A great conclusion to Matchi's Innovation Sponsor Summit!

Matchi and Standard Bank hosted their inaugural Fintech Innovation Showcase at the bank’s headquarters in Johannesburg on 5 December 2014. Held in Standard Bank's auditorium, the showcase highlighted the exciting future of financial services with cutting-edge demos and presentations by 28 Matchi Innovator Members including local African fintech firms and innovators from Chicago, San Francisco, Zagreb, Tel Aviv, Boston, London and Dublin.

View the video: Standard Bank FinTech Innovation Showcase with Matchi.biz

Bank Hapoalim reserves full rights to the region of Israel for 3 years

Awarded ‘Best Bank in Israel’ by both Global Finance and Euro Money, Bank Hapoalim is the latest bank to join Matchi’s exclusive sponsor community with an agreement that includes first rights access and first mover advantage within the region of Israel for 3 years.

Read more: New Matchi Sponsor - Bank Hapoalim

Bridging the worlds of Financial Services and disruptive Tech Firms

Exclusive Interview with Matchi co-founder Warren Bond – London Fintech Podcast

Finance guru Mike Baliman’s latest Fintech podcast series aims to bridge the worlds of financial services and disruptive tech firms. Kicking-off the series with a bang, Baliman interviewed Matchi’s co-founder Warren Bond to discuss his journey with innovation as well as current fintech trends and tips for fintechs aiming to sell into banks.

Read more: London FinTech Podcast - Interview with our Warren Bond

Spanish banking giant Santander has launched a $100 million, London-based fintech venture capital fund as it bids to get in on the ground floor at startups leading the financial services digital revolution.

Owned by Santander UK but operating as an independent unit, the fund will look to invest in fintech firms around the world, initially focusing on startups involved in e-commerce and payments, online lending and investing, and big data analytics.

Read the full article in Finextra: Santander launches $100m fintech venture fund

Recognised as "The most valuable banking brand in Africa" by Forbes Magazine, Standard Bank Group has joined Matchi's exclusive sponsor community with an agreement that includes full rights to the Sub-Saharan region for 3 years.

Endorsing the recent trend for banks and innovators to find each other in innovation eco-systems, Africa's largest bank is now actively seeking innovations aligned to their strategy through Matchi's innovation matchmaking platform.

Read more: Standard Bank joins Exclusive Matchi Sponsor Community

The global innovations team of Claro Partners and the strategic arm of leading financial advisory firm Anthemis Group have joined forces to launch a new range of consortium projects to dive deeper into major disruptive shifts in financial services.

The first project ‘Always in Beta’ - Financial Services for Digital Natives will start in early Fall and Claro and Anthemis are now seeking organisations to be part of this exclusive opportunity.

Read more: Join a new project on the disruptive shifts in financial services

Marketplaces are one of the things that have thrived on the Internet since day one. These marketplaces, such as eBay, Craigslist, AngelList, Etsy, Zando and countless others, have removed friction between buyers and sellers of stuff. Online dating has done the same for romance.

New platforms, which seek to remove friction between innovative ideas or products and their potential buyers, are emerging. In this article I look at how this is happening in financial services, based on my personal experience with one player in particular.

Entrepreneur, meet Bank; Bank, meet Entrepreneur

Read the full article in Finweek: ENTREPRENEURSHIP: Fintech matchmaking leading to new love