• Martin Cass, Vice President at Barclays Wealth


• 07.09.2016 12:45 pm
Fintech

1.      Go international early

Any successful entrepreneur will tell you that if you want to build a global business, the sooner you get yourself on a plane the better. This is probably truer in fintech than any other sector. Dublin is a thriving international tech hub and has a unique standing internationally as both the country’s financial centre and tech capital. However, Brexit or no Brexit, London is still the world’s financial and fintech capital, with Europe’s largest VC network. Being located in the heart of this ecosystem for 13 weeks is the opportunity of a lifetime. Last year we received 680 applications from 56 countries for 10 places on the programme. This is a chance to test yourself against the best in the world. Moreover, the experience you will bring back to Ireland afterwards will serve to enhance the ecosystem here, helping both the current and next generation to fulfil their global ambitions.

2.      Access amazing mentors

Startups often ask us why they should choose a single bank fintech Accelerator such as ours over a multi bank one; thinking that there would be more value in the latter. The answer is simple – While the latter will lead to a bunch of great first meetings, it often leads to little follow through; whereas with us you get direct access to and mentorship from a senior Barclays team from the start and right throughout the programme. You also get hands on mentorship from Techstars’ team (all former entrepreneurs and/or industry experts with wide-ranging experience), as well as access to a diverse panel of external mentors from the financial services sector and beyond (with backgrounds in engineering, product, marketing, finance and law). So you get the best of Barclays and much more besides. No equivalent programme in Ireland offers such breadth and depth.

3.      Challenge, develop and accelerate your business idea

This is no slow moving incubator disguised as an accelerator, so prepare to be challenged! This will be the most intensive (and enjoyable!) 13 weeks of your working lives. The goal is to take a great team with a really good early stage business/idea, rapidly turn that into a scalable business proposition and prepare the founders to raise the necessary funding to deliver this. Programme participants can leverage the Barclays and Techstars global networks – connecting your business with customers in a matter of hours and helping you grow your revenue in a matter of weeks and months, versus the usual months and years. 80% of the companies that have come through the programme were able to announce proof-of-concept agreements with Barclays on demo day and 100% announced partnerships with at least one corporate.

4.      Unparalleled preparation for financing

Month one is all about intensive mentoring, so as to generate business traction in month two, then prepare you to pitch to a room full of industry experts and investors at the Demo Day the end of month three. We had more than 400 angel and VC investors at our last London Demo Day. We prepare you by ensuring that you can answer the questions that they will ask...and can back it up! In the two years since we launched the programme, the 70 companies that have come through the Accelerator have already raised a combined $47.51m in funding in this short space of time, with an average 3x uplift in valuation from pre to post programme. Our partners Techstars have the highest success rate for follow on funding of any startup VC, with over 90 successful exits and $2.4bn of combined financing across all of their programmes.

5.      A global network for life

Completion of the programme is not an end in itself; it is just the end of the beginning. Programme participants are based at our Barclays Rise workspace in Whitechapel for the duration of the programme, with many choosing to stay on afterwards. This means that current participants get to mix and mingle with alumni, as well as other local and international start-ups and scale-ups that we offer hot desk space to there. Rise is Barclays’ global innovation network – with physical hubs in London, New York, Manchester, Vilnius, Tel Aviv, Cape Town and Mumbai – connecting and fostering collaboration between start-ups, corporates and investors. Techstars, meanwhile, is one of the largest and fastest growing networks of entrepreneurs around in the world. The Barclays fintech programme itself already has a sizeable and diverse alumni network - with 70 companies from 15 different countries having participated to date. Though two came very close last year, we have yet to have an Irish participant, so this is your opportunity to showcase the incredible fintech talent we have in Ireland.

The next Barclays London Fintech Accelerator begins in January 2017, with applications close on October 15th. I am hosting a Dublin open evening on September 12th, with the opportunity to have a one-to-one with Techstars MD Chris Adelsbach the following day. Please click on the links below to register and contact me for further information.

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-barclays-accelerator-powered-by-techstars-is-coming-to-dublin-tickets-27069501608

https://docs.google.com/a/techstars.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSekBF8D6T4BEAeoBVsxoGEhK24CGeeOYQhjcM93Ss37VUkYmw/viewform