The European Women Payments Network (EWPN) and the U.S.-based Women’s Network in Electronic Transactions (Wnet) share a mission to create better opportunities for women and the men that advocate for them in the fintech and payments industries. As a result of their like-minded goals to improve inclusion and diversity, the two organisations today announced they are coming together to allow their respective members to share the benefits of both networks. Members of both organisations can learn more by visiting EWPN and Wnet.

Through the new alliance, EWPN and Wnet will publish dedicated landing pages where members can access each organisations’ extensive intelligence, networking opportunities events, and programming. EWPN, launched in 2015 to champion diversity and inclusion in fintech and payments, serves over 1,000 individual members and 11 corporate members. Wnet, launched in 2005, serves over 3,000 women each year in the U.S., through events, information and knowledge sharing, and networking opportunities.

“This exciting alliance will see EWPN and Wnet working together, leveraging both networks for the benefit of all our combined members”, explained Martha Mghendi-Fisher, Founder of EWPN. “Both networks are dedicated to improving prospects for all women in the payments industry, increasing inclusivity and diversity. Sharing our insights, knowledge and membership will make us both stronger and allow us to bring about change as quickly as possible".

Members will also have access to each organisation’s workshops and networking events in various U.S. and European countries throughout the year, as well as mentorship programmes. In addition, individual members of EWPN and Wnet may become members of the other organisation at a discounted rate, even if their employer is not a corporate member or sponsor.

Wnet Executive Director Lisl Dutterer announced the collaboration news on stage at the 2019 Wnet Leadership Summit "Leading in a Changing World", the premier payments industry event designed by and for women leaders and the men who advocate for them.

“By working together, Wnet and EWPN are creating global change and the opportunity for more women to lead in the payments industry”, said Dutterer. “Wnet has been extending our member benefits to women around the globe, and we are excited for the opportunity to work with EWPN’s leadership to accomplish that goal. Sharing our insights, knowledge, and experience will make our organisations stronger and is another effort to bring about positive change across the global payments ecosystem”.
 

Since launching in 2015 as the first ever non-bank to provide Virtual IBAN accounts, Banking Circle has been delivering ground-breaking FinTech solutions to help increase financial inclusion. As a next-generation provider of mission-critical financial services infrastructure, Banking Circle is continually growing its team and recruiting innovative developers to build market-leading solutions.

Now the multi-award-winning financial utility, which started life in a small Copenhagen office, is seeking new talent to join the team based in Denmark. Michel André, Chief Technology Officer of Banking Circle, commented: “When Banking Circle launched it had just three employees, but has grown at a tremendous pace with the global team now comprising over 200 people, including more than 50 already based in Copenhagen.

“However, to continue developing so rapidly and delivering solutions which offer true value to businesses around the world, we need to grow our team and bring in new talent with diverse experiences and new ideas.

“We are excited to be attending GOTO Copenhagen 2019 later this month and look forward to showing budding and experienced developers how they can be part of improving SME financial inclusion around the world, which in turn boosts economies. Not only is Banking Circle a great place to work, but it is a FinTech pushing for and inspiring change in the global financial industry today.”

As Chief Technology Officer, Michel André heads up the Banking Circle technology team based in Copenhagen. He has more than 20 years’ experience as a financial services developer, designing and redesigning a wide range of existing and new trading and risk management systems to increase scalability and throughput.

To find out more about Banking Circle, visit its booth at GOTO Copenhagen, or www.bankingcircle.com.

A new report from Sage, the market leader in cloud business management solutions, says the role of the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) has changed forever. Their primary role is no longer in financial reporting, but they are now polymaths driving strategy and making technology decisions that affect the whole organisation.

The ‘Sage CFO 3.0 – digital transformation beyond financial management’ report is a wide-ranging look into the future of business finance. It reveals a significant evolution in the CFO’s job function, having to become a ‘ninja of numbers’ in digital transformation, data analytics, cyber security, and financial accounting.

