Brussels, 6 June - Innotribe, Swift's initiative to enable collaborative innovation in financial services, is holding the European leg of its annual Startup Challenge in Belfast on 14th June. The competition will bring Belfast's most promising entrepreneurs together to win the opportunity to successfully grow their business with consultation and funding from Swift, Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication. Semi-finalists of the Belfast Innotribe Startup Challenge will pitch their innovative business ideas to a panel of the financial industry's leading angels, VC's and decision makers. The winners of the Belfast Startup Challenge will go on to compete against the winners from New York and Singapore for the $50,000 prize at Sibos in October.
Innotribe focus on creation and collaboration and has selected 15 semi-finalists whose business ideas identify and address important gaps within the financial technology sector. Matteo Rizzi, Innovation Manager, Innotribe says, "The goal is to bring Innovation and technology expertise within the FinTech eco-system together. The first two legs of the Startup Challenge in New York and Singapore were a great success and I look forward to providing the opportunity to talented entrepreneurs and promising start-ups in Belfast."
This year's semi-finalists are:
Playmoolah won ‘Top Startup' at the Singapore leg of the Startup Challenge and will be at Sibos competing against the other finalists. Min Xuan Lee, Co-founder, said "We were surprised by the amount of support and love we got from the event! Winning the Singapore leg by audience vote truly showed that people appreciated the problem and felt the true need for financial education from a young age, and agreed with our methods of starting with kids and parents with real-world impact. We had a couple of banks and investors approach us to explore further possibilities."
Pendo Systems won ‘Top Innovator' at the Singapore leg of the Startup Challenge. Pamela Pecs Cytron, CEO, said "Far too often, those considered ‘too big to fail' view us as ‘too small to succeed'. That is not only unfair, it's wrong. To win ‘top innovator' at the Innotribe Startup Challenge is an honour and I look forward to the opportunity of meeting key players in the industry at Sibos."
The Innotribe Belfast Startup Challenge will be held in conjunction with the Innotribe@Belfast conference 13-14 June. The conference facilitates innovative idea generation for the banking industry which is stimulated through a variety of interactive and creative workshops. It will offer participants the opportunity to address the challenges of alternative currencies, consider the increasing role of telecommunications companies as they partner with financial services firms, as well as exploring the innovation processes within tier 1 banks and how internal innovation impacts corporate culture.
- View comments from Innotribe Startup Challenge New York here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdMDWIKZz9w
- For further information about the Innotribe Startup Challenge please visit: http://innotribestartup.com/
- For further information about Innotribe Belfast please visit: http://www.innotribe.com/index.php/events/7-events/13-agenda
About Innotribe
Launched in 2009, Innotribe is Swift's initiative to enable collaborative innovation in financial services. Innotribe presents an energising mix of education, new perspectives, collaboration, facilitation and incubation to professionals and entrepreneurs who are willing to drive change within their industry. It fosters creative thinking in financial services, through debating the options (at Innotribe events) and supporting the creation of innovative new solutions (through the Incubator, Startup Challenge and Proof of Concepts (POCs). It is through this approach, the Innotribe team at Swift is able to generate a platform that enables innovation across Swift and the financial community. For more information, please visit http://www.innotribe.com/.
About Swift
Swift is a member-owned cooperative that provides the communications platform, products and services to connect more than 10,000 financial institutions and corporations in 210 countries. Swift enables its users to exchange automated, standardised financial information securely and reliably, thereby lowering costs, reducing operational risk and eliminating operational inefficiencies. Swift also brings the financial community together to work collaboratively to shape market practice, define standards and debate issues of mutual interest.
For more information, please refer to http://www.swift.com/
For more information, please refer to http://www.swift.com/ or contact:
Cognito Europe
Paul Bowhay / Claudia Coleman
Tel: +44 (0) 207 438 1100
innotribe@cognitomedia.com
