Tech Nordic Advocates FinTech Working Group Just Launched
The Tech Nordic Advocates (TNA) FinTech Working Group convened for the first time on a conference call Tuesday 29th March to discuss key investment trends and agree on what the group would like to achieve over the next year.
The purpose of the working group is to foster an open, collaborative and inclusive exchange of FinTech intelligence and seek to identify mutually beneficial opportunities to partner. It is comprised of representatives of FinTech companies, VCs and financial institutions in the Nordic (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden) and Baltic countries (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania).
The group will seek to convene via four virtual call-outs and one or more physical meetings each year. Based on a recent survey, key topics of discussion will be prioritised around innovation and collaboration and emerging trends to start with, followed by policy and regulation, payments, blockchain, robo-advice and challenger banks. Members of the Group will be asked in advance to deliver case studies, research and use cases for each of these areas on future calls.
Over 25 individuals joined the initial call, which was chaired by Lawrence Wintermeyer, CEO at Innovate Finance. The call focused on the 2015 FinTech Investment Landscape, particularly in the Nordic and Baltic countries. As discussed, 2015 saw 860 FinTech deals globally, attracting $12.5 billion in investment. The Nordic region is the largest FinTech community in Europe next to the UK, having raised $118 million in 2015 venture funding across 18 deals. The majority of these took place in Sweden, including the top three deals; iZettle ($66.7 million), Billhop ($12 million) and Kryex Group ($10 milllion). Payments alongside alternative finance led the way in this region.
Shaun Thanki, Founder of TechLive!, Norway’s largest tech-startup and crowdfunding event, noted on the call that about $15 million was raised last year by Norwegian startups such as Zwipe, Encap, MeaWallet and mCash. Shaun hosted an event in Oslo on February 17th on “Disruption within the Financial Sector”, which attracted over 700 attendees, demonstrating the high level of interest in this sector.
Kasper Oldby, Co-Founder at Dansk Faktura Bors, a Danish marketplace for receivables/invoices, painted a similar picture with regards to Denmark, stating that there were at least 10 relatively successful alternative finance players operating in the country. Conor Barchak, Investor at Conor Venture Partners, shared his views on the FinTech landscape in the Baltics, highlighting the fact that FinTech unicorn, TransferWise, which is often described as a UK company was actually born out of Estonia.
“There’s a growing number of impressive Nordic firms disrupting markets here and around the world, such as iZettle, mCash and Zwipe” said Lawrence Wintermeyer. “We look forward to working with regional FinTech leaders and meeting the talented entrepreneurs that are instigating positive changes to the financial services sector.”
Several representatives from established institutions, such as Nordea, also joined the call. The rise of FinTech startups in the Nordics, has prompted large financial institutions to seek out new partnerships and collaborations. Victor Dyrhauge, Innovation Specialist at Nordea, discussed Nordea’s accelerator, a three-month programme featuring 10–15 startups delivering payments, blockchain and biometric authentication solutions, with each startup gaining access to Nordea’s technology teams and executives at its offices in Helsinki.
Helsinki will also be where the next TNA FinTech Working Group meeting will take place on the 19th of April, please save the date, details will be posted shortly. The discussion will coincide with the Lord Mayor of London’s visit.
