FinTech Connect shapes the future of financial services with the UK’s only full FinTech ecosystem event at London’s Excel December 4-5
SHARE THIS STORY
Join us as FinTech Connect welcomes world leading Fintechs, Financial Institutions, Challenger Banks, Merchants, Scale-Ups and StartUps, Investors, Accelerators and Media to The ExceL, London.
FinTech Connect
Each year we welcome visionaries from the UK, Europe and beyond all looking to innovate within the market, expand their footprint and drive businesses forward. The event brings all this under one roof, over two insight-packed days, sparking ideas, forging partnerships and accelerating change.
Tackling the hottest topics and biggest challenges in the fintech market. Including: embedded finance, Web3, cross-border payments, investment, scaling, Gen AI, crypto, regulation, digital innovation and customer experience (CX).
Our mission is to connect the global thought leaders across the FinTech ecosystem in an event like no other. Set yourself up for a strong 2025 by signing up for the UK’s only full FinTech ecosystem event and join 2,000+ fintech leaders in London.
Insights from FinTech’s biggest names
We’ll be asking the big questions… What AI elements do financial institutions need to follow? Build, buy or partner? What opportunity works best in the modern ecosystem? How are banks advancing their digital transformations in 2024? Who owns the CX?
Gain insights on these topics and more from some of the biggest names in financial services. Speakers include Victoria Cleland, Executive Director – Payments, Bank of England; Rory Tanner, Head of UK Government Affairs at Revolut and Nick Kerrigan, Managing Director, Swift. Thought leaders will also be taking to the stage from HSBC, DZ Bank, Lloyds Banking Group, BT and a host of other leading institutions.
Keep up to date with the latest speakers, discussions and more. Download the full agenda here.
Here are five of the biggest procurement events happening during 2023 that chief procurement officers won’t want to miss.
SHARE THIS STORY
Procurement Futures
London, UK | 1-2 February 2023
Held at the QEII Centre in central London, Procurement Futures is a new conference, launching in 2023. It promises delegates the chance to find out how to make supply chains more resilient, with thought-provoking and presentations and discussions designed to inform and inspire.
There is a flexible programme of content that can be tailored to attendees’ preferences, with networking opportunities throughout and a huge variety of sessions to attend and take part in.
This CIPS event has three streams of content: Insights, Ignite and Interact. Insights will showcase presentations and panel discussions from leaders, Ignite will consist of hands-on workshops to help delegates optimise their procurement strategies and Interact will be smaller groups taking part in interactive roundtables and debates.
Speakers across the two days will include Ross Grierson, Director of Procurement, Primark; Patrick Dunne, Director of Group Property, FM & Procurement (CPO), Sainsburys Plc; Rebecca Simpson, Procurement and Supply Chain Director, Balfour Beatty; and Nick Jenkinson, Chief Procurement Officer, Santander. In addition, delegates are ablew to book a one-to-one career workshop, where they’ll get advice on professional development from coaches covering a variety of specialisms.
Tickets are £795 for CIPS member, £995 for a non-member and £2240 for a supplier/solution provider, and there is a discount of 30% for tickets purchased before 30 November 2022.
The third World Digital Procurement Summit is aimed at procurement directors, VPs, managers and other industry specialists. The two-day event will focus on accelerating procurement processes, adopting emerging technologies, finding the right talent, overcoming the barriers to progress and embarking on a journey of transformation. It’s a hybrid event, bringing together procurement experts from various industries, which will maximise knowledge exchange opportunities. The event organisers list five key learning points for delegates:
Exploring the latest advances in data and cognitive technologies to gain greater insights and improve procurement processes
Overhauling the procurement ecosystem with new technologies and strategies to drive business value
Sharing the best practices of monitoring and managing a range of risks to hedge against future disruptions
Developing capabilities and skillset required for the digital transformation of procurement
Defining ESG metrics of the procurement strategy to ensure business continuity
Speakers will include Paul Harlington, Group Procurement Director at TUI Group and Patrick Foelck, Head of Strategy and Transformation Procurement at Roche.
Click here to check out a video from a previous event. Tickets cost €1495.
Returning for its 8th annual event, Women in Procurement & Supply Chain will deliver two days dedicated to leadership and the future of procurement. The event will feature a series of exclusive panel discussions and keynote addresses examining career development, overcoming imposter syndrome, working with confidence, developing an unbeatable talent pool, mentoring, diversity and inclusivity.
It will also address risk mitigation, digital disruption, ESG, sustainability, economic development, ethical sourcing, category management, cultural diversity, strategic sourcing, supplier relationships, procurement with purpose, and supply chain resilience. There are two pre-conference masterclass options on 6 March – that can be booked separately – covering either contract law or leadership skills.
