New York FinTech Innovation Lab Calls for New Entrepreneurial Applicants
Wells Fargo is the latest addition to the group of mentors supporting the Accenture and Partnership Fund for NYC FinTech Innovation Lab program. Now in its fifth year, the 12-week program has helped early and growth-stage financial technology companies develop their business by giving them access to C-suite executives and real-world applications at some of the world's largest institutions.
The lab is gaining momentum among startups and banks. Wells Fargo joins an impressive list of supporting institutions with presence in New York City, including American Express, Barclays, Bank of America, Capital One, Goldman Sachs, Citi, Credit Suisse ,and JPMorgan Chase.
The program connects qualified fintech companies with the institution it feels will be the best fit. The executives and institutions commit to the development and fine tuning of an entrepreneur's technology before knowing (and with little input into) which startup will be assigned to them.
Incubator programs like the one co-founded by Accenture and Partnership Fund for NYC have become more popular in recent years as financial firms have looked to smaller firms for cutting-edge ideas to stay ahead of competitors. The number of sponsors and entrepreneurial applicants have likewise increased. According to a 2014 Accenture and PFNYC report, global investment in fintech companies has grown four times faster than venture investing overall. And investment has been growing rapidly in New York's fintech sector, which received $472.1 million of venture and private equity investment in the first three quarters of the year -- more than was invested during all of 2013.
"The FinTech Innovation Lab promotes a unique collaboration between financial institutions and startups that ultimately forms strategic partnerships for both parties," said Cris Conde, former CEO of SunGard and executive-in-residence of the FinTech Innovation Lab, said in a press release. "The program is designed to help these entrepreneurial companies turn their innovations into the products and services that participating banks need the most to address their customers' challenges and needs."
FinTech Innovation Labs in New York, and now in London and Hong Kong, have featured entrepreneurs in the areas of big data and analytics, mobile and wireless, payments, risk management, security, and social media and collaboration technologies. Applications for the 2015 FinTech Innovation Lab are available at www.fintechinnovationlab.com and are due Dec. 5.
Becca Lipman is Senior Editor for Wall Street & Technology. She writes in-depth news articles with a focus on big data and compliance in the capital markets. She regularly meets with information technology leaders and innovators and writes about cloud computing, datacenters, ... View Full Bio
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