 40% of respondents as top drivers of cloud adoption.
  3. 82% of IT executives say they have a clear strategy for adopting cloud technology
  4. 81% of respondents agreed that a multi-cloud strategy will become a regulatory prerequisite by 2025

Read full report here

November 23, 2021 FinTech Australia, Insight, Partners Announcements No comments yet

DNX Solutions joins FinTech Australia corporate partner program

Cloud technology provider DNX Solutions has joined FinTech Australia’s corporate partnership program. It joins other major technology companies such as Facebook, Google, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Xero, all of whom have become members in the past 12 months.

FinTech Australia’s ecosystem partnership program helps foster relationships with the fintech industry’s key players and help companies better collaborate with the sector. The program has grown exponentially in 2021, signing over 14 partners in the past 12 months.

In joining the program, DNX Solutions said it wanted to level the playing field for emerging fintechs with cloud solutions.

“Our goal is to democratize cloud technology. We want companies to have the most modern and secure solutions available in the market,” Allan Denot, CTO from DNX Solutions said.

“We’re focused on compliance and security, which we know are crucial for the fintech industry. This is why we’re keen to further engage with the fintech sector and ensure they are getting the most out of their cloud solution.”

FinTech Australia Head of Strategic Partnerships Rehan D’Almeida said: “Cloud technology underpins the growth and development of all startups, but it plays a particularly important role in fintech, where it can work to support regulatory compliance.

“As such, we welcome DNX Solutions’s involvement with the sector, and look forward to working with them as part of our partnership program.”

Media contact
Harrison Polites
harrison@themediaaccelerator.com.au
0409 623 618

November 16, 2021 FinTech Australia, Partners, Partners Announcements Comments Off on DNX Solutions joins FinTech Australia corporate partner program

Airwallex bolsters ASEAN presence with regulatory approval in Singapore

Airwallex, a global fintech platform, today announced at Singapore FinTech Festival that its Singapore entity, Airwallex (Singapore) Pte Ltd, has been granted a Major Payment Institution License by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) under the Payment Services Act. Airwallex is permitted to provide a suite of payment services including account issuance, domestic money transfer, cross-border money transfer, merchant acquisition and e-money issuance. 

Airwallex will progressively introduce a suite of product and service offerings that will enable businesses in Singapore to operate and grow across the ASEAN region and globally. This includes a modern global business account, multi-currency wallet, company and employee cards, spend management, online payments, international collection & transfer and other value-add solutions for Small and Medium-sized businesses, as well as an API for larger enterprise businesses that require embedded payments and financial services. 

Jack Zhang, CEO and Co-founder of Airwallex said, “We are pleased to have received regulatory approval in Singapore as we continue to make steady progress in Southeast Asia, scaling our payment offerings and solutions in the region for our customers. Receiving this approval reflects our robust policies, compliance framework and risk management systems we have put in place. We will continue to work closely with regulators and partners to ensure we facilitate a safe, effective and transparent way to manage their cross-border financial transaction needs. We look forward to launching our services in Singapore next year and enabling businesses in Singapore to operate globally without borders.” 

Founded in 2015, Airwallex is one of the fastest growing financial technology companies today. The company has nearly doubled its headcount in 2021 to over 1,000 employees today across 19 locations globally, including Singapore. In September, the company also announced its entry in Southeast Asia after securing a money service business (MSB) license in Malaysia, followed by news of a US$200 million Series E fundraising round, raising its valuation to US$4 billion as it continues to focus on its regional and global expansion.

For more information:

Gina Daryanani
gina.daryanani@airwallex.com

About Airwallex

Airwallex is a global payments platform with a mission to empower businesses of all sizes to grow without borders, and by doing so, contribute to the global economy. With technology at its core, Airwallex has built a financial infrastructure and platform to help businesses manage online payments, treasury and payout globally, without the constraints of the traditional financial system. Airwallex has secured over US$700 million since it was established in 2015, and is backed by world-leading investors. Today, the business operates with a team of over 1,000 employees across 19 locations globally. For more information, please visit www.airwallex.com.

November 8, 2021 FinTech Australia, Partners Announcements Comments Off on Airwallex bolsters ASEAN presence with regulatory approval in Singapore

As the Australian borders open, Open Banking gets ready for take off

Frollo’s ‘State of Open Banking 2021’ shows Open Banking is at a tipping point, with a wave of new use cases expected in the next 12 months

Australian Open Banking provider Frollo has published the second edition of its yearly industry report, ‘The State of Open Banking 2021’. The report shows an industry that’s ready for take-off, as data availability has accelerated, APIs have proven to be fast and reliable, and people are more excited than ever to get started with Open Banking.