The study showed nine-in-ten (94%) financial decision makers believe their financial role has expanded and shifted ‘significantly’ in the last five years. Now, six-in-ten say they’re primarily responsible for digital transformation.

Yet, two thirds of CFOs (64%) are still unable to make data-driven decisions to drive business change. Almost half (42%) are spending just as much time collecting and preparing data as they are analysing it, limiting the overall productivity of the finance function. For many, this means they rely on experience and intuition, rather than the overwhelming weight of data they have at their disposal.

Sabby Gill, Managing Director UKI at Sage said: “CFOs are expected to be ‘visionaries’, using data to make intelligent decisions, in order to drive digital transformation in their organisation. For this to become a reality, it has to be easier for leaders to act upon data at speed. They need tools that will empower them to use their skills and experience in a much more compelling way.”

“While the burst of e-commerce and, in turn, digital transformation in business poses many opportunities, it is the very nature of e-commerce that is driving the top three challenges that financial decision makers face - managing risk such as fraud and cybersecurity, compliance and legislation changes and adapting to changing role requirements”, said Gill.

However, the report also highlights organisations must not overlook the cultural impact of new technology. While eight-in-ten respondents (86%) believe that automation has already improved business productivity, six-in-ten are worried about the extent to which their role will be automated in future. The vast majority (93%) believe that technology has to be carefully selected to align with the culture of an organisation.

“Automation does not pose a threat to the workforce, but rather an opportunity to focus on the changing requirements of the business and core competencies. It’s clear that investment in data-centric tools and skill-sets will help propel business finance forward.

“The intersection between emerging technology and human interaction has created an opportunity for leaders to reimagine business, upskill and offer a more strategic and visionary approach to their role.”

The majority (94%) of finance leaders believe next-generation financial management technology has a crucial part to play as their role changes. At the same time, technological literacy is the number one priority for over two thirds (78%) of CFOs.

Sage releases ‘Sage CFO 3.0 – digital transformation beyond financial management’ as the company announces the launch of Sage Intacct cloud financial management in the UK. For more information visit www.sage.com/uk/intacct.

“While we welcome AI, we should also realise its implications and consequences”, says Suresh Prabhu at World AI & RPA Show

The recent announcement of corporate giants Reliance Jio and Microsoft coming together in a 10-year partnership to provide digital solutions to Indian startups has shown us that India is getting serious about going digital. While technology is evolving at an exponential rate, most Indian industries are led by the fear of being left behind when it comes to having the competitive advantage of leveraging emerging technologies in their businesses. The growing interest of Indian organizations in deploying 5^th generation technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning and Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is likely to drive significant growth in investments in this space. According to Accenture, AI has the potential to add US$957 billion, or 15% of India’s current gross value in 2035, and with the RPA market growing immensely at 63.1% to US$846 million last year, research firm, Gartner predicts that by the end of 2022, 85% of large organisations will have deployed some form of RPA.

In India, RPA is finding itself to be most significant in the BFSI, BPM and F&A sectors, with the highest adoption rate through multi-process use case implementations. Indian banks such as State Bank of India (SBI) and Bank of Baroda are already betting big on AI. However, being the IT capital of South Asia and a leader in producing IT infrastructure and manpower, where does India stand as a potential contender in the race for AI and RPA leadership among top countries like South Korea, the United States, Germany, Singapore and Japan?

NITI Aayog’s plan to establish a National Program on AI spells out the government think tank’s AI strategies that are set to roll out in critical areas such as agriculture, healthcare, education, Smart Cities and Infrastructure and Smart Mobility.

At the global AI conference, World AI & RPA Show that was hosted in Mumbai recently, Suresh Prabhu, India's Sherpa to G7 and G20 and former Union Minister for Commerce and Industry stressed on the importance of India’s national strategy to leverage AI for economic benefits. In his keynote, he added, “Even the most developed economies are still trying to comprehend how to deal with artificial intelligence. We must look at the ethical side of emerging technologies and make sure that while we welcome AI, on one hand, we should also realise its implications, consequences and how to deal with it in a rational manner.”  

