Fintech Innovation Africa roadshow to kick off in Cape Town

One of SA’s largest accelerators, Sw7, in partnership with the law firm, Webber Wentzel, will launch their roadshow, known as the Fintech Innovation Africa. The roadshow will launch in both Cape Town and Johannesburg during the week of 27 February 2017.

“Innotribe’s Startup Challenge for Africa plays an important role in finding the continent’s most exciting young companies, bringing them together with the financial sector,” said the head of Middle East, Turkey and Africa at SWIFT, Sido Bestani in a press release to Ventureburn.

Fintech Innovation Africa will act as a runway event for the SWIFT Innotribe Startup Challenge which will be held in both Africa and Russia. Africa’s SWIFT Innotribe Startup Challenge will be held in the Ivory Coast with finalists of that event presenting at Sibos in Canada in October.

“The Emerging Markets, with their large underserved and ‘mobile only’ communities, have the greatest opportunities for meaningful collaboration between fintechs and financial institutions,” said the regional leader for Innotribe Startup Challenge, Hazel Nolan.

The Fintech Innovation Africa Roadshow aims to tackle issues within the fintech ecosystem

The Roadshow will focus on:

• How fintech looks in African markets
• The role of large banks in this ecosystem
• How can the various opportunities and challenges be leveraged
• How financial inclusion, job creation and other core challenges be affected by innovation

“There is a unique opportunity for fintech innovators in Africa. The financial markets are currently dominated by a few large corporates. Under-resourced and under-served markets, combined with the access to market which these corporates offer, will mean that the opportunities to be leveraged are likely to be partner driven,” said co-founder of SW7, Odette Jones.

“As the pace of innovation increases, the larger businesses will be more and more hampered by their ability to create and deploy new market appropriate offerings. Our goal is to bring the fintech innovators together with the existing corporates to speed up the partnering process, lower the friction to engage and shorten deal cycles,” Jones continued.

Nolan, Angus Brown, the ex-CEO of e-bucks, and other fintech legal specialists, will be presenting at the various events held at the Webber Wentzel offices (Cape Town) and the SW7 workplace in Rivonia, Johannesburg.