Ready for take off

Over the last 18 months the Open Banking ecosystem has improved measurably, and now delivers the coverage and performance required to build great user experiences. 

In the first 10 months of 2021, 70 banks started sharing consumer data and 14 businesses became Accredited Data Recipients. This is an increase from just 5 Data Holders and 5 Data Recipients in 2020. 

And significantly, more are getting ready: The industry survey shows 62% of respondents plan to use Open Banking data within the next 12 months, and 38% within the next 6 months.

The new CDR access models announced by the Treasury earlier this year will likely help fintech’s, brokers and financial advisers get started, although there’s still a lot of uncertainty about what these models really mean. 1 in 3 respondents have no idea which of these models they would consider for their business.

The most popular use cases can be grouped into three categories:

  • Lending: Income & Expense verification (highly valued by 59% of respondents) and credit scoring algorithms (37%)
  • Money management: Multibank aggregation (50%) and Personal Finance Management (50%)
  • Verification: Customer onboarding (49%), Identity verification (38%), account verification (34%) and balance checks (30%) 

Room for improvement

Although the survey shows a lot of growth, there’s still room for improvement. The biggest challenges that respondents see to achieving their CDR objectives are consumer education & uptake (32%), complexity & clarity of the rules (23%) and cost (18%). The latter two could in part be solved with the new CDR access models like the Affiliate, Representative and Trusted adviser model. 

The former is in line with how respondents rate the Federal Government’s consumer education efforts to date (3.9/10) and will likely improve when more use cases are launched and the government starts its consumer awareness campaign early next year.

What’s next?

The Consumer Data Right will cover much more than just accessing the banking products that are currently available. Respondents are keen to see this expansion, especially with various other financial products, and of course Open Banking payments and financial product switching – both of which could be part of what is called ‘Action Initiation’ on the CDR roadmap.

The most popular additions to the CDR roadmap are:

  • Financial product switching (83% would find this valuable for their organisation)
  • Open Banking payments (78%)
  • Sharing data from superannuation products (75%)
  • Sharing data from investment products (72%)
  • Sharing data from the insurance sector (71%)

Other sectors attract less interest, but over 50% of respondents would still find them valuable for their organisations:

  • Sharing Government data, for example health, and Government payments (66%)
  • Sharing data from the energy sector (55%)
  • Sharing data from the telco sector (53%)

Finally

Looking back, year one of the Consumer Data Right could be considered one big Proof of Concept, in which the ecosystem proved capable of building and delivering engaging Open Banking use cases.

With many of the regulatory, data and technological building blocks in place, the time is right to start building Open Banking powered consumer experiences. Year Two will see access to Open Banking increasing with many more consumers able to access Open Banking in many more places.

Learn more

The full report, The State of Open Banking 2021, includes many more insights, visualised and broken down by organisation type. It also includes interviews with Open Banking innovators Nick Malham (Bank of Queensland), James Wyper (P&N Group), John Sanger (AFG) and Tony Carn (NextGen.Net) about how their organisations use Open Banking and what we can expect in the next 12 months.

Download the report and visuals here: https://frollo.com.au/open-banking/the-state-of-open-banking-2021

The numbers

Fintechs

  • 76% of Fintechs want to start using Open Banking in the next 12 months
  • The Affiliate model is most popular with fintechs – 36% would consider it for their business – yet the Representative model would only be considered by 16%
  • Fintechs are most interested in multibank aggregation (68%), Personal Finance Management (64%) and customer onboarding (60%)
  • More than two thirds of fintechs (68%) are planning to invest in CDR, but expected investments are generally lower as 40% indicate they’re going to invest up to $100,000 over the next 12 months.

Trusted advisers

  • Most trusted advisers are familiar with Open Banking (81%), up from 25% last year
  • Most trusted advisers either don’t know (44%), expect to spend nothing (13%) or up to $100,000 (19%). This is a clear contrast with 63% of trusted advisers saying they intend to use CDR data in the next 12 months.
  • Most popular Open Banking use cases for trusted advisers are Income & Expense verification (63%) and identity verification (56%)
  • 38% of trusted advisers think multibank aggregation and Personal Finance Management would be valuable use cases for their business

Banks & lenders

  • 89% of banks are familiar with Open Banking, only 44% of lenders
  • Banks and lenders place most value in Income & Expense verification (77%), credit scoring algorithms (62%) and Personal Finance Management (57%)
  • Unrestricted ADR is most popular (38%), especially with banks & lenders (53%) and technology providers (57%).
  • 66% of banks and lenders are planning to use CDR data within the next 12 months

About Frollo

Frollo is a purpose driven fintech and Australia’s first Open Banking intermediary. We help businesses use Open Banking data to deliver better customer outcomes. From reducing debt and increasing savings, to providing a better, more personalised customer experience.

