Building the payments infrastructure for B2B clients, bringing payments lessons from Europe into Australia, and helping Australian fintechs scale globally


Piers Cracknell has 20+ years’ experience in banking, payments & fintech across senior roles at NAB, CBA and global fintechs in Australia & the UK.
Piers was recently hired by European bank – Banking Circle – to set up their Australian operation, which is known locally as BC Payments Australia,

In this podcast we discuss:

1. What does BC Payments do in Australia?
2. Difference between Banking Circle (EU) and BC Payments Australia?
3. Building the payments infrastructure for customers
4. In Australia: Typical clients (B2B, acquirers, issuers), access to NPP, access to cross border payment schemes
5. What’s driving growth for BC Payments? Time and cost of settlement
6. Need for KYC and AML frameworks, understanding all types of risks (eg onboarding process, ongoing monitoring and supervision of client)
7. Experience in Europe – how is it relevant for Australia?
8. View on future of payments – domestic & cross border

From online application to money in the customer’s account in 36 minutes


From customer service (call centres), fraud detection & prevention, credit scoring & risk assessment, personalised banking, routine task automation, loan approvals, trading, to regulatory compliance and much more, Ai is changing finance, and fast. 

In this episode Glen Frost interviews Julian Fayad on how his business, LoanOptions.Ai is changing unsecured lending, including how decisioning and payment is getting faster and faster – with the record at LoanOptions.Ai being 36 minutes for a Nurse to apply online, be and approved and received the money in their account in 36 mintues.

Loan Options AI is an AI powered loan matching and application platform to find you the best offers for car loans, personal loans, business loans, equipment loans and all other types of asset finance. LoanOptions.ai uses a combination of AI and dynamic logic to provide predictive pre-approval and accurate lender rates for hundreds of financial products from over 90 different banks and lenders. You can apply in under 5 minutes with no impact to your credit score.

Julian originally started in technology and has spent his entire career in asset finance, and Loan Options.ai is the culmination of everything he knows & using technology to make lending a better, faster and more efficient experience for the customer and the lender.

The FinTech Report Podcast: Episode 55: Angelina Wu, CEO & Co-Founder, InvestmentMarkets

Investment Markets launches to sophisticated (self directed) investors with 500 products, plans for growth 

Angelina Wu, CEO & Co-Founder, InvestmentMarkets

investmentmarkets.com.au is an independent, Australian investment platform. It is a two sided market place for self-directed high net worth investors  and investment product issuers (from emerging companies to institutionally managed funds to fixed interest products) – essentially, anything that is ‘unitised’. 

Their taglines are "Every kind of investment opportunity, all in one place " and "the Home of the Independent Investor" 

Angelina’s background includes money markets, wealth advisory and media, including stints with Commonwealth Bank, UniSuper, Trustees Australian and Guangzhou TV in China, and the last 4.5 years with investment markets. 

Angelina and her co-founder Chris Morton launched in March this year after years of testing and refining the service.

Learn more: www.investmentmarkets.com.au 

Contact Angelina: [email protected] 

Topics discussed include:

1. What led Angelina and her Co-Founder to create Investment Markets?

2. What problem they are solving? How does the platform work? What is the unique selling proposition?

3. Angelina describes a user journey

4. Who are the customers? Who are the product issuers?

5. What types of products/investments are available for investors? 

6. How does matching work? There is no advice on financial products

7. What’s the business model? (product provider charged a flat fee)

8. Why Investment Markets have undertaken two years’ worth of research before launching

9. Future plans? New products, new markets?

10. What does success look like? 

Why don’t people switch banks? ACCC Retail Deposits Inquiry shines light on banks approach to deposit accounts; insights in ACCC Report influences Upworth to create ‘Savings Account Scanner’

THE FINTECH REPORT PODCAST: EPISODE 54: Alexandre Chavotier, Co-Founder & CEO, Upworth

According to Alex, the ACCC Report key points are:

Limited competition, interest rates not shown
Entry is hard
Product complexity (active pricing strategy)
Segmentation, price discrimination (introductory rates, bonus rates; ACCC report found 70% of account holders did not achieve the bonus rate)
Household deposits matter
Comparison websites
People generally don’t switch banks – why? Can CDR help solve this?


