Intersekt 2023 Recap: A Pennant Technologies Perspective
As we sip our next Melbourne cuppa, we can’t help but reflect on the incredible experience the Pennant team (Coffee cart sponsors) had at Intersekt 2023, Australia's leading and biggest fintech festival. It was wonderful to be a part of the supercharged world of finance and technology, discover the latest innovations, connect with brilliant minds, and forge meaningful connections. The conference brought together industry stakeholders, including accelerators, policymakers, regulators, investors, and advisors. Delegates dove deep into the intricacies of the fintech landscape, exploring opportunities, challenges, and the latest trends shaping the industry's trajectory.
The conference started with a keynote by Hon. Stephen Jones MP, Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services, who shared his perspective on the future of finance and the critical role the sector played in the Australian economy. The key theme at Intersekt this year was innovation in fintech, with firms from across borders launching their ground-breaking ideas, from AI-powered personal finance assistants to blockchain-based identity verification solutions.
Intersekt 2023 Highlights
For Pennant, some of the key highlights are:
The fintech industry in Australia/Oceania is an interconnected ecosystem with amazing opportunities for collaboration. Embedded finance continues to gain traction with increased focus on customer success and risk mitigation. Partnerships for innovation and global alliances for digital asset regulation and building a strong fintech ecosystem were a key theme. There were also several discussions on security risks in the space, and the role of open data in shaping personal finance offerings.
The newest developments are expected to be in the domains of financial wellness, embedded finance, money management, product diversification and innovation with responsible AI, hyper-personalisation and sustainability. Customer expectations are changing radically, demanding hyper-personalisation, digitalisation and innovations such as changes in lending lifecycles, superannuation, crypto-finance, more value added overlay services beyond Australian PaymentPlus, and better engagement through their lifecycle moments of truth. Better management of financial crime, challenges of onboarding and digital identities, as well as tackling the tough task of issuing with fintech actuators were other key points being discussed. A new theme in 2023 was understanding how Generative AI technologies can revolutionise financial services and using cloud-based technologies for simplifying credit control.
There will be a continuing evolution of the modular, cloud native, secure, resilient ‘platform’ based-model, where Lego blocks of capabilities from different players will be API integrated , and will fill in the slivers of white spaces in fintech value chains - breeding more inter-connectedness and collaboration amongst FinTech platforms
The responsibility of regulators and policy makers towards inclusivity in policy formulation and control collaboratively with fintechs will become more prominent, with government bodies learning from past experiences to craft future reforms. Adoption roadmaps will be built in the interest of the customer and improving the citizen experience. There will also be a more focus on regulating non-bank lending and enhancing Consumer Data Right (CDR) rules.
Partner organisations and government bodies will play a larger role in helping fintechs build financial sustainability, establish ethical practices, and drive growth in emerging fintech markets. They will also drive international collaboration with US and European fintech accelerators fostering cross-border flow of innovation capabilities.
This annual event has become a cornerstone for thought leaders, start-ups, and established companies in the Oceania fintech ecosystem, and we’re already looking forward to the next event in 2024. The conference showcased inclusive innovations in the fintech space and provided the opportunity to ‘Intersekt’ passionate experts, policy makers, venture funds and accelerators driving this industry forward. Pennant had a great time discussing with delegates (at our very busy coffee cart!) on reimagining and transforming lending operations for an industry impacted by disaggregation and disintermediation.
This article is provided by Pennant Technologies
