Guernsey’s resilience has long been praised in the face of changing economies and evolving markets and, based on the evidence on display at last week’s FinVention event, the island is going to be in the vanguard of pioneers of the next big thing – fintech.
The premise for FinVention, organised by the States of Guernsey and public-private partnership the Fintech and Digital Oversight Group (FDOG), was simple – gather together innovators from within the island and beyond and give them each eight minutes to pitch their idea. But not in the hackneyed Dragon’s Den kind of way, rather in a way that gave the audience a real sense of the ideas and the thinking and personalities behind them.
Being Guernsey, innovations that would disrupt (which is a good thing in the world of fintech) the financial services sector were the order of the day. From making regulatory compliance easier to communicating project data more quickly in a unified fashion, the presenters took to the stage to demonstrate how they were going to solve the problems that many in the audience will encounter on a