Our modular, end-to-end Open Banking platform enables businesses to bring Open Banking powered use cases to market quickly by leveraging Australia’s most advanced and reliable CDR Gateway, with plug & play access to lending, personal finance management and customer onboarding solutions.

Trusted by clients like ANZ, Volt Bank, REA Group, P&N Bank, bcu and Bank of Queensland, Frollo is an Australian market leader in Open Banking.

For media enquiries
Piet van den Boer
Frollo
0468 375783
piet@frollo.us 

November 8, 2021 FinTech Australia, General, Partners Announcements Comments Off on As the Australian borders open, Open Banking gets ready for take off

Hybrid Approach: Pressing Go on Open Banking in Australia

This whitepaper from Envestnet | Yodlee aims to show the continued evolution of Open Banking models in Australia and how hybrid service models can speed the process for service providers. Consumer awareness will continue to grow. So will consumer expectations that they can choose who can access their data and how their data is used, as codified in Australia’s Consumer Data Right (CDR).

A hybrid approach to Open Banking gives financial services providers a jump-start in their product offerings and experience while the Open Banking ecosystem continues to mature.

Envestnet | Yodlee Whitepaper

For more info, visit website

 

November 7, 2021 FinTech Australia, Partners Announcements Comments Off on Hybrid Approach: Pressing Go on Open Banking in Australia

BENCHMARK YOUR ORGANISATION TODAY – 2021 CYBER SECURITY SURVEY

With a new operating environment emerging in early 2020, organisations ushered in significant opportunities through the use of technology. However, as organisations continue to adapt their processes to respond to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, there remains a staggering degree of risk.

Last year’s BDO and AusCERT Cyber Security Survey found that data breaches doubled and organisations were overconfident in their cyber controls. To challenge this trend, now is the time to review your approach to cyber security.

Take the next step

The annual BDO and AusCERT Cyber Security Survey identifies the current cyber security trends, issues and threats facing organisations across Australia and New Zealand.

Our 10-minute survey provides you with an opportunity to sense check your organisation’s approach to cyber risk. By taking part, you will gain access to valuable data, allowing you to benchmark your organisation’s cyber security efforts and gain insights into the cyber threats faced by your industry peers.

The survey closes at midnight on Friday, 3 December 2021.

2021 Cyber Security Survey

November 7, 2021 FinTech Australia, Partners, Partners Announcements Comments Off on BENCHMARK YOUR ORGANISATION TODAY – 2021 CYBER SECURITY SURVEY

Global Processing Services raises over US$300 million to accelerate technology development and global growth

  • Global API-first payment technology platform powers the world’s leading fintechs, including Revolut, Curve, Starling Bank, Zilch, WeLab Bank and Paidy
  • Investment from Advent International and Viking Global Investors provides deep payments and fintech experience and capital; follows strategic investment by Visa in 2020
  • Company intends to use investment to accelerate technology investments in product innovation and to continue the expansion of its customer base in 48 countries today across Europe, Asia Pacific and the Middle East

LONDON, October 13, 2021 – Global Processing Services (“GPS”), the leading global payment technology platform, today announced it has raised over US$300 million from Advent International (“Advent”) and Viking Global Investors (“Viking”), who will co-control the company. The investment by Advent will be funded through Advent Tech and Sunley House Capital, an affiliate of Advent.

GPS’ API-first payment technology platform enables innovative card programmes for the world’s leading fintechs, digital challenger banks and embedded finance providers. Its platform has helped scale multiple unicorns and powers a vast array of prominent fintechs across Europe, Asia Pacific, and the Middle East, including Revolut, Curve, Starling Bank, Zilch, WeLab Bank and Paidy. Through a single unified code base, GPS enables its customers and partners to launch and scale card programmes across 48 countries, supported by integrations with over 95 issuers. To date, it has issued over 190 million physical and virtual cards, and last year processed more than 1.3 billion transactions on its cloud-based platform.

“GPS provides key payments technology infrastructure, enabling the global fintech revolution. Their agile, resilient and modern cloud platform drives some of the most innovative use cases and allows fintechs to globalise through a single API,” commented Peter James, Director at Advent International.

