Author: nripn

South African fintech startup Scale, an issuer orchestration platform and payments tool, has raised US$700,000 in pre-seed funding to accelerate its expansion into Kenya, Ivory Coast and Zambia . Founded last year by Miranda Perumal, Ladder specializes in issuing cards that help fintechs achieve their go-to-market and speed-to-revenue strategies, leveraging their expertise and innovative technology stack to accelerate onboarding and launches of products. The startup’s US$700,000 pre-seed fundraising is led by prominent early-stage investors, 54 Collective (formerly Founders Factory Africa) and First Circle Capital, joined by Sunny Side Venture Partners and prominent investors angels in the sector. Scale will use…

Delaware has been a financial business technology hub for years, but it’s projects like Fintech CAFE that are putting the state on the map as a place for fintech entrepreneurs. After a successful first cohort this spring, the Fintech CAFE accelerator returns for the fall. It gives fintech startups in financial stocks the opportunity to apply for the 8-week hybrid program based in FinTech Innovation Center at the University of Delaware’s STAR campus in Newark. For the latest cohort, the program provided an opportunity to see what Delaware offers, both in terms of the fintech industry and for young companies…

Big tech companies are betting that a new wave of smaller, more precise AI models will be more effective in meeting the needs of businesses in industries like law, finance and healthcare. Jaap Arriens | NurPhoto via Getty Images LONDON — More and more financial services companies touting the benefits of artificial intelligence when it comes to increasing productivity and overall operational efficiency.Despite bold claims, many companies are failing to deliver tangible results, according to Edward J Achtner, head of generative AI at the British banking giant. HSBC.“Frankly, there’s a lot of success there,” Achtner said during a panel at…

Innovation September 19, 2024 | By Anthony Venutolo “We’re not looking for founders who are trying to create the next hot consumer brand, but rather creating deeply important technologies that solve real problems in our industry, and who are obsessed with that problem, and not so much with the final solution. .” In the latest episode of “What’s Next In,” Mastercard’s podcast that informally explores technology, innovation and ideas, host Vicki Hyman chats with Sabrina Tharaniwho runs Mastercard Start Path Startup Engagement Programwhich is celebrating its 10th anniversaryth birthday this month. The program now counts more than 400…

(Bloomberg) — Facebook parent Meta Platforms Inc. launched a new artificial intelligence tool that can generate or edit videos based on a simple text prompt, increasing competition with rivals like OpenAI and Google in the race to develop the world’s most advanced AI technology.Most read on BloombergMeta’s product, Movie Gen, can create a new video up to 16 seconds long based on a text prompt. It can also use such prompts to generate sound or edit an existing video, or even use a photo to create a personalized video featuring a real person.Movie Gen is only available to select internal…

The five-day Hong Kong FinTech Week (HKFW), scheduled for October 28, will bring together executives from the mainland’s financial and technology giants to showcase their latest innovations and is expected to attract more than 30,000 attendees from from over 100 savings.With a focus on emerging technologies, the event will feature eight themed forums ranging from AI to blockchain, as well as a Greater Bay Area tour, lifestyle activities and workshops.The main conference is scheduled to be held at AsiaWorld-Expo Hong Kong on October 28-29, with around 800 speakers as well as more than 700 sponsors and exhibitors.General…

As Plaid has expanded its fintech services, while expanding its customer base. Plaid got its start as a company that connected consumers’ bank accounts to financial apps, but has since gradually expanded its offerings to also include loans, identity verification, credit reporting, anti-fraud and payments. The 11-year-old company was nearly bought by Visa for $5 billion before antitrust regulators pulled the plug on that deal. Plaid then raised funds from a valuation of $13.4 billion After the deal failed and has since strived to diversify its sources of income. In its early days, the fintech giant primarily sold to other…

(Bloomberg) — Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. plans to increase server capacity to meet stronger-than-expected demand for Nvidia Corp.’s chips. used to develop AI, reflecting its expectations that spending on artificial intelligence will remain high.Most read on BloombergPresident Young Liu told Bloomberg Television that demand for next-generation Blackwell chips is “crazy,” echoing similar remarks from Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang last week.The Taiwanese company is currently building the largest server assembly plant in Mexico housing Nvidia’s most advanced Grace Blackwell chips. Hon Hai will have a planned capacity of 20,000 GB200 NVL 72 servers in 2025, according to Liu, revealing its…

Great investors tend to be avid readers, always looking for information that would give them a financial advantage. There are decades, even centuries, of examples of professionals who combined something they read (in a book, article, or regulatory filing) with their market experience to gain lucrative insight. For example, investment manager Jim Chanos’ close reading of Enron’s regulatory filings and his past experience detecting fraud led him to suspect accounting irregularities at the company. He made $500 million when Enron filed for bankruptcy in 2001. These days, however, even the most avid readers would struggle to compete with the volume…

Young fintech startup OpenBB reveals the next step in its plan to take on the heavyweights of the investment research world. The company is launching a new free version of a product that will open its arsenal of financial data and tools to more users. OpenBB is the work of a software engineer Didier Lopeswhich launched the Python-based platform in 2021 to enable amateur and enthusiast investors to perform investment research using different datasets for free, via a command line interface (CLI). The company then raise $8.5 million in start-up financing OSS Capital and angel investors such as Ram Shriramone…