It is necessary, as in any industry, to make money circulate. Reminding SmartMoney how Fintech is still – though with a very high potential – a niche, is Matteo Rizzi, partner of Venture Capital, a fund specialized in Finance and SBT Technology, and co-founder of the FinTechStage event, ready to land in Milan on March 30 and 31. “The amount of money that gets to all Fintech’s startups in a year is the same, or little more, than that which gets into the coffers of just Uber”, he explains. “Italy”, he continues, “has nothing to envy of countries like France or Spain: what we need, within our borders as well as in the rest of the world, is to find a place where startups, startup networks, banks and investors can communicate and network into a system “.
FinTechStage, launched by Rizzi and Lazzaro Campos, arrives in Italy (here the page to purchase tickets) exactly for this reason: two days to assess the situation with the most important players on the international scene”. For example all Fintech funds will be present,” affirms Rizzi, anticipating that among the startups present we will also find the Israeli eToro, capable of raking in 60.9 million dollars in funding. Whereas waving the Italian flag there will be MoneyFarm, investment management platform, and Satispay, the app that sends money via smartphone. The event begins on the morning of the 30th with a training session organized – “in English, of course” – for the startups: how to address investors, how to negotiate agreements, and how to revise your business model. The afternoon will be dedicated to 50 industry guests, who will then proceed in the evening on to Talent Garden with the SmartMoney community (even in this case by invitation, but free of cost). The following day, Tuesday 31st, representatives of players such as BBVA Ventures, the Spanish bank that has recently invested in Coinbase, and United Ventures, the fund that has backed MoneyFarm, will take the floor. An interrogative will be raised on the direction that Fintech investments are taking and how to align the efforts made to actual bank needs. “In the coming months we will see an ever increasing number of institutes ready to invest in Fintech startups and a greater dialogue between them. In order to innovate, we have to be willing to share; even banks are realizing it”, notes Rizzi. Always on the afternoon of the 31st, the selected startups (7-8 in total), along with their investors, will bring a new and interesting format to the stage. Not the traditional presentation or pitch, or have you, but a complete reversal of perspective: because, the investor will explain, I decided to put money into it.
Next, FinTechStage will visit Barcelona and Paris. And one of the next issues to explore will be that of non-financial operators: such as Apple or Facebook, who are increasingly more interested in competing with banks on their own playing field. “They possess a reputation and a wealth of data so remarkable to allow them to influence the sector and impose fast reactions.” We need to move fast. This is a train – which we spoke of only a few days ago when observing Italy’s absence at London’s Finovate – which we cannot miss.
