Even in the short time that FintekNews has been publishing (since July 2016), we've seen the number of fintech incubators and accelerators explode, both in the US and worldwide. What is unknown is whether or not they are churning out viable future fintechs or just giving facetime to the fintech phenomenon to appease their boards and convince investors and shareholders they are on the cutting edge. Not so with Britain's Barclays. They just extended formal offers to 8 of 11 fintechs that were within their 13 week Accelerator program to work with the bank in a number of capacities, proving the incubator model can work and provide innovative solutions that would not otherwise have been born within their own corporate brain trust.
(Cindy Taylor/Publisher)
"Barclays, Britain's second biggest bank, has given formal engagements to eight of the 11 financial technology (FinTech) start-up companies that pitched yesterday at its Rise event in London, U.K., after graduating from their 13-week business Accelerator program run jointly with Techstars.
The Demo Day was held at the new Rise London offices the lender has just opened, which it claims is the biggest FinTech center in Europe. It houses 40 FinTech start-ups and the lender's in-house banking technology teams.
One of the eight firms, Nivo, is an 'intrapreneur' internal team that is being spun out from the bank as a separate secure mobile messaging company. It will run a pilot scheme with Barclays' Premier banking unit in the forthcoming months and is focused on improving customer service.
The Accelerator graduates pitched to a collection of 250 investors, technologists and bankers at the Demo Day in London yesterday after winning their places on the program earlier in the year.
Other start-ups to secure deals with Barclays, included:
- Simudyne: who will work with the bank's risk team on scenario planning and other strategic end uses.
- Barac: will work with Barclays' UK and International divisions, using its real-time analytics on predictive anti-fraud and computer outage tasks.
- Flux: will run a pilot of its technology with over 10,000 Barclays UK and Barclaycard customers, providing in-app digital receipts.
- Alyne: the operational risk firm will help the bank improve its control functions and react to new regulations and compliance demands more effectively..."