Jan van der Saar

🎉 Another Successful European AI Conference! 🎉 Yesterday, we hosted the 9th edition of the European AI Forum Conference in beautiful Vilnius, organized by the Artificial Intelligence Association of Lithuania. It was an incredible day filled with insightful discussions and forward-thinking perspectives on AI in Europe. In case you missed it, here are some key takeaways: ✨ Lucilla Sioli shared exciting news that the #AIAct will be published on July 12th and will come into force on August 1st. ✨ Thomas Schneider presented the Conseil de l'Europe's impressive efforts to regulate AI with a focus on protecting democracy and human rights while fostering innovation. ✨ Daniel Abbou, Piotr Mieczkowski, and I discussed the state of AI in our respective countries and highlighted the key topics for the future of AI in Europe. ✨ Dr. Katharina von Knop delivered an outstanding talk on the impact of Digital Trust on decision-making and why Trustworthy AI is crucial. Interested in more? Catch the full conference replay (with chaptering) on our YouTube channel! ⬇️Link in the description. Thank you to everyone who participated and helped make this event a success! #EAIF #ArtificialIntelligence #Innovation #HumanRights #DigitalTrust

65

9 komentarzy

Lifting of BaFin restrictions boosts growth at N26 https://buff.ly/4eH0dRS The recent removal of restrictions by BaFin has significantly accelerated the growth trajectory of N26, a leading digital bank. This regulatory relief allows N26 to expand its services and improve customer experience without previous limitations. As a result, the company is poised to enhance its market position and attract more users. Such regulatory changes are crucial in the fintech industry, as they enable greater innovation and competitiveness.

7

Mariana shares an update on the current state of global #openbanking regulations from our Q2 Open Banking/Open Finance Trends Report

7

If one third of European Banks that do not currently offer #instantpayments are unsure or unconfident they'll be ready for #SEPAInstant (source: RedCompass Labs), you can bet their institution's "bottom dollar" they are far from ready for the increase in #fraud that accompanies real-time payments. What's needed now is intelligent, learning technology that offers #SPEED and #ACCURACY in both transaction #MONITORING and #SCREENING. That's where Alertspeed comes in. With 96% payment screening accuracy and at lightning-fast speeds that enable you to #interdict and #prevent the fraudulent payments leaving, it makes moving to SEPA Instant just that small bit more comforting. Remember that fraud, and how your institution handles it, especially compensation, is going to become a hotly contested customer retention and acquisition issue. It's time to get ready. #Alertspeed is a multi-award winning, #RealTime, anti-financial crime platform recognized for Speed AND Accuracy.

13

10 komentarzy

Why AI adoption will increase assurance jobs AI in these days is everywhere. In the news, I mean.  In practice, AI adoption is certainly increasing in different tasks and jobs but it is not really a mass adoption. By April 2024, OpenAI claimed 100 mln active weekly users of which 11% were from the US. We are still in the early stages. There are fears AI will make people redundant but, after a transition, AI will increase other jobs. One of which is assurance jobs of various kinds. Two examples. –Software developers. Yes (some kind of) developers will be replaced by AI tools (web developers for example).  Out of 10 web developers let’s assume 3 will stay in place 7 developers will be replaced by tools. What would the other do? Unless they will be absorbed by other types of development a natural solution will be…assurance. First we need to notice that when AI tools will create most of the websites, it means websites will be cheaper to build. If a website cost 100 in pre-AI era, and now cost 30, 2 mechanisms will be triggered: Websites will become more complex and with more functionalities. Since now it costs less (30 instead of 100) companies or individuals can now re-allocate part of the spared budget (70) to other functionalities: chatbots, booking systems, videos.. (virtual reality?? At the very end).  Since it now costs less to build, you can now re-allocate a few more bucks to assurance and cybersecurity. Before you simply did not have the budget. You spent it all to build stuff. –Document transcriptions and translations. Parliaments or legal bodies around the world need to record and/or transcript all possible documents.  For example, every session of the parliament pre-AI era has an army of shorthand writers who record everything it has been said during the session.  The transcript then goes to the national archives or alike. Shorthand writers are so many , because they work in shifts of 5-10 minutes to assure attention span. In similar ways, if a law or legal documents need translation, there are many translators. Now, with voice2text solutions and automatic translation, shorthand writing is a job in extinction. The EU parliament has now a solution for translation for example.  What happens to shorthand writers?  They convert into assurance jobs. With the advent of AI tools, yes manual transcription or translation, 2 mechanisms are triggered: Volume of text. Since it is now a lot cheaper to record, much more documents can be produced. It’s like when Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press: yes monks who copied the texts were out of work but the volume of texts increased massively. Assurance again. With more text produced by AI, you need a lot more assurance (and cybersecurity) to assure that the text is actually trustworthy and no corruption has occurred. Yes, certain jobs are in the extinction phase. But yes we can already see new jobs are created. #ai #artificialintelligence #innovation #business #work #technology