About Alex: 

·       Started career in investment banking in Europe before working at McKinsey and Quantum Black in Sydney

·       Was at the forefront of McKinsey´s work in AI, including the development of a trading solution that secured internal VC funding

·       Consulted to all the large Australian banks on an array of strategic topics and projects

·       Came back to Australia 2 years ago to start Upworth after a 3-year stint in Mexico as right-hand to the Founder and CEO of ZeBrands, a successful scale-up comparable to Koala here (mattresses sold online)

About Upworth:

·       Upworth is the wealth superapp. 

·       A one-stop-shop for personal finances where you can connect all your accounts to track your net worth, access unique and personalized insights and apply for financial products in a few clicks

In this episode we discuss:

1.      ACCC Report – top 3 issues/key chapters (and Upworth’s interpretation)

a.      Deposit accounts: limited competition, interest rates not shown

b.     Many banks offer retail deposit products, but the sector is concentrated with barriers to entry and expansion; There are 4 major banks and 6 mid-tier banks which supply 89% of retail deposits, and a long tail of smaller banks supplying the remainder

c.      Open Banking slow – why?

d.     Chapter 7: Strategic pricing strategies lead to greater complexity for consumers and, for some, poorer outcomes – why?

2.      Opportunities for Upworth? 

3.      How does it work? 

4.      What do users / customers need to connect? Eg bank accounts. And how do they do this?

5.      Tech behind the new product? Platform, APIs, open banking, who do you partner with?

6.      Results so far? 

The FinTech Report Podcast: Episode 53: Melanie Hayden, Truyu, x15

Melanie started her career as a lawyer, with tier 1 law firm Allens, specialising in banking M&A; she then spent the next 6 years at the Commonwealth Bank, in various roles, most recently being in charge of partnerships and business development; the past year has seen Melanie take on a new challenge; as the Managing Director of a Truyu, a new Identity and fraud prevention business within x15 ventures, the commonwealth bank’s venture scaler division.

Outside of her role at Truyu, Melanie is a coach at Startmate, and a Board Member of the Liverpool Women’s Resource Centre, a charity helping women and their children access services they need to live stable lives and help their communities.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/melaniehayden/ 

** Details of CBA’s/x15 Ai competition https://www.linkedin.com/company/x15ventures/ **

Consumers are targeted with investment scams, dating scams and false billing scams, leaving them embarrassed and often financially compromised. 

How can financial services firms combat scams and Identity Theft? From giving consumers an easy way to protect their credit reports to creating a secure digital identity, this podcast explores how technology is helping financial services.

Problem and solution

We know fraud and scams are a significant problem in Australia with estimates placing this at about $3 billion each year (ACCC Targeting Scams report, April 2023. Not adjusted for under-reporting). Drilling down further, identity fraud is a big and growing problem in Australia, with 25% year-on-year growth over the last year and 199,000 individual cases based on ABS data (FY22 / 23). 

Truyu is a new app launched in early May, available on a free trial in the Apple and Google app stores. It is an Australian first solution, built inside x15, that alerts you in real time when your identity is used, either by you or by someone else. To bring this to life, if you sign up for a new phone plan at a telco, you will get an alert from Truyu. In this scenario there’s hopefully nothing to worry about – the alert simply provides reassurance the product is working. However, if you’re sat at home on the couch and get a Truyu alert that someone is using your identity to attempt to open a bank account at a major bank, you may be about to become a victim of identity fraud. And because Truyu alerts you in near real-time, it helps you to stop the fraud in the moment before an account or new service has even been opened.

Just a couple of months in market and Truyu has already prevented major cases of fraud, which have enabled customers to change their licence details and take other steps to prevent future identity fraud. Interestingly, some of these cases of attempted fraud are not yet resulting in an account being opened. Instead, it seems the fraudster could be using an identity check to test whether the stolen details work, with perhaps a view to on-sell them further. If this is what’s happening, Truyu is alerting customers to something that would’ve otherwise likely gone undetected, enabling customers to stop fraudsters in real-time. 

Other comments

Truyu believe that fighting fraud and scams will require a whole of ecosystem approach, with the private and public sectors working closely together. One way Truyu think they can help industry and government is by moving fast and testing propositions. Truyu built the app in just over four months to ensure that they could get a solution quickly in the hands of customers, and Truyu are fully committed to sharing learnings from the pilot. Truyu know the Government is building a similar solution and expects to launch the first iteration later in the year, s

The FinTech Report Podcast: Pablo Seoane, Co-Founder, BIGGER

Delighted to welcome Pablo Seoane, Co-Founder, BIGGER to the podcast.

