Last month some of our team attended BrainBar in Budapest. Billed as the ‘conference on the future’ the content ranged from science fiction writing to cooking. And it turns out that dipping into seemingly unrelated topics can help you look at your own subject in a different way.
In 30 degree heat on the banks of the Danube, we pulled up beanbags and sat in the courtyard of the Corvinus University for a conference quite like no other. Not focused on a particular sector, BrainBar’s spotlight is the future, looking at innovation in any form.
Being a Fintech we obviously found ourselves drawn to the couple of talks on the future of finance, however our biggest takeaways were from talks we just went to just for fun!
Spring clean your way to better spending
Eliette and Marieke Staub’s talk “Home Detox — Is tidying up a life-changing magic?” was exactly the kind of talk we…
Is it because we can have a unique take on things? Is it because we can tap into emotions better? Are we better listeners? More driven by a social cause? Or is it simply to smash the status quo?
Truth be told the gender ratio just kinda happened.
A mixture of guys and ladies made it to the interview stage. We focused on hiring the most talented, passionate and down to earth people and 75% female is the result.
Who knew eh?
A click, a tap, a beep… that’s all money has become now. But, how has this intangibility affected our financial lives, even our future? In more ways than we think. We explore the uncomfortable truth about convenience at a time when people are increasingly jaded about the power of capital.
Do you care about your money?
Of course. We all do.
But our relationship with money is going through a tough time. Day after day, we’re becoming increasingly estranged from the one thing that touches every single aspect of our lives. And it’s wreaking havoc on both our spending and our saving.
New technologies have conspired to make money disappear from our lives, liberating us to spend seamlessly. Regardless of what we choose to buy, our money is reduced to a beep. At the same time, the world’s biggest financial crash has caused an entire generation to doubt the power…
Startups have the golden opportunity to work hand in hand with people we’re creating products for. But, to gain from it meaningfully we need to go beyond focus groups and user testing, and create a platform for free flowing conversations. Here’s our experience of it.
Creating a digital community is something for big, established brands, right? On the contrary, we think it has the biggest value for startups.
A clean slate offers an amazing opportunity — to create a product with the consumers at the heart of it. So, why not involve them in the making of it from the…
What the hell do you do when you’re building a new financial solution… from scratch?
The cogs of our startup had already been turning for a few months, there’d been meetings in the Tate modern café, interviews in Wagamamas, finance discussions in the White Hart, but there’s something about the day you turn the door handle of your new office that feels like ‘this is it’. This is day one. The clock is ticking now. (Well, the rent has started after all.)
In the 150 years prior to 2010, the number of banking licenses the Bank of England awarded to new companies was precisely, zero. In the few years since, there’s been 27 new banking licenses, dozens of e-money licenses and hundreds of apps designed to help you manage one aspect or another of your finances. So what on earth makes us think it’s worth launching yet another new offering?
We aim to put the ‘Fin’ back in ‘Fintech’.
Current players in the Fintech market have greatly enhanced people’s digital experience. We however, want to go beyond this and enhance the financial experience.
We’re looking beyond the traditional financial structures and…
Project Imagine
Project Imagine is a vision of an easy and accessible financial future for all. Our first brand dozens launches this autumn.