4

1 komentarz

Have you ever felt like your bank or fintech team has everything it needs to innovate, but is still lagging behind? We hear this story all the time from new prospects. You have skilled people, deep industry knowledge, and clear goals, but when it’s time to launch a great digital product, something is missing. And you keep going, hoping to figure it out in the future. Where can innovation come from if internal resources are exhausted? How can we go beyond functionality and create unique products that feel intuitive, seamless, designed for the user and convey brand's personality? An outside perspective can make all the difference. Some executives feel that outsourcing product design can feel like giving up control, but a fresh set of eyes can help uncover new ideas, spot unseen gaps, and elevate a digital product from good to exceptional. For example, combining US bank team’s insights with our specialized UX expertise—designed a product that’s not just functional, but memorable and delightful. If you open to explore what’s possible when strategic UX comes in the house to align digital product with your vision and user needs, let’s start a conversation. Time to bridge the gap between what is—and what could be: https://lnkd.in/dpqny_R9 #FintechDesign #FintechAgency #Banking #FintechUX #BankingUX #DesignThinking #ProductDesign #BankingInnovations #UXDA

8

Ecosystem #supercharged and leveled up! Ecosystem is what we do, just as the circuit board of a chip connects, transmits and functions as the hub, EIT Digital is the multi-stakeholder collaboration platform for Europe’s universities, public bodies, corporates, startups, scaleups, SMEs, investors, and students. In the first half of the year, we #supercharged! 🖇 opened a new office in Greece, with our partner ICCS, thanks Angelos Amditis and team! - Orestis Elena 🎤 had the distinct pleasure to speak at the Delphi Economic Forum on #chips #AI and #skills – special thanks to EC’s Vice-President Margaritis Schinas for taking part in the Makers & Shapers video series - Evangelos 🏆 selected 13 Champions, the best #deeptech scaleups to join our Growth Services - Fabrizio Daniel 🌟 designed a #tech immersion for the (policy) SHAPERS at the #EITHOUSE for a real discussion with #digitalinnovators #GrowDigital24 - Dorottya Federico Camilla Nadia 🤖 brought the MAKERS (industry) together for the 2nd time as part of the Corporate Innovation Club, hosted by Bosch and Egis in Budapest - Denes Jesus 🧠 announced 22 new partnerships, including with Riga Technical University, preparing the ground for a new Master Programme in Fintech, the establishment of an EIT Digital office in Latvia and the Master School 2024 kick-off - Salvatore Lea Andrea 🤝 supercharged beyond EIT Digital. Collaborations are key! We're implementing the #EUEIC Community Platform, having the opportunity to bring EIT Digital trainings to EIC beneficiaries. We were also actively involved in ADRA's information day - Federico Sergio Susanah 🖇 got awarded 2 Regional Innovation Valleys Projects - we will work with our partners to supercharge 10 regions! GO UNITE and RIVCircular projects Marina Lina Tessa Martin Micol 🛣 fast tracked 9 scaleups to the EIC Accelerator Ben Elia 💻 organized the EIT Deep Tech Talent initiative call, launched a new edition of the Speed Master training, the second edition of the Generative AI essentials course and delivered more than 800 certificates in upskilling with a female participation of over 45% Asja Siddhesh Sonay Diva Tommei 🖇 got awarded 11 strategic partnerships projects, supercharging our ecosystem Dorina Annalisa Susanne Esther 🤖 supported the first cohort of startup investments in the Open Innovation Factory and selected a new one for the second half of the year Antonio Ana 🧠 selected the first batch of 40+ teams creating their venture with us as part of the Venture Incubation Program Mirko 🔝 participated in and organized several tech events across Europe including our own Cybersecurity First! event in Budapest - Tuan Krisztian ⤴ brought the startup founded by 4 EIT Digital Master School alumni LEVELS into our ecosystem supporting their initial phase All this is only possible with an amazing & dedicated team, great partners & a collaborative public sector European Commission!