Contact Pablo here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/p-seoane/

Email Pablo Seoane: [email protected] 

Website: https://www.biggertech.co/ 

Pablo is the Co-founder of Bigger, their mission is to remove barriers for early-stage startups to help them achieve their full potential. they do this by providing tailored software engineering services for early-stage startups. Since launch, they’ve grown the team to over 70 professionals and have successfully assisted more than 26 startups.

Before Bigger, Pablo served as the General Manager of Byjus Australia, one of the world's largest EdTech companies. he established the local entity from the ground up, growing the team to over 70 individuals and taking annual recurring revenue from zero to $20 million.

Pablo is truly passionate about startups and always eager to connect with other entrepreneurs.

In this episode we discuss:

1.     Why did Pablo start BIGGER? What do you do?

2.     Who are your customers? sectors

3.     What are the key issues? Eg tech co-founder may not have right skills

4.     What tech do you use? Why? 

5.     How is BIGGER set up? (ie Australia, Argentina – plus BIGGER ACADEMY)

6.     Case studies – client success

7.     Your experience at Byjus – lessons? Learnings? Esp tech at scale, lockdowns ?

8.     How else do you help? Eg help find clients a CTO

9.     Message for early stage founders

10.  Message for mid to later stage looking to rebuild tech stack?

The FinTech Report Podcast: Episode 51: Cathy Lyall, LIQUIDISE

Delighted to welcome Cathy Lyall, Co-Founder and a Director of Liquidise, to the podcast.

Cathy Lyall is passionate about developing and growing Australia's FinTech ecosystem and markets infrastructure.  As a Founder, Investor, Adviser and Director of several startups and financial services enterprises both in the UK and Australia, Cathy has lived the founder and startup experience and journey for close on three decades.

Cathy co-founded Seismic Foundry in the UK in 2017, a firm that specialises in investing in capital markets fintech. Since moving back to Australia has become a partner in Seed Space Venture Capital and a Non-executive Director of listed fintech Wisr.

Cathy is also Executive Director of RedBelly Network, a blockchain network developed by the University of Sydney and CSIRO.

Cathy's experiences as a Founder, Manager and Investor were a big driver in creating Liquidise – she realises how important it is for staff in startups and growing private companies to actually have a way to realise their ESOPs.  More on that in our conversation.

Liquidise allows private companies to trade their shares on an independent platform. Australian regulated, and featuring instant settlement and proof of ownership, Liquidise unlocks private companies equity for shareholders, promotes capital flow (liquidity, hence the name) and gives investors access to unlisted private companies.
Now platforms for private companies share sales aren’t new.  However what Liquidise is doing is providing a guarantee of cash for vendors – in other words liquidity – for all transactions undertaken on their platforms.  Its this guarantee of liquidity – or the pricing of private companies liquidity – that the Liquidise team are hoping will allow their platform to catch on, and their unique point of difference.

In this interview we cover:

1.What is the story behind Liquidise? Who needs Liquidise?
2.What is your vision?
3.Your point of difference. What do you do that is over and above others?
4.Who are your clients? Typical client or all different?
a.What private companies are using Liquidise … Pipeline?
b.Investors?
5.Liquidise: self funded or Money raised to date, various rounds, which VCs / angels?
6.Progress so far and next steps/goals? By year end?
7.Will you be global? What are the most likely offshore markets?
8.Will you be looking at tokenising assets and equities?
9.Regulation: who regulates you?
10.Team size, structure
11.Help from other partners?

https://liquidise.com/ 

The FinTech Report Podcast: Episode 50: Michael Titshall, CEO of APAC, R/GA

What are the key challenges for banks when they’re trying to reach GenZ + Gen Alpha?

 Michael’s Bio

Michael leads R/GA APAC, overseeing six offices across Australia, Singapore, Japan and Indonesia. Driven by a passion for transforming brands and businesses with creative solutions, he has led agencies spanning brand, creative, experience, data, technology, and media services.    

 Prior to his APAC role, Michael led R/GA Australia overseeing a remarkable growth period in the last 18 months. Under his leadership, it doubled its headcount, acquired numerous new clients, and earned accolades at major global and regional award shows, including Cannes Lions, D&AD, the Effies, and Spikes Asia.