“Through their customer-centric innovation, GPS has quietly established a leading position in key markets around the world with an attractive, diversified and global customer base. Together with Viking, we look forward to supporting GPS’ leadership team to expand the business’s product offering and accelerate its international reach.”

“We are delighted to partner with Advent and Viking, with their deep experience and track record in payments and fintech, and, who share our bold vision for the next generation of global payments,” said Joanne Dewar, Chief Executive Officer at GPS.

“GPS has been at the heart of the global fintech explosion, simplifying access to the global rails of the new digital payments era. This investment will allow us to turbo charge our geographic footprint and product expansion plans as we drive the payments ecosystem in the key verticals of today and tomorrow, including digital banking, Buy Now Pay Later, B2B virtual cards, financial empowerment, and much more.”

Advent has a strong track record in the growth of businesses across the payment and software industries, including a recent investment in Planet, the global integrated payments leader, and Dock, the Latin American financial technology infrastructure provider where Advent’s affiliate, Sunley House Capital, co-invested alongside Viking. Worldwide since 2008, Advent has invested ~US$5 billion across 12 payments platform companies.

Viking has a long history investing in payments and software, across both the private and public markets. Viking is investing in GPS out of its private equity vehicles, which currently manage over $17 billion. Recent payments investments include Dock, the Latin American financial technology infrastructure provider where it co-invested alongside Advent, and Clip, the Mexican digital payments and commerce platform.

The transaction will be subject to customary closing conditions.

Media Contacts:

Sumeet Vermani / Louisa Bartoszek
Global Processing Services
Marcom@globalprocessing.com

Graeme Wilson / Harry Cameron
Tel: +44 (0)20 7353 4200
Advent International
Advent@tulchangroup.com


About Global Processing Services (GPS) 

Global Processing Services (GPS) is the trusted and proven go-to payments processing partner for today’s leading fintechs, including Revolut, Curve, Starling Bank, Zilch, WeLab Bank and Paidy. GPS has to-date issued over 190 million physical and virtual cards, enabled in over 48 countries, and last year processed over 1.3 billion transactions on its API-first cloud-based platform.

GPS’ highly flexible and configurable platform places the control firmly in the hands of global fintechs, digital banks, and embedded finance providers, enabling them to deliver rich functionality to the cardholder. It is a multi-award-winning issuer processor powering next generation payment segments, including expense management, B2B payments, crypto, lending and credit (including Buy Now Pay Later propositions), digital banking, FX, remittance, open banking and more.

GPS is certified by Visa and Mastercard to process and manage any credit, debit or prepaid card transaction globally, with offices in London, Newcastle, Singapore, Sydney and Dubai. Its platform is equipped to meet the stringent standards required by Tier 1 banks, integrating with 95 issuer partners and operates programmes for a client base across the globe.

Company highlights from the last two years include:

  • Expansion into Asia-Pacific through establishing a new regional centre of excellence in Singapore alongside a hub in Sydney, with a fast-growing customer base including WeLab Bank, the first homegrown virtual bank in Hong Kong, and Paidy, the largest Buy Now Pay Later player in Japan.
  • Secured strategic investment from Visa, a long-term partner of GPS, and established a new regional centre of excellence in United Arab Emirates (UAE) having been selected as one of its preferred issuer processors in Asia-Pacific and the MENA region

Website: www.globalprocessing.com

About Advent International

Founded in 1984, Advent International is one of the largest and most experienced global private equity investors. The firm has invested in over 380 private equity investments across 42 countries, and as of June 30, 2021, had €68 billion in assets under management. With 15 offices in 12 countries, Advent has established a globally integrated team of over 245 private equity investment professionals across North America, Europe, Latin America and Asia. The firm focuses on investments in five core sectors, including business and financial services; health care; industrial; retail, consumer and leisure; and technology. After 35 years dedicated to international investing, Advent remains committed to partnering with management teams to deliver sustained revenue and earnings growth for its portfolio companies. For more information, visit:

Website: www.adventinternational.com  

About Viking Global Investors LP

Founded in 1999, Viking is a global investment management firm that manages approximately $48 billion of capital for its investors. It has offices in Greenwich, New York, Hong Kong, London, and San Francisco and is registered as an investment adviser with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. For more information, please visit www.vikingglobal.com.