58

2 komentarze

How open should you be with your ecosystem, and how to monetize with the increased degree of openness? Feng Zhu and Carmelo Cennamo share some great insights on thr topic. https://lnkd.in/dbRBm-Fp

3

1 komentarz

Like me, if you are in love with #BNPL and admire how #Klarna made this model so popular around the world, I recommend this episode from #Acquired. I especially loved how its CEO is humble enough to be proud of the fact that his management team ignored him multiple times. Once they went into the fashion industry and secured new global leadership, even though previously he prohibited them to do so. He literally said, "That's a horrible idea, and you are not allowed to do that!" several times during their entry into the #UK market.. Yet, the team signed with #ASOS, and eventually he was proud of their independence and maturity in decision-making. He also describes how they were competing with #Adyen and #Stripe in merchant acquiring but realized they were failing the execution of that strategy. They then refocused on the consumer side, and now Adyen and Stripe are their distributors. He speaks so clearly and truthfully about many things in the podcast. Just let me know your thoughts. https://lnkd.in/ebUCRQX3 #DigitalBanking #Azerbaijan #Payments

34

Mastercard wants to achieve 100% tokenization of online card payments in Europe by 2030 and phase out manual card entry in favor of a one-click button. Tokens protect sensitive card data and make online payments even easier and more secure. Fraud cases are reduced and at the same time convenient, fast payment is made possible with just a few clicks.    💳 With network tokenization, Mastercard creates a seamless payment process for customers who pay with a stored card. The card data is encrypted during payment and the 16-digit card number is automatically replaced in the background by a randomly generated token. The actual card data is not transmitted during the transaction.   🛒 But this is just the first step: with the new online checkout solution Click to Pay, card payments as a guest in online retail will be even faster, more convenient and more secure in future. The card information as well as the delivery and billing address only need to be registered and stored once at a central location. The information then no longer needs to be re-entered and verified for each individual purchase in the online store or in the app. There is no need to enter the card number or passwords.   👁 In future, payment processes will increasingly run in the background. The Internet of Things is changing our lives. With the help of network tokenization, all kinds of devices can potentially be turned into secure payment platforms - cars, televisions or even fridges. Together with biometric two-factor authentication, tokenization can provide more security and convenience in payment processing.   Read more below to find out how tokenization works and why it matters. 👇   #Mastercard #innovation #ecommerce #FutureofPayments #tokenization #ClickToPay #IoT #Cybersecurity #payments

5

1 komentarz

Digital Banking Europe: N26 hits profitability 🌟 - Reporting a net operating income of €2.8 million for Q3 2024, marking its first profitable quarter since its launch in 2013.💡 #Fintech #Milestone #Profitability #N26 #DigitalBanking

