The South African Reserve Bank (SARB) on Thursday announced 12 financial technology (fintech) solutions to be showcased at its Fintech Demo Day, on October 29, in Johannesburg, when it would select the two winning solutions.
The 12 solutions were identified through the Global Fintech Hackcelerator @ Southern Africa, which was the result of the SARB teaming up with financial innovation platform KPMG Matchi in August.
The 2019 Global Fintech Hackcelerator @ Southern Africa is an acceleration programme that creates a platform for fintech firms to demonstrate their solutions to complex financial challenges in the Southern African region.
Fintech firms from all over the world were invited to submit an application in response to problem statements constructed in collaboration with the SARB.
The regional hackcelerator received 95 entries from interested fintech firms located across the globe.
All responding firms were validated by KPMG Matchi’s analysts and scored by a team of 24 industry executives from the following organisations: Absa, Capitec, Discovery, the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA), FirstRand Group, Investec, Liberty Group, National Treasury, Nedbank, SARB, Standard Bank, and the Technology Innovation Agency.
The Fintech Demo Day event aims to explore sustainable financial services innovations that must address real-world financial services challenges. A panel of judges from the SARB, the FSCA, local and Asian industry experts will select and announce two winning solutions.
Each Global Fintech Hackcelerator @ Southern Africa winner will receive a stipend towards travel expenses to attend the 2019 Singapore Fintech Festival. Each will get an opportunity to pitch their solution live during the Hackcelerator Demo Day at the 2019 Singapore Fintech Festival and engage with industry experts.
Further, each winner will receive funding to develop a contextualised proof of concept - to be deployed within a year from the Demo Day - and work with high-value corporates to contextualise a solution to their needs, as well as obtaining market entry into the Singapore and Asia-Pacific region.
The top three winners at the Singapore Fintech Festival will each receive a cash prize.
The 12 solutions selected by the SARB as finalists are car and household insurance advice app Ctrl; virtual identity app e4 Strategic; corporate data navigation analytics company Emerge Analytics; digital financial services development aide company Hydrogen; artificial intelligence auditor company MindBridge Analytics; digital insurance platform Nimbla; biometric payment company Paycode; remittance monitoring company Sedicii; small and medium-sized digital banking service company Strands; automated insurance process company Tautona AI; informal traders digital payments company Ukheshe; and blockchain real estate company Wealth Migrate.