The conference hosted close to 550+ top C-level executives that included AI & RPA business solution providers, innovative startups and investors who came together to contribute to the global conversation on AI and India’s stake in the AI revolution. As one of the most attractive destinations for startups, the conference also hosted the Pegasus Tech Ventures Startup World Cup Regionals that provided a platform for nine startups in the tech space to pitch their innovative solutions to global investors. Bengaluru–based drone and Data Analytics organization, AeroLogiks triumphed as the winner of the pitch competition.

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CDP Equity and FSIA Investimenti, a company held 70% by FSI Investimenti (in turn controlled by CDP Equity with a 77% stake) and 30% by Poste Italiane, has today concluded the acquisition of the shareholdings in SIA, the payment systems company, of F2i, HAT, Intesa Sanpaolo and UniCredit.

More specifically, CDP Equity has acquired from F2i Reti Logiche 17.05% and from Orizzonte Infrastructure Tecnologiche (entirely owned by HAT) 8.64% of SIA, thereby becoming owner of 25.69% of the company, while FSIA has acquired the shares held by UniCredit and Intesa Sanpaolo, equal to 3.97% each, increasing their stake in the shareholding from 49.5% to 57.5%.

Commenting on the deal concluded today, Pierpaolo Di Stefano - Chief Investment Officer of CDP and CEO of CDP Equity – underlined that CDP will continue in its strategy of developing and strengthening SIA, since that of payments and financial transactions is a strategic and highly innovative sector. The acquisition of these further stakes also serves to offer more effective strategic options in order to maximize the value of the investment, the technological benefits and the creation of jobs in Italy.

In these years, F2i has accompanied SIA’s extraordinary industrial development that has seen it double its operations and economic results in the period in which we have held a stake in its capital, helping it to become a Europewide player. With this investment, we have achieved results in line with our fund’s mission: create Italian infrastructural models capable of competing worldwide and generating solid returns for our investors”, said Renato Ravanelli, F2i’s CEO.

“We are highly satisfied with this operation - commented Nino Attanasio, Chairman of HAT – and sure of the fact that CDP will carry on in its industrial project to develop SIA in the payments area, with innovative solutions able to support the growth of the country system.” “The SIA acquisition – added Ignazio Castiglioni, CEO of HAT – demonstrates our ability to invest in an opportunity accessible to few and to distinguish ourselves as a value added investment fund manager, capable of contributing financial and technological know how”.

Ripple, the enterprise blockchain solution for global payments, announced today that the company has surpassed 300 customers. Ripple has also seen 10x year-over-year growth in transactions on RippleNet, the company’s global network of banks and financial institutions that enables faster, lower-cost payments around the world.

Just last year at Ripple’s annual conference Swell, the company announced On-Demand Liquidity (ODL), which leverages the digital asset XRP as a bridge currency to eliminate the need for pre-funding in cross border payments. 

In less than a year since the commercialization of ODL, Ripple has seen tremendous growth and customer interest with two dozen customers signed on to use the product. Some of the notable customers committed to using ODL include goLance, Viamericas, FlashFX and Interbank Peru. There have been more than 7x the number of transactions using ODL from the end of Q1 to the end of October. 