12

1 komentarz

Do you believe that tenders for designing banking products work? I mean, what if these tenders actually sabotage the success of digital banking? 🤔 Every year we receive dozens RFPs for tender to design UX/UI of banking solutions. And quite often we refuse. Because it often seems like tenders end up being a race to the bottom, with the cheapest bidder getting the deal. But when the lowest cost becomes the highest priority, what are we truly giving up? Is opting for the least expensive option leading banks straight into the hands of low-quality suppliers whose decisions might harm both: business and end-users? Maybe office supplies for branches have the same quality at different prices (although this is also doubtful), but does this work for the design of digital products? We see that purchasing managers are often unable to assess the quality of such a complex service, although their actions determine whether the bank will be competitive in the digital market. Picture this: A new banking app launched, designed by the lowest bidder. It has clunky, confusing, copycat design. Customers are frustrated, trust dwindles, and the brand's reputation takes a hit. And all this just to save a few thousand up front. Was it worth it? Maybe it's time to rethink this tactic. Shouldn't financial brands focus on value over cost? And is it even possible? Shouldn't price be preceded by an assessment of the agency's ability to understand the intricacies of financial services, maintain a long-term priority for business growth, ensure brand consistency, ensure accessibility, ensure security, and the ability to develop a seamless user experience that embodies business strategy? Unfortunately, price often becomes the first and foremost criterion. Ultimately, every bank needs the best design that will build lasting trust with its customers, and designers who will achieve bank's goals in the best possible way and without risk. What do you think? Is the traditional tender process for digital design doing more harm than good for financial brands? Is it time for banks to reconsider how they choose their digital partners? Here are some more thoughts on why outsourcing product design to low-cost vendors can be one of the most expensive mistakes any bank can make: https://lnkd.in/dDEfETK6 #Banking #Fintech #DigitalDesign #UXDesign #CustomerExperience #BankTender #BankTenders #DigitalTender #Tender #Tenders #BankingInnovations #Banks #Bank #BankRFP

14

5 komentarzy

I generally do not comment news, but this is quite interesting. Hopefully BaFin lifting N26 growth restrictions it is a sign of the adaptation of existing regulatory framework to digital banking #digitalbanking #n26 #AML #regulatorycompliance https://lnkd.in/dT6Qkd3h

1

1 komentarz

AI’s Little Secret ILLUSTRATION: EMIL LENDOF, ISTOCK By Deepa Seetharaman Artificial intelligence got better in recent years by going big. We wouldn’t have ChatGPT if tech companies like OpenAI hadn’t devoted a lot of money, computational power and data to its development. Making money, however, is about the little things. The AI industry is increasingly focused on what are known as small- or medium-language models, as my colleague Tom Dotan and I reported. In the early days of the generative-AI boom, companies largely focused on large-language models like OpenAI’s GPT-4 or Meta’s Llama 3. Smaller models are trained on less data and are designed for specific purposes: financial modeling, coding or analyzing Supreme Court cases. Executives and consultants told us that these smaller models are often more reliable for day-to-day tasks. They’re also a lot cheaper—something that’s key for these companies as they figure out how to actually make money from AI. This might be a bit surprising given that gigantic models have grabbed the headlines over the past 18 months. They can still do a wider range of tasks than their smaller counterparts. But many companies largely rely on AI for summarizing documents or generating images. Here, using a large model is overkill—the equivalent of picking up groceries in a tank. Or as one executive at an AI company told me last year: “If you’re ordering fast food from a restaurant, it doesn't need to tell you a bedtime story.” A well-designed small model trained on high-quality data can even outpace its larger counterparts, according to research published last year by Microsoft, OpenAI’s biggest backer. Microsoft’s researchers compared such a data set to a “comprehensive, well-crafted textbook.” And smaller models can run straight from your laptop or phone, making them both faster and more secure. OpenAI—the vanguard of the large-model movement—and other large-model companies have taken notice. The ChatGPT maker now plans to release smaller models in the future that are efficient and fast at basic tasks. It likely won’t be the only big AI company going small. —Deepa is a technology reporter based in San Francisco

