The FinTechnology Forum ended yesterday in Milan, a high-profile course conceived by IFIS Bank e The European House - Ambrosetti in collaboration with Finint Bank e Microsoft dedicated to building a shared roadmap between banks, Fintech companies and startups. An initiative that started in October 2017 and which brought together operators and key policy makers in 4 different appointments, to start an open dialogue and stimulate concrete actions that can guarantee the competitiveness of the bank of the future.
During yesterday's forum, after the opening speech by Alessandro Braga, Head of Innovation and Technology at Ambrosetti, the first roundtable saw representatives of successful startups such as Valentino Pediroda (CEO and Founder of modefinance), Filippo Maculan (Head of Experience Design of Neosurance), Elena Lavezzi (General Manager of Circle) and Andrius Biceika (Head of Country Managers of Revolut) discuss the topic of international best practices and opportunities for the Italian market.
The main players on the Italian scene followed, Giovanni Bossi (CEO of Banca IFIS), Fabio Moioli (Director of the Enterprise Services Division of Microsoft Italy), Salvatore Stefanelli (General Manager of Cedacri) and Matteo Concas (General Manager Italy of N26) discussed of the theme 'Fintech: revolution or evolution?'.
Finally, the last roudtable explored Blockchain technology with Marco Amadori (CEO of Inbitcoin), Carlo Alberto Carnevale – Maffè (Professor of Strategy, Bocconi University School of Management) Alessandro Lombardi (Digital Advisor and Blockchain expert, Microsoft Italia) and Renzo Taffarello (Strategic Advisor, Interlogica Industries).
The first results of the mapping of Fintech startups launched in February in partnership with StartupItalia!, which collected 25% of the ecosystem and which will be completed at the end of 2018, were also illustrated.
Until now the analysis of StartupItalia! 48 players replied (73% already active on the market). The fields most covered were Investments (18%), Financial Management (14%), Insurtech (10%), P2P Lending (10%) and Payments (10%) while on the topic of financing only 21 % of the startups declared having raised over one million euros and 16% between 500 thousand and one million euros up to those who did not receive any financial support (25%). In 2017, 29% of startups had a turnover of around 50 thousand euros and only 10% over 1 million euros.
Italy is therefore bringing up the rear in Europe compared to the attention garnered by Fintech which in 2017 recorded a new record in loans, with the European market growing strongly, the Asian market slowing down for the first time after years of progressive and uninterrupted growth and the North American market recovering after the decline experienced in 2016.
“Investors trust Fintech globally. The scenario in 2017 confirms this perception: there were 1.128 investments globally for a value of 16,6 billion dollars and 8 new unicorns were born, which are now 25 in total with an aggregate valuation of 75,9 billion dollars . As the first private think tank in Italy, we are proud to have launched the FinTechnology path with the collaboration of Banca IFIS, Banca Finint and Microsoft Italia with the mission of creating a high-level thinking center to support the competitiveness and growth of the sector” , he claims Alexander Braga, Head of Innovation and Technology Hub, The European House – Ambrosetti.
“We are witnessing a cultural and business change that is shifting the perspective of financial institutions from a logic focused on products, services and processes to a vision that introduces network logics, in which the company itself becomes part of a wider ecosystem , dynamic and interconnected, based on the sharing economy and the valorisation of information” he said John Bossi, Chief Executive Officer of Banca IFIS. “Fintech pushes financial institutions to rethink their organization and culture. So my wish, thanks to initiatives such as that of the FinTechnology Forum, is to accelerate the merging of innovation paths”.