• Michael Brooks, CEO of goLance: “The freelance marketplace is growing dramatically as more companies are hiring talent, both domestic and overseas, to help grow their businesses. At goLance, we want to ensure that freelancers are paid on-time, with minimal fees. That's why we're partnering with Ripple. Through our partnership, goLance uses blockchain technology and XRP to address the current inefficiencies with cross-border payments by making transactions quicker, more reliable and cheaper. By lowering the cost of sending payments, goLance can put more money into the hands of the freelancers and improve their quality of life.” 
• Paul Dwyer, CEO of Viamericas: "As one of the fastest growing money transmitters in the world, we understand the current challenges of sending money globally and look for operational efficiencies to make the process easier and more affordable for the people we serve. Last year, remittance flows were at an all time high at close to $600 billion, and have long been one of the largest sources of external financing in developing countries, of particular importance to low and middle income families. Ripple's On-Demand Liquidity enables us to send real-time payments and lower payment costs, as we are able to manage our liquidity more efficiently."
• Nicolas Steiger, CEO of FlashFX: “As one of the earliest adopters of Ripple’s On-Demand Liquidity, we’ve seen the benefits firsthand of the product and its potential to not only dramatically improve cross border payments for customers, but to also impact our bottom line. We’re excited to be at the forefront of using this technology and to help Australians save time and money when transferring money overseas.”

ODL first launched offering payment corridors in Mexico and the Philippines. Corridors have since expanded to Australia, with Brazil coming soon. Plans for additional corridors across APAC, EMEA and LATAM are in progress for 2020.

“This year has been our strongest for Ripple yet. In 2019 we’ve seen continued momentum with customers, growth of RippleNet and adoption of On-Demand Liquidity. In just a year since we launched ODL, we are already making an impact on the bottom line for our customers,” said Brad Garlinghouse, CEO of Ripple. “We’re excited to continue this momentum into next year and for the expansion of ODL into new markets.”

In June MoneyGram, one of the world’s largest money transfer companies, announced its plans to implement ODL. Just two months after the announcement, MoneyGram was live and transacting on RippleNet. The company initially started with payments into Mexico, from the US and has since started sending cross border payments to the Philippines.

"One of the core strengths of MoneyGram is our global liquidity and settlement engine that enables our customers to send money in over 200 countries and territories. Our partnership with Ripple has helped us to improve this strength and we’ve already started seeing the product’s potential to streamline our back- end capabilities,” said Alex Holmes, MoneyGram’s CEO. “For the first time ever, we're settling currencies in seconds, and because of these results, we’re expanding our partnership with Ripple and are excited to announce that we have started executing foreign currency trades with the Philippine peso using ODL.”

Sage, the market leader in cloud business management solutions, is today launching its financial management platform Sage Intacct to customers in the UK. The native cloud platform gives CFOs and their teams the insights and automation they need to deliver a value-add, strategic service, keeping up with the ever-changing demands of the digital business environment.

Earlier this year, Sage Intacct scored the highest product score (4.63 out of five) for Core Financials for the Lower Midsize Enterprises use case in the 2019 Gartner report Critical Capabilities for Cloud Core Financial Management Suites for Midsize, Large, and Global Enterprises. This is the third straight year Sage Intacct has scored highest for that use case.

Sage Intacct provides finance professionals with:

• A platform designed for and by CFOs and finance professionals: Sage Intacct is a powerful cloud financial management platform, designed for finance professionals, providing deep multi-dimensional accounting, automation for efficient financial operations and sophisticated visibility for real-time decision making
• Best of breed integration: Sage Intacct’s technology uses open APIs, making it easy to connect with third party cloud applications, including Salesforce, providing a highly extensible and scalable platform
• Lower cost of ownership: Sage Intacct is a highly modular solution where customers pay for what they need, get more efficient and cost-effective implementations, world class security backups and disaster recovery delivering a lower total cost of ownership

Commenting on the local availability of Sage Intacct, Sabby Gill, Managing Director UKI at Sage, said: “Our UK research shows that CFOs are now expected to be ‘visionaries’, using and analysing data to predict the future direction of the organisation and drive digital transformation. This is the next stage of an evolution that has already seen them move from being historians to real time analysts.

“With two thirds of financial directors still making decisions based on gut feel - not data - the modern finance department needs access to high-capacity automated financial management, to enable CFOs to provide strategic direction on digital spending, managing risks, imposing governance and responding to regulatory change.

“The UK launch of Sage Intacct addresses this clear need in the market, providing finance professionals with the tools they need to meet the needs of the modern enterprise – all in the cloud.” 