8

1 komentarz

Last December I wrote an article about how the growth in UK open banking payments is slowing – from 171% (by volume of transactions) in 2022, to 90% in 2023. I forecast that growth would slow again to 59% in 2024, predicting there would be 44m txns in the first quarter this year, 93m in the first half and 206m for the whole year. The actual numbers were 45m payments for the first quarter and 97m for the first half – and my revised figure for 2024 is 225m payments, a 73% increase on 2023, better than I predicted last December, but only by 19m payments and still down on the 2023 percentage growth. My benchmark for a successful new payment method is the contactless card, the largest and most successful new commercial payment product introduced in the UK this century. According to UK Finance, there were 19bn contactless transactions last year, over a third of all UK payments. Open banking has a long way to go to match this, but its addressable market - ecommerce and bill payments is enormous. As a start, to have a meaningful impact, open banking payments need to reach at least 5% share of UK payments, or 2.5bn payments. My forecast for open banking payments over the next five years is shown in the graph. The blue bars continue the current trend of positive, but declining annual growth rates, the orange bars show volumes if growth is sustained at 73% per year, my growth prediction for 2024. For context, in their first 10 years (ignoring the first two years after launch), contactless annual volume growth ranged between 116% and 257% and Faster Payments between 20% and 49%. We shall see in due course which path open banking takes to reach 2.5bn payments. It is unlikely that open banking will emulate the fast growth in contactless card transactions, but it is growing at a quicker pace than Faster Payments at a similar stage. Open banking has a commercial impetus behind it, with over 20 bank and non-bank payment providers driving it - with the right product-market fit, they have all to play for. #payments #openbanking #fasterpayments #contactless

14

3 komentarze

Following the call for EU tech renaissance, I just signed the EU Inc petition. Indeed, new EU commissioners will set their agenda on December 1st. It's time to promote a unified "EU Inc" entity to simplify cross-border scaling, hiring, and investment for startups. “The multitude of countries and cultures in Europe is its unfair advantage. But because of that, our startup scene is fragmented,” read the open letter, which was published on a newly created website for the EU Inc initiative. “Legal and regulatory compliance is a burden, and cross-border collaboration is rare,” said the letter, which added that, unlike U.S. venture capitalists, the capital from European investors tends to remain within national borders. This results in “stifled momentum, unrealized potential, and an artificial limit on our startups’ chances of success.” Rather than writing new legislation at an EU-wide level to simplify regulations for tech startups, the founders are calling on policymakers to allow for the creation of a new single entity, called EU Inc, under the bloc’s 28th regime. https://www.eu-inc.org/

6

Messengers and fintech – it sounds a little bit strange 🙄 but if we dive deeper into the topic we may find several examples, e.g. WeChat that is the global leader – number of users, transaction value and so on. Number of monthly active users is 1bn+, the app is used not only to communicate with each other, it has at least: ☑ WeChat Pay – it is easy to understand that it is a payment system ☑ WeChat Wallet – virtual wallet integrated with WeChat It is just an example to show you that messengers are also focusing on fintech while, for example, traditional banks are searching for additional communication channels – it is so ironic 🤣 😂 In this case I mean traditional payments, accounts/wallets that have features similar to traditional banking payment cards and banking payment services. The main focus of today`s post is on another messenger – Telegram Messenger. As usual Why ❓ The messenger is about to start total tokenization. We can`t even say that it is a messenger as of now – it is about to become a super app that will give access to content and commerce: ☑ It is the 1 platform that will tokenize its user space ☑ Users will soon be able to buy digital products ☑ Monetization for content makers ☑ Payments in TON (crypto) for admins (about 70% of sales revenue) ☑ Tokenization of stickers ... It looks impressive but the following information has impressed me even more: ☑ The company is privately owned by one person, Mr. Pavel Durov ☑ Number is users is close to 1 bn ☑ It has about 30 employees ☑ I don’t think that it is possible to find an open position at Telegram, they probably don’t have HR team ☑ It is one of the fastest growing apps, probably the fastest one 😏 ☑ It will be a super app with many fintech features Fintech is everywhere 😲 Have a nice week ❗ The Tucker Carlson Interview: Pavel Durov https://lnkd.in/eBXS7XiD #fintech #messenger #tuckercarlson #paveldurov #bank

13

2 komentarze