October 14, 2021 FinTech Australia, Partners Announcements Comments Off on Global Processing Services raises over US$300 million to accelerate technology development and global growth

Databricks joins FinTech Australia’s partnership program as Gold Partner

Databricks, the Data and AI company, has become a gold partner in FinTech Australia’s corporate partnership program. It joins other major technology companies such as Facebook, Google, Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Xero, all of whom have become members in the past 12 months.

FinTech Australia’s ecosystem partnership program assists in the fostering of relationships with the fintech industry’s key players and aims to further embed them in the growing ecosystem. 

In joining the program, Databricks aims to work more closely with digital natives on leveraging data to drive both more engaging customer experiences and greater returns on equity. 

“With Open Banking now rolling out in Australia, data has become an increasingly valuable asset for the fintech industry — one that many in the sector are still working out how to best utilise,” FinTech Australia CEO Rebecca Schot-Guppy said.

“Given this, we welcome Databricks as a gold member in our corporate partnership program, and believe the move to join the program is incredibly well-timed.” 

Bede Hackney, Regional Vice President for Australia and New Zealand at Databricks said: “Data is the lifeblood of every company and is fundamental to driving innovation in what is one of the world’s most dynamic fintech industries.  

“As the sector continues to diversify and new entrants challenge traditional financial business models, we look forward to collaborating with Australian fintechs, and enabling organisations to unlock greater value from their data.”

Media contact
Harrison Polites
harrison@themediaaccelerator.com.au
0409 623 618

October 12, 2021 FinTech Australia, Partners Announcements Comments Off on Databricks joins FinTech Australia’s partnership program as Gold Partner

Adatree launching Australia’s first non-financial CDR use case

Adatree is excited to announce the launch of COVID Hotspot Alert, an innovative new service using the power of CDR for Good. COVID Hotspot Alert helps keep Australians safe during the pandemic by leveraging a user’s card purchase data and matching with COVID Hotspot locations released by the Government. Alerts are sent directly to a customers phone if they have purchased at a COVID Hotspot location within minutes of new exposure sites being announced.

COVID Hotspot Alert has been built with Adatree proprietary Data Recipient Platform, which is currently active and receiving bank data from data holders couple with Adatree’s new Analytics Engine, machine learning algorithms that run the complex matching process.

Adatree fundamentally believes in applying the Consumer Data Right not only for financial gain, but also for use cases that help our society. We created this product to demonstrate that the CDR is live and working and to show that the CDR can be used for greater social good.

For more information about COVID Hotspot Alert and to join the waitlist for this innovative service, go to covidhotspotalert.com.au

October 12, 2021 FinTech Australia, Partners Announcements Comments Off on Adatree launching Australia’s first non-financial CDR use case

REA’s PropTrack joins FinTech Australia’s partnership program

REA Group’s data business PropTrack has joined FinTech Australia’s ecosystem partnership program, becoming the 14th major partner the peak body has signed in a year.

The program embeds companies within the fintech ecosystem and assists in the fostering of relationships with the fintech industry’s key players.

PropTrack is a property data and valuations business servicing customers including Australia’s major banks with trusted property data analytics and insights, customised data platforms and an Automated Valuation Model (AVM).

Other companies involved in the program include: Xero, the Sydney Stock Exchange, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Mastercard, EY, Facebook, Google, eftpos, IDEMIA, Regional Australia Bank, RSM Australia and the Newcastle Permanent Building Society.

“This is an exciting partnership for FinTech Australia, as we’ve always seen a key link between the property sector and the fintech industry,” FinTech Australia CEO Rebecca Schot Guppy said.

“Property is crucial to wealth and investment in Australia, there’s a substantial number of fintechs operating in the sector. Our partnership program will assist PropTrack in building those key relationships to help create new opportunities.”

Melina Cruickshank, Chief Executive Officer, PropTrack, said: “PropTrack is uniquely placed to provide unparalleled access to property data and insights through the integration of proprietary REA Group demand data and industry-leading software, apps and tools. We’re excited to connect with new fintechs to help build their competitive advantage with trusted market intelligence.”

Media contact
Harrison Polites
harrison@themediaaccelerator.com.au
0409 623 618

About FinTech Australia

FinTech Australia is a national association for the Australian FinTech Startup community. Our vision is to make Australia the leading market for FinTech Innovation and Investment by working with both sides of Government, Industry and the Australian FinTech community to create a supportive environment and partner ecosystem in Australia and abroad.

September 13, 2021 FinTech Australia, FinTech Australia Announcements, Partners, Partners Announcements Comments Off on REA’s PropTrack joins FinTech Australia’s partnership program
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