7 Startups to Watch: Payments, Savings, Blockchain, and More
Knowing which startups to keep an eye on in fintech can be a full time job (for some, it is actually a full-time job), especially as more and more of them launch, get funding, and partner up with banks.
Take a look at the seven startups Bank Innovation is watching this month below:
Berlin is playing host to a growing number of fintechs in Europe, one of which is bonify, a startup founded in 2015 by alumni of Zalando and McKinsey. The company offers consumers free access to their credit score, before allowing that user to upload other financial data. Once uploaded, the startup provides credit tools and personalized financial recommendations to the user, enabling consumers to have a more transparent, holistic view of their money.
Mortgages are one of the most competitive (if not the most competitive) financial products offered to consumers, and yet, most potential homeowners still have to deal with week-long wait times and a backlog of paper documentation.
Better Mortgage, founded in 2014 by Vishal Garg, thinks that for a transaction that costs about $5,000 in administrative fees alone, the mortgage process should be, well, better. The first step is digital, which is why the New York-based company provides a completely digital, automated mortgage experience for users. The startup utilizes data science and machine learning on its platform to provide the best possible loan matches and recommendations for that particular user.
Blockchain is a thriving area for financial services, and startups like Factom are part of the reasons why.
This Austin-based startup’s goal is to provide companies with all of the security benefits of the blockchain, without experiencing any of the typical problems that come with building one’s own chain (cost, speed, etc). Factom uses blockchain-as-a-service to securely store data in a decentralized way, with everything from mortgage documents to digital assets to compliance data.
Taking financial data, aggregating it, regularizing it via machine learning, and then providing it to anonymous data scientists paid in bitcoin sounds a bit like science fiction. Numerai has been doing it for two years.
The San Francisco-based startup is aiming to push more financial data to scientists, taking out the human bias that normally filters into the stock market by using machine learning to make the data both more available and more abstract. Essentially, Numerai is using data and machine learning to build a giant, collaborative brain working on the best model for hedge funds and stocks—and its scientists are paid in bitcoin for the trouble.
Changing consumer behavior when it comes to finances is not particularly easy (there’s a reason there are about a dozen personal finance management and investment apps vying for the top slot), but startups like Nutmeg are making pretty decent strides.
The London-based startup has been active since 2010, and provides an online investment platform for users that specializes in investments and savings. The service also gives users more transparency when it comes to managing their pensions and ISAs.
Making the right investments is a key part of financial health for consumers, but so are savings — making the choosing of the right savings product quite important. Raisin (previously SavingsGlobal) is working on it.
Founded in 2013, this Berlin-based startup provides users with an online marketplace for savings products. Using its platform, consumers can open deposits across Europe, skipping the traditional, lengthy account-opening process. The safety of Raisin deposits for up to €100,000 euros, by the National Deposit Guarantee Scheme.
Creating the next generation of cross-border payments isn’t easy, but luckily, we have cryptocurrency. Startups like Veem are using it to allow small businesses to send or receive payments across the globe using local currency.
The San Francisco-based startup is using blockchain to facilitate these payments, which has the additional benefit of eliminating the middlemen during the transactions (banks and other institutions which process cross-border funds).
Take a look at the other startups currently on Bank Innovation’s Watchlist.