Aaron Harris, Chief Technology Officer, Sage, said: “Sage is committed to providing every customer, including finance leaders, with the tools and technologies they need to thrive every day. Sage Intacct brings trusted tools that enable them to not only deliver on their core competencies, but also be confident in driving the digital agenda throughout their organisation. The successful internationalisation of Sage Intacct will empower our global customers to accelerate growth, streamline financial processes, and deliver the operational insights needed to scale their business.”

Sage Intacct is named by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) as its first and only preferred provider of [US] financial applications. Sage Intacct consistently scores higher than any other ERP grid report and currently has a satisfaction rating of 98 out of 100 on G2.com . 

New research by Sage, ‘CFO 3.0 - digital transformation beyond financial management,’ highlights how the role of a CFO has changed from managing compliance and day-to-day operations to providing visionary leadership and driving digital transformation.

Sage Intacct available in the UK

Sage Intacct will be brought to customers through direct and partner channels. Business partners certified for the program offer deep expertise in specific vertical markets. The first cohort of partners includes Acuity, Baldwins, Ion, ITAS, Percipient, Solutions for Accounting, with PwC being named as a Strategic Partner for implementation and business transformation services.

Sage Intacct also offers customers easy access to a growing ecosystem of technology partners that deliver complementary, pre-integrated solutions to extend the capabilities of Sage Intacct via the Sage Intacct Marketplace. More than 75% of existing Sage Intacct customers have seamlessly integrated two or more Marketplace solutions as part of their Sage Intacct deployment -- including applications for CRM, ecommerce, advanced inventory management, payroll, point of sale, tax management, and time & expense management.

The UK launch of Sage Intacct marks a key milestone for Sage, as the product is now available to customers across all four major English-speaking markets: US, Canada, Australia and now the UK. For more information on Sage Intacct in the UK visit www.sage.com/uk/intacct.

Mumbai Fintech Hub (MFH) and FinTech Convergence Council (FCC) have joined hands for a collaborative growth ecosystem for fintech in India. The two bodies have jointly fashioned the ‘India Fintech Festival (IFF)’ a global platform to showcase the opportunities while discussing the key challenges in the industry and the possible solutions to counter the same. IFF 2020 is backed by the Government of Maharashtra (GoM) as it will be driven by GoM Fintech Policy, operationalized under MahaIT. The platform is powered by World Bank, NITI AAYOG and Invest India, while MEDICI, a global innovation and insights platform for fintech is the program partner.

Fintech in India has today become a global growth story riding on key points such as – digitizing money in financial services, solving for identity in the form of Aadhaar for formalization, getting everyone a bank account or equivalents (PMJDY) to store money, building scalable platform(s) to move money (IMPS, UPI, etc.) and finally, allowing banks, FinTechs and wealth/insurance/lending players to access platform like UPI to innovate. This framework has led India to a FinTech revolution.

The GoM and FCC now aim to foster next-generation innovation enabling financial empowerment and technological advancement across the entire financial services ecosystem thus nurturing the sector for global competence. The Government wants to take the first step in this direction by focusing on making the country the next FinTech destination globally.

The festival, scheduled in the first week of March 2020, intends to empower the global FinTech ecosystem by providing them with an opportunity to showcase their ideas and technologies that promote innovation in the financial services’ industry. The platform will help build relationships, create business and investment opportunities while bringing together the who’s who across the global landscape to discuss the effects of regulatory and policy shifts. 5000 delegates across 50+ countries comprising of Fintech start-ups are expected to attend the event along with regulators, key financial institutions, tech companies, governments, industry bodies, corporates and students.

IFF will serve as a representation for the innovations of the best of over 2000+ Indian startups working to make India a $5 trillion economy by 2024. With the present economy at $2.7 trillion India’s is aiming for two times growth. Whereas digital financial services contribution to economy is expected to grow by five times during the same period.    

