It gives me pride and joy when such news shows up in my
feed. This is a very good initiative by EcoBank as it gives the voice to most
voiceless folks behind the keyboard.
We
have lots and lots of innovators that have very good ideas on paper but have no
platform or financial support to bring these ideas to life.
$500,000 challenge.
Ecobank have come up to the ecobank fintech challenge which
is targeting developers, programmers and technology innovators in the Africa
continent whom have developed or are developing a financial technology solution
system.
This is to bring an end to the pressing banking issues. There are
several key categories that you can place your desired interest, I will still
cover this.
Categories:
There are 10 categories that one picks from. You can provide solutions for one or more
categories, if you are the guru of gurus you can pick all(which I highly
drought). This categories include:
- Predictive analysis for big data
- Agency banking
- Secured client authentication
- Apps to work without internet connectivity
- KYC technology
- Customer analytics
- Credit scoring
- · Microloan system
- · User experience optimizing
- · Blockchain technology/solutions within banking
Out the 10 I have I have two favorite that I will keep an
eye on to see how it goes. One of them is app that will works offline. This will
be a very interesting development as in my previous articles I covered the google
offline search and am curious if it will use the same caching technique.
The second one is the blockchain technology likewise I did
cover an article on the same and am curious how banks will adopt this
technology. My friends at bithub Africa have been spreading the gospel on the
same. Think of it if banks start using
bitcoins this opens more opportunity for many.
Eligibility/ benefits
Basically All African startups / individual innovators are
eligible to apply to the fintech challenge. There is no application fee
joining is free.
Funny enough
your applications pass though f6s website not the fintech website. The application is open till 11pm GMT, April 14, 2017. For those
who love last minute rush you still got time.
You can apply as an
individual or as a start-up and you can place as many application as you want
but remember to classify them under the given categories, also demos for your
products is mandatory. Do not forget this.
Some of the benefits you
may enjoy for submitting your entries include:
- Becoming a fellow – mentorship by exerts
- Be a service partner
- Attract funding
- Maximize/ enlarge you audience
- Go multinational – get partnership in 33 countries
- Showcase your ideas
·
The diagram below summaries
it all. (Courtesy of finetech website)
For more information and
application visits their website