Mastercard today marked the first tests of a new digital service that has the potential to verify a person’s identity immediately, safely and securely in both the digital and the physical world.

The initial in-market pilot will take place in Australia through two separate efforts with Australia Post and Deakin University.

Eventus Systems, Inc., a leading global trade surveillance and market risk platform provider, has just won the 2019 FOW International Award for Best New Technology Product: Market Surveillance.  Officials from FOW, part of the Global Investor Group, announced the recognition for the firm’s Validus platform at the FOW International Awards Gala Dinner last night in London.

Disruptions that began with technological and business model innovations in other places are expressed in new ways in Asia. In banking, payments and retail, Asia is leading the wave of disruption.

In each case, these changing models, as well as unique situations, are enabling consumer choice, shifting profit margins and creating new opportunities.

Technology

Boomi™, a Dell Technologies business, today announced the results of its research on banks’ engagement with their customers. The research finds almost one in three (30%) UK adults consider the search for a better customer experience in digital interactions the main driver for changing banks. 

The research quizzed 6,000 adults across the UK and Europe on the customer experience provided by their bank, and how the bank meets their needs.

A new report published today projects that establishing financial identities for the world’s financially excluded – or “unbanked” – population would add an extra USD $250 billion to global gross domestic product (GDP), mainly from developing nations in Asia and Latin America. This is the equivalent of bringing the productive potential of a country the size of Vietnam - a country of 95 million people - into the formal global economy.

FPL Technologies, a fintech startup focused on re-imagining credit and payments in India today announced its partnership with Visa to launch a mobile-first credit card in India. FPL will issue credit cards in partnership with banks and leverage Visa’s brand, technology and global acceptance footprint to make its credit card available for a wide range of use cases. The company recently raised US $4.5M from Matrix Partners, Sequoia Capital and other reputed angel investors.

SteelEye, the compliance technology and data analytics firm, has taken the next step in its international expansion plan with the opening of a new office in Paris.

Since its inception in 2017, SteelEye has acquired over 40 clients across 7 countries. This new office supports SteelEye’s rapid growth and positions the company closer to the regulated financial markets in France. The Paris location also brings SteelEye closer to the Benelux region, Switzerland and many of its existing clients.

Visa (NYSE: V) and the pan-African fintech leader MFS Africa today announced a partnership that will help bridge the gap between the rapidly growing mobile money ecosystem in Africa and the world of online digital payments, significantly expanding Visa’s reach and its ability to open up ecommerce to the region.

Consultants with cyber security provider F-Secure have discovered an exploitable design flaw with a smart lock that attackers can use to easily pick the device. The lock’s inability to receive firmware updates means the flaw cannot be fully fixed, highlighting the difficulties faced by manufacturers and consumers with securing the new internet-connected devices hitting the market.