Maharashtra was the first state to launch a FinTech policy in 2018 which is being operated under the banner of "Mumbai FinTech Hub", in an attempt to build awareness and inculcate the widespread adoption of financial technologies.

The festival will have an advisory board with eminent personalities like Suniti Nanda, Fintech Officer, Government of Maharashtra, Naveen Surya, Chairman, Fintech Convergence Council; G Padmanabhan, Ex-RBI Executive Director, Current Non- Executive Chairman at Bank of India; Dilip Asbe, Managing Director & CEO at National Payments Corporation of India; Srinivas Jain, Executive Director and Chief Marketing Officer, SBI Mutual Fund; and Mohan Tanksale, Strategic Consultant, SWIFT among others.

On the occasion, Mr. Ajit Patil, IAS – MD, Maharashtra IT Corporation Limited said “With 400+ Fintechs, an API sandbox, investment platform, education platform, fintech adoption by state - we are leading the Fintech movement in India. We are firm in our belief to make Mumbai a Global Fintech Hub and the Fintech gateway for India. Through IFF (India Fintech Festival), we look forward to host 1000+ global delegation. We aim to showcase our Fintech strength and foster investments / new Fintech setup in the state”

Ms. Esperanza Lasagabaster, Practice Manager - Finance, Competitiveness and Innovation Global Practice, World Bank said “The World Bank recognizes the positive impact Fintech can have in addressing the long-standing barriers for financial inclusion, financial sector deepening and development. In recognition of this potential the World Bank jointly with the International Monetary Fund unveiled the Bali Fintech Agenda in October 2018 to guide our efforts in helping our client countries harness the opportunities and mitigate the risks associated with the rapid advances in financial technology that are transforming the economic and financial landscape. We are pleased to be a partner to the Government of Maharashtra and the Fintech Convergence Council in the organization of the inaugural India Fintech Festival. This event will offer an opportunity to showcase the rapid strides made by India in harnessing the potential of Fintech responsibly and also to bring lessons from across the World to shape the further development of Fintech in India.”

Ms. Suniti Nanda, Fintech Officer – Government of Maharashtra, said, “An event like IFF (India Fintech Festival) will be a testimony by itself which resonates the objective and passion of COLLABORATION between all key stakeholders in Fintech ecosystem.”

Commenting on this progressive move, Mr. G. Padmanabhan, Ex-RBI Executive Director and Current Non- Executive Chairman at Bank of India said, "India boasts of a state-of-the-art financial services system but the goal of complete digitisation is still miles away. The world is witnessing a technological revolution and being one of the fastest growing economies it is imminent that India joins the digital wave. Any event of this magnitude is impossible without the support of the most important stake holder, the Government, and we are fortunate to get their whole-hearted backing. The spontaneous gesture of support by the World Bank and other influential policy makers has encouraged us further to bring to you the best of FinTech-- be it speakers, seminars or the latest technological developments. I hope this event becomes the harbinger of digital transformation for the Indian FinTech ecosystem."

Mr. Naveen Surya, Chairman, Fintech Convergence Council who has been instrumental in bringing fundamental changes in the digital payments system was quoted saying, “India has led its digital Initiatives across the globe thanks to the potential of innovation, investment and collaboration in the country. This sector though evolving rapidly is still in its nascent stage. It is therefore imperative for opportunities to be harnessed in the right ways thus cementing India's position as a leader in the digital landscape. IFF was conceived as that global platform to facilitate communication and collaboration through shared learning experiences across the globe. We are thankful to many prestigious institutions who have agreed to become our partners and our eminent advisory board for their role in making IFF a reality."

Dilip Asbe, Managing Director and CEO, National Payments Council of India stated, “NPCI is committed towards the mission of Digital India. With the support of Government of Maharashtra and IAMAI/FCC, we expect IFF to host a vibrant community of innovation enablers, enterprises and start-ups to drive new solutions relevant to address industry needs and challenges. Government of Maharashtra has been the first state in India to create a Fintech Policy and IFF would be yet another step towards providing the right and deserved platform to the innovative tech minds who are ready to disrupt the fintech space.”

