The FinTech Five – 3rd September 2021
03 September, 2021
Welcome to the FinTech Five, the part of the week where we take a closer look at the best articles, news, and features from over the past week from our FinTech Wales members.
1. Applications Opening for the second phase of the City of London Corporation and FCA Digital Sandbox.
First this week, on September 6th applications will open for the second phase of the City of London Corporation and FCA Digital Sandbox.
The Digital Sandbox provides innovators with access to a suite of tools to collaborate and develop financial services Proofs of Concept. This phase will support innovators developing technology solutions in the area of ESG data and disclosures to form part of the Digital Sandbox ecosystem and act as observers, mentors, or collaborators.
This includes established market players, potential end-consumers of the products being developed, sustainability experts, investors and others who may be able to provide guidance and expertise to the participating firms.
Digital Sandbox are also seeking guidance from data experts in identifying useful real data or creating synthetic data sets for the participants to test and train their models.
The application window is between 6 September and 11 October.
The Digital Sandbox will run between November 21 – March 22.
To learn more or apply, click here: https://www.digitalsandboxpilot.co.uk/
2. The Lexis Risk Solutions Government Identity Fraud Summit is now available on-demand.
Next, The Lexis Risk Solutions Government Identity Fraud Summit, a virtual event that took place on July 21st this year, is now available on-demand.
The sessions, which were co-hosted by the Center for Digital Government,had an amazing agenda full of information on all things identity fraud that are important to you and your agency, including a Fraud Trends panel and a Fraud Mitigation Success Stories panel featuring industry leaders.
Recordings of each individual session are also available to you via the links below:
- Seeking Balance: A Conversation with Suzi Levine
- What Trust Means to Fraudsters: The Importance of Data to the Good Guys – and the Bad presented by Security Consultant and Public Speaker, Brett Johnson
- Techno-Crimes: Are You Ready for Post-Pandemic Fraud? presented by Investigation Futurist and CEO of Techno-Crime Institute, Walt Manning
- Panel 1 – Fraud Trends Addressing Today’s Risks and Tomorrow’s Challenges
- Panel 2 – Success Stories: Real Strategies for Fighting Fraud
3. Staff shortages hold businesses back, but in a recent blog Yoello highlights how technology can help.
Next, with 63% of hospitality businesses saying that they’ve been affected by staff shortages, it’s becoming a major issue for the industry. In fact, Industry bodies say one in five workers have left the sector during the coronavirus pandemic
Technology has proved helpful as the sector rebuilds. With the option to operate with lowered staff numbers and still deliver exceptional service, mobile ordering technology is coming to the rescue.
Here’s some of the top ways that tech is easing staff shortages and helping businesses keep going…
Yoello increases table turnover by up to 40%
Mobile ordering technology can increase table turnover by up to 40%. This means more people through the door, more food and drink sold, and ultimately more profit.
While it increases table turnover, it doesn’t necessarily require more staff. This means that business can run as usual without the extra hands that would otherwise be needed.
Yoello can double the speed of which staff can serve customers
With the help of mobile ordering, staff can get food and drinks to their customers quickly and easily with minimal room for error. When you’re short staffed, having a mobile ordering system that serves people in half the time is a blessing.
Reducing the number of touchpoints during service
By removing the need to actually go and take the customer’s order, technology is enabling waiters to minimise touch points with customers. Not only is this a great win from a safety perspective, it also means that there is less work for the wait staff and less room for error when taking orders. In turn, this has the potential to boost staff satisfaction and minimise staff turnover.
Self service means less staff are needed
Yoello is often referred to as an ‘invisible waiter’, offering much of what wait staff do but through a digital, self-served format. With the helping hand of a mobile ordering system, businesses can ensure that they keep thriving despite staff shortages.
Read the full article on Yoello’s website, here. OR reach out for more information and get mobile ordering set up in your venue today!
4. Principality Building Society is providing £20 million of funding towards greener housing projects, in support of the Welsh Government’s commitment to achieve net zero emissions by 2050
Last but not least this week, Principality Commercial is playing its part in Wales’ low carbon future with a major financial incentive.
Eco-friendly housing developers are being urged to pitch for a share of Principality’s £20m green development fund.
Principality Commercial has now issued an update that revealed that just over half that amount has been allocated with four developers benefiting.
“Following the launch of the society’s Green Development Fund in March 2021, we are delighted to confirm that the society has so far agreed, in principle, to support four separate client projects that will deliver 76 low carbon homes, with a total funding of over £10m,” said senior relationship manager Chad Griffiths. “We look forward to sharing details of these projects in due course.”
The society has made it a number one priority to support housing developers which build greener properties in the light of the Welsh Government’s intention of reducing carbon emissions in Wales to net-zero by 2050, with the Welsh housing sector accounting for a significant proportion of overall emissions.
‘’Climate change and sustainability is becoming an ever more important issue in society and it is part of our responsibility as a member-owned organisation to look at how we can support the natural environment and the communities we operate in,” said Mr Griffiths.
“We believe that a thriving community is a sustainable one and want to work with housing developers who are as passionate and committed as we are. Principality has made some small but significant steps forward in recent years in lending to developers creating low carbon homes but now we want to see the green plans of home builders really flourish in the next decade. Working with like-minded, progressive developers, we hope we can make bigger strides to help achieve this goal.”
You can read the full article here. For more information on how housing developers can apple for funding, click here.
5. FinTech Wales schedules its next AGM meeting and invites prospective new panel members to get in touch
Last but not least this week, as we come to the end of another successful year at FinTech Wales, we would like to announce that our second AGM (annual general meeting) is scheduled to take place on the 12th of October, 2021.
FinTech Wales is an inclusive organisation, and in spirit of this we make sure to rotate our advisory panel annually.
Now is an exciting time for us at FinTech Wales, having solidified our company’s strategy moving forwards. We are therefore keen for people to join us on our journey and would like to give formal notice that we are searching for new panel members.
Please stay tuned in on our socials as an official statement involving how new prospective panel members can apply will be issued later today.
Until Next Week
And that’s it for the FinTech Five this week. Thank you for reading, and don’t forget to join us next week for more of the best content from across our FinTech Wales membership.