Some of the reasons to attend include:
Discover the path to taking your procurement career to a new level while elevating your organisation with dedicated days on leadership and the future of procurement
Learn best practice strategies to facedown supply chain vulnerabilities and reduce risk exposure
Get ahead of the game with insights into the future of procurement and the impact of globalisation on modern supply chains
Put yourself at the cutting edge of ESG and procurement with the latest updates and trends in procurement with purpose
Speakers for the main two-day conference include Michelle Richard, Director of Procurement, Thales; Karina Davies, Chief Procurement Officer, icare NSW; and Kylie McKinlay, Procurement Partner – Property and Business, Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
Tickets start at $3,495 with discounts available until 25 November 2022.
The Americas Procurement Congress will feature the region’s most progressive CPOs sharing their expertise
With a focus on what makes CPOs tick, the Americas Procurement Congress will feature the region’s most progressive CPOs sharing their expertise in keynote presentations and working groups.
Giving delegates the tools to stay on the cutting edge of procurement developments, there are also sessions aimed at those with responsibilities over governance, procurement capabilities and quantifying data. Unsurprisingly, sustainability will also be a key theme in 2023, and attendees will hear from a diverse range of sustainability leaders about how to transition from traditional metrics to a purpose-driven function.
The agenda for Americas Procurement Congress 2023 will include:
Sustainability of the future
How to transition from traditional metrics to a purpose-driven function
Harnessing the power of digital transformation
Utilizing data as a driver of sustainable value, supply continuity and transparency Agile procurement
New approaches and skills that facilitate speed and agility
Frictionless procurement
Removing friction from the procurement process to support high-velocity sourcing
Beyond Just in Time
Designing future-fit supply networks for an age of chaos and conflict
Gartner Supply Chain Symposium/Xpo 2022 addressed the most significant challenges that chief supply chain officers and supply chain leaders face as they mitigate risk and navigate uncertainty in an increasingly dynamic and challenging environment.
At the conference, the top 5 sessions that CSCOs and supply chain leaders met on included:
Signature Series: The Future of Supply Chain
What the Pivot to Sustainable Profit Means for Procurement Leaders
The Art of the New Age One Page Dashboard: Why Your Current Perfor-mance Measures May Be Doing More Harm Than Good
Manage Supplier Risk With Technology
Procurement Role Redesign: Stop Fitting Square Pegs Into Round Holes
we.CONECT offer a virtual and hybrid approach to live events planning delivering tomorrow’s business engineering today
SHARE THIS STORY
we.CONECT was founded in 2011 by two self-confessed “passionate event industry geeks” with an entrepreneurial spirit. Henry Fuchs and Daniel Wolter saw an opportunity to meet the need for change within the event industry with a new approach to b2b-conferences within the innovation, enterprise and tech sectors.
Henry Fuchs
“We have grown by more than 50% yearly ever since,” reveals Henry. “Today, we serve engineering and manufacturing, automotive, digital transformation and the IT sectors across DACH, Europe and the US market. Our focus has always been on interactions and creating forums and platforms for meetings and connections. This allows decision-makers to interact and network with their peers and get the latest ideas and industry trends. In our environment, they will be given opportunities to grow their businesses and skill sets.”
A diverse network
we.CONECT boasts a 50,000+ strong network, taking pride in having companies as clients rather than simply defining their attendees as the audience. “Our ambition is to fuel them with new ideas, new connections and new inspiration,” pledges Daniel. “We attract everyone from specialists and strategists to management newbies, geniuses and visionaries to help the world’s biggest brands, most innovative companies, and the most promising start-ups, shape tomorrow´s business.”
Daniel Wolter
The rollcall of clients is impressive… Adidas, Adobe, Amazon, BASF, BMW, Coca-Cola, Daimler, Google, Paypal, Nasa, Tesla, Apple are all part of we.CONECT’s network of business partners enjoying unique event experiences alongside the likes of Bosch, Cisco, IBM, Microsoft, Nvidia, Samsung, Siemens and SAP.
The 1.5 million business users in we.CONECT’s ecosystem demand excellent networking and learning opportunities. “Our events are packed with more than 30 session formats covering different interactivity levels – strongly geared to our customers’ needs,” says Henry. “The problem solving and discussion focused world café-sessions and our ‘Live Tech Take’ are two great examples of formats our clients greatly appreciate.”