 Before joining R/GA, Michael spent five years with CHE Proximity, where, in his role as Managing Director, the agency earned six accolades as Agency of the Year and was recognised as the fourth Most Innovative Company in Australia. 

PODCAST OUTLINE

Gen Z is characterised by its digital savviness. However, banks should not assume that Gen Z’s digital-first lifestyle means they want only digital solutions. Are branches still seen as an extension of mobile banking? 

Gen Zers have serious concerns about their financial future. Considering this perception of financial uncertainty, it is perhaps no surprise Gen Zers are highly motivated to save money and learn about banking and finance from a young age. This is an opportunity for banks. 73% of GenZ believe banks should provide more advice on spending habits, budgeting, paying off debt and loans

Michael discusses work done for Weyay, Bradesco and Mox Bank; 

Kuwait

Weyay Bank
https://www.weyaybank.com/

Weyay: Creating the first digital bank for the next generation of Kuwaitis
Video case study

Brazil

Next Bank for Bradesco

A new bank for the digital age goes from zero to 10 million customers in four years.

https://www.dandad.org/awards/professional/2018/graphic-design/26947/banco-bradesco-next-bank/
 

 Hong Kong

Mox Bank

Mox bank treating customers as people, not as data

https://mox.com/

 For further information, contact:

Kate Neill

Director, Marketing and Communications (Australia)

t: +61 451 135 708

e: [email protected]

The FinTech Report Podcast: Episode 49: Interview with Mac Duncan, Co-Founder, Constantinople

Mac Duncan, Co-Founder of Constantinople.

 https://www.linkedin.com/in/macgregor-duncan-bb0381179/ 

Prior to his current role, Mac was Chief Development Officer at Westpac, a non executive director at 10X Technologies, and Associate Director at Goldman Sachs; he started his career as a lawyer working at the High Court. 

Constantinople is the first of its kind: an all-in-one software and operational platform for banks. Constantinople hosts and manages your bank's customers directly on their cloud native infrastructure. they support a full range of banking products which are branded as the company name, together with all operational services needed to run a bank. 

Constantinople's state-of-the-art platform frees banks from running expensive infrastructure and replaces manual operational and compliance processes with automation at scale. By removing the operational complexity of banking, Constantinople allows banks to focus on customers and the business of banking.

In this episode we discuss:

1.     Mac’s background; influences in banking & fintech

2.     The vision for Constantinople? What is the story behind Constantinople? Why did you and Di want to start it?

3.     Do you call yourself a fintech? Bank tech? do definitions matter? 

4.     Money raised to date, various rounds, which VCs / angels etc

5.     Will you be global? Can all fintechs plan to be global from Australia?

6.     Foundation client? Is focus on SMEs and lending? What is the brief you have to deliver on?

7.     Your point of difference. Point solutions vs end-to-end solutions; whats the story here? What is a core banking platform? What do you do that is over and above the core banking?

8.     It’s a very competitive field. Who are the competitors? 

9.     How do you serve banks who want to be flexible? Flexible on products, pricing, reg, distribution – what other factors?

Interview with Jordan Lawrence, Co-Founder & Chief Growth Officer, Volt.io

Jordan Lawrence; Co Founder & Chief Growth Officer, Volt.io | European Advisory Board Member Merchant Risk Council | Real-Time Payments Everywhere

Prior to Volt.io Jordan was founder of PCN: PCN Capital is a leader in recruitment, focusing on Payments, Fintech, Data Science & Cyber Security through it's brands. Jordan is also a kite surfing expert and started his career in sports and kite surfing instructing

Volt is building the next generation payment network that is global, instant and interoperable - connecting real-time payments everywhere. 

In Volt’s words they are “driving the shift to an era where real-time is the only time.”

 In this episode, we cover:

1.     What is the vision for Volt.io  

2.     Progress to date – product, countries

3.     Fundraising – from who? Best places & funds/people to raise from?

4.     Building the team: in UK, Brazil, Asia, and then Australia

5.     Plans for Australia? What will your service be? Target market?

6.     What is unique or better about Volt.io in Australia?

7.     Typical customer?

8.     Partners in Australia? 

9.     Why partner, why not go direct?

10.  Thoughts/comments on Open Banking 

11.  Message to the fintech market?

Learn more: https://www.volt.io/