Tag: Mobile payments

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsBtydb2Pqc&t[/embed] 2017 Webit stage saw the cooperation of two people - the one with years of experience in the sphere of fintech - Michel Stuijt, the CEO of Eurogiro, and the great, innovative mind  Or Benoz, co-founder of Rewire. They both investigated the trends in cross-border payments.

In his experience, Michel opens the discussion, he outlined a four expectations of what people see in the future of payments:

• Free

• Fast, if not instant

• Secure

• Full withdrawal

However, Michel’s observations are one thing, but the Israeli point of view is different. In the developed regions in Europe, like Sweden, where Michel comes from, key words are freedom and security. In developing countries, however, there won’t be mass adoption of these technologies. For example, in India, one cannot pay rent with bitcoin.

The main trend, the future in financial technology, lies in the cooperation.

The duo on the stage is quite a good example - the financial institution Eurogiro and the innovative products Rewire create is a great example in cross border cooperation. In 20 years time the only solution for regulation of the blockchain, fintech, trading, transactions, etc, is the good cooperation between all stakeholders. Because, let’s face it - there are few companies that create new technologies in the world today. In 5 - 10 years from now, we will see many technology companies focusing on consumer experience, making the experience amazing; on the opposite side, the financial institutions, organizations, etc, already have financial instruments, licenses and the infrastructure. The future of cross border payments lies in the cooperation between both ways.

Mobile payments right now are incredibly complicated and figuring out how to do them has been a great challenge. However, once we figured that out the next challenge we are facing is how to persuade consumers to use them. Speedinvest is an early stage venture fund in Vienna. They invest in countries like Turkey, Slovenia, and hopefully soon in Bulgaria. Investing in FinTech is like a rollercoaster, with disruptions going on in every field, like trading, cryptocurrency, payment and many other fields. It really doesn’t matter which area you will choose, there is room for startups in all of them. This is because big players aren’t able to cope with the development speeds of the technology, they are not flexible enough. There are exceptions to this rule, but startups are generally more able to grasp the new trends in technology and use it to create a new field. As in every other startup market you need to create traction with your first product, or you will not get too far. FinTech is different, however, from other verticals, because it is a regulated business. When you start one you have to choose to either partner with a licensed institution or get a license yourself. Both of these solutions take time, and getting a license yourself costs a lot of money. One piece of advice to take away is that investing in teams made up only of experts is not a good idea. It looks very tempting, but those people are typically not very good founders. Really good founders can learn about every field and become an expert in the field in a very short period of time. The ways Speedinvest deals with the founders it finances is creating bonds with them, not just giving them money. In order to be successful in the field, there has to be mutual trust and respect between founder and investor. The investment is emotional as well as financial.

 "In the end, it is all about great founders. No matter what and how much you invest, you need a great founder team in order to succeed" shared on the stage of CEEDS'15 Stefan Klestil - General Partner, SpeedInvest.