Digital ‘managed’ events
we.CONECT’s Digital Managed Event (DME) offering is for exhibitors that don’t want to share their leads with others. “They bring the content and the crowd; we assist with the hosting, event infrastructure and marketing of the event,” explains Daniel. “With a DME, exhibitors have an opportunity to tailor-make an event relevant to their product and solution; it’s a chance to invest in your own exclusive and customised format.”
Hybrid connections
we.CONECT’s hybrid business event portfolio offers business leaders from all over the world exclusive content, leads and an opportunity to be a part of evolving business communities to gather information, share knowledge, network with peers and find solutions for business-critical challenges. “We believe it’s imperative to be part of a new world of networking with other global players and niche businesses both live and fully digital in an ever-changing world,” asserts Henry. “The hybrid format delivers in that regard. It offers total flexibility, is COVID-compliant and enables both the audience and the exhibitors a chance to make the most of their experience.”
hubs101
Daniel and Henry began innovating with the digital transformation of events back in 2016 through the development of their own event app platform and in 2018 with their own first digital events – long before Covid became an issue.
“When the pandemic hit, we were able to react with agility and digitalise our entire event portfolio in 2020,” recalls Daniel. “One of the key enablers was our own virtual event platform, hubs101. It’s a complete platform, built on our event insights and know-how with the latest technology in focus. We’ve gradually developed it over the years, like the company itself, with constant tweaks and improvements. hubs101 has now been road-tested by more than 10,000 customers and hosted over 500 events, which is just the beginning…”
The we.CONECT team continually add new functions to improve usability based on the feedback received from each event. These invaluable insights contribute to the continued innovation of 30 different session formats that inspire attendees to interact and learn from each other’s experiences.
The timing of the public release of hubs101 with the pandemic was a coincidence but the team felt the platform had reached a stage where it could be beneficial for others. “Before Covid, we’d launched the platform to host 12 online events,” remember Henry. “When the lockdowns started, we identified the potential for virtual events and were able to scale up the platform to host most of the used-to-be on-premises events, working on over a hundred in 2020.”
AI matchmaking
hubs101 users can enter their event interests, business goals, and expectations on the platform; that data is sorted and matched with other participants’ entries. The AI matchmaking function enables hubs101 attendees to find the business partners they’re looking for and connect with them immediately. This saves time and avoids the uncertainty to connect with the right person on an on-premises event, and thus helps businesses reach their ROI more quickly.
Germany, Berlin, 18.09.2019 – Industry Of Things conference in Berlin 2019.
Marcel Wogram for WeConect.
“Our goal is to provide event attendees with the best event experience,” adds Daniel. “Therefore, we’re constantly searching for ways to take the current online event experience on hubs101 to the next level. Right now, users can attend a virtual event smoothly and find the right business partners with an AI matchmaking function. And we aim to expand that function to include not only attendee matching but also interest matching. In the future, hubs101 users can expect to meet the right person and get suggestions for the right event, based on their own goals and expectations they provide to the platform.”
The pandemic has accelerated the process of event digitalisation. Henry and Daniel have embraced the challenge and are determined to continuously help define the future of the event industry, and to transform as many events as possible to a full-scale hybrid experience. “In these times when marketers worldwide rank virtual events as a top three method to generate leads, boost revenue and improve brand impact, we.CONECT and hubs101 can help shape and improve any company’s future strategy and tactics for events and meetings.”
Learn more about emerging trends across the tech panorama in the latest issue of Interface
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) announced on Monday that it has set up a US$2 billion green investments programme…
SHARE THIS STORY
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) announced on Monday that it has set up a US$2 billion green investments programme (GIP) to invest in public market investment strategies that have a strong green focus.
This will help to support the Singapore financial centre in promoting environmentally sustainable projects and mitigating climate change risks in Singapore and the region.
The GIP is a major prong of the
green finance action plan announced by Mr Ong Ye Kung, Minister of Education,
and Board Member, MAS at the 2019 Singapore FinTech Festival (SFF) x Singapore
Week of Innovation and TeCHnology (SWITCH). The GIP aims to foster the growth
of a strong and diverse ecosystem of green financing capabilities in Singapore.
MAS will place funds with asset managers who are committed to drive regional green efforts out of Singapore and contribute to MAS’ other green finance initiatives including developing green markets and managing environmental risks.
Selected managers will be those who have demonstrated a firm commitment to deepening their green investment capabilities across functions such as research, stewardship, policy and portfolio management, accelerate local capability transfers, and increase the management of green-focused funds in Singapore.
The green capabilities and experience of the team managing the strategies will be a key part of the evaluation. The deep engagement with these asset managers will help to further the development of Singapore’s green financing ecosystem, as well as strengthen MAS’ understanding of climate change risks and to better position MAS’ own investment portfolio for long-term sustainable returns.