A survey has revealed that nearly a third of UK employees (31%) do not check their payslips regularly.

This is despite one in seven (15%) of the 1129 employees surveyed by IRIS Software Group indicating that they were worried about the accuracy of their payslips. 

The research showed that somewhat surprisingly, it was people working in the finance and accountancy sectors that were among the least likely to regularly check their payslips (41%), along with those employed in media, marketing and sales (47%) and education (42%). 

A number of high-profile cases in recent years have underlined the importance of employees reviewing payslips to check for errors.

It was only a couple of years ago that Tesco had to pay out nearly £10m in underpayments to 140,000 of its employees due to a payroll glitch. Argos too have fallen foul of payroll errors and ended up with a whopping £1.5m HMRC fine on top of owed backpay topping £2.4m.

Nick Gregory, chief marketing officer at payroll experts, IRIS Software Group, said: “We find that one of the main reasons employees don’t read their payslips is because they do not fully understand them. 

“Organisations could do more to help staff understand their pay. Providing fact sheets and visual guides to explain all the terms on a payslip would be one way to make this easier.”

The survey also revealed that many small and medium-sized businesses are sticking to paper payslips over electronic methods. Nearly a quarter of all employees stated that they still received paper payslips, four out of five of which (84%) worked for SMEs.

Nick Gregory continues: “The survey results suggest that SMEs may be slower in making the move to digital than larger businesses. But the added risk associated with paper-based payslips arriving late or going missing means going digital should be a priority for any size of business.”  

Equiniti, an international technology-led services and payments specialist, is delighted to announce that it has opened EQ Tek, a new R&D facility for its client-facing applications.

Headquartered in Krakow, Poland, EQ Tek will create an additional 150 roles for high-calibre developers as well as systems and UX experts within Equiniti. The team will be developing best-in-class applications and product delivery systems across all divisions of the business.

This focused operation is expected to transform the services Equiniti is able to offer its entire client-base, delivering a sophisticated suite of applications and a market-leading digital experience for end customers.

Opening the office in Krakow unlocks a huge pool of talent in one of the world’s most exciting cities for tech innovation. The state-of-the-art facility is located in a newly built tech hub that is already home to a number of multi-national organisations, including Salesforce, Cisco and IBM.

The new app-focused facility, adds to Equiniti’s growing technology estate. Since 2016 the Group has opened a Fintech Innovation Centre in Cardiff, a Northern Tech Hub in Leeds and a data science lab in Exeter. In February this year, a new Digital Hub in Bangalore also went operational to underpin its North American business.

The office will be officially opened today by James Hughes, Minister-Counsellor for Economic Affairs (British Embassy), Ms Katarzyna Wysocka, Director of the Entrepreneurship and Innovation Department (Krakow), Guy Wakeley, (Group Chief Executive Officer at Equiniti) and Kevin O’Connor (Group Chief Information Officer at Equiniti).

Guy Wakeley, commented: “Technology underpins everything that we do at Equiniti, so by investing in a dedicated centre to develop these applications that are so essential, we expect to start delivering a truly differentiated service across our international client base.”

Kevin O’Connor, who is leading on the delivery of the new office, commented: “We are delighted that EQ Tek is up and running, and we have made a strong start on developing the top-quality applications that will be of invaluable use for our international clients across our broad suite of services.

“Krakow is a globally renowned hub of tech talent and it is already clear that we have recruited an incredibly high-level team that will push our products on to the next level.”

James Hughes commented: “We are delighted to support the investment of another UK Fintech company in Poland. Equiniti is a profitable, growing business with a fantastic reputation in the tech sector and their commitment to looking after their team is great to see. I am sure they will be impressed by the sheer scale of tech talent in Krakow and I look forward to following their progress over the coming years.”