MAS’ first
investment under the GIP will be a US$100m placement in the Bank for
International Settlements (BIS)’ Green Bond Investment Pool (GBIP). Together
with other participating central banks, MAS hopes that this initiative will
help catalyse further deepening of the green bond market.
The Digital Insight talks exclusively to Jay Weintraub, CEO & Founder of InsureTech Connect, all about digital transformation in the…
SHARE THIS STORY
The Digital Insight talks exclusively to Jay Weintraub, CEO & Founder of InsureTech Connect, all about digital transformation in the insurance industry.
Weintraub, currently at InsureTech Connect 2019 in Las Vegas, explains the challenges and opportunities currently in the insuretech sphere, whilst also noting the “groundswell of activity by entrepreneurs” who are looking at the world and wanting to make a change.
In the podcast, Weintraub also discusses buzzwords, the power of relationships and what lies on the horizon for businesses.
CPOstrategy met with procurement leaders from banking, utilities, consulting, solutions providers and financial services. Taking the temperature on the latest…
SHARE THIS STORY
CPOstrategy met with procurement leaders from banking, utilities, consulting, solutions providers and financial services. Taking the temperature on the latest trends and predictions for the future we spoke with Barclaycard, Enel, Bain, Coupa and Legal & General.
Barclaycard
Rob
Tuckwell, Director of Partnerships & B2B
Barclaycard is building an ecosystem of
P2P software providers (including Coupa and Amadeus) with the aim of bringing
payments and procurement closer together for B2B. “We’ve got to make sure that
our payment products are embedded within those ecosystems,” says Tuckwell who
is keen for Barclaycard to tackle “horrendous inefficiencies” for its customers…
“Digital payment products work in the consumer space. Why is that not filtering
through to business? Our strategy is to go from Procure-to-Pay to
‘Procure-and-Pay’. It’s a really key difference that they’re not separate
processes anymore and the future for payments and procurement is going to be
the convergence of these areas.”
Enel
Salvatore
Bernabei, Head of Global Procurement
Enel is among the world’s leading
integrated private utilities with a presence in over 40 countries and more than
70 million retail customers. Bernabei is focused on developing relationships to
enhance flexibility, minimise time to market and add value. “We welcome
innovation by vendors,” he says. “We
say: I have a challenge here, I am not capable, with my knowledge, to solve it.
It’s a very precise case study. I invite suppliers, offer a case with one month
to provide a solution before I select the best idea. We offer the possibility
to experiment, on our plans and assets before a contract is awarded.” To
support this approach Enel has an agreement with crowdsourcing platform
Innocentive.
Consulting firm Bain & Company’s Performance Improvement
Practice advocates targeted solutions for immediate impact combined with broad
transformation programmes to redefine how work gets done. “Once we have helped
implement technology to optimise tactical processes in procurement, such as
invoicing and purchase orders, we have to address the broader digital struggles
of an organisation,” explains Mattios. “Procurement tends to be a back-office
activity linked to savings,” agrees Tramazaygues. “There’s a big opportunity
for procurement to be a real part of the business; it can play a big role in
rebuilding the supply chain to make it more agile, opening the best markets and
bringing innovation through from suppliers.” Tramazaygues and Mattios believe
new approaches are vital in the current inflationary environment.
Coupa
Rajiv
Ramachandran, Product Strategy Management
Coupa offers an all-in-one, end to end, business spend management
platform. “Coupa provides users the richness
of insights, based not just on their own data but truly normalised, and
anonymised data across all the buyer, supplier relationship that exist on our
cloud-based platform,” says Ramachandran who cites the need to be able to use
consolidated data to chart the efficiencies and risks of suppliers. It’s a
“game changer” he sees customers greatly benefiting from when analysing B2B
data on a platform holding approximately one trillion dollars of spend. Coupa
believe the ability to match your progress against the community of the
platform, and take efficiencies from it, points to the future for agile
procurement as part of an ecosystem.
Legal
& General
Maarten
Ectors, Chief Innovation Officer
Legal & General is focused on disrupting
procurement from the inside out. Ectors stresses the importance of allowing
ecosystems to generate innovative solutions for its customers. “You need to get
everybody at your organisation excited about innovation,” he advises. “You
can’t innovate on your own and if you don’t collaborate with the challengers in
the market they can only disrupt you, but not in a positive way.” Ectors
highlights an important trend, the need to optimise the cost of failure: “Our
Beta programme runs four-week trials with new companies to assess potential new
partners,” he explains of a process which allows L&G to remain agile in its
approach to innovations that can speed up claims handling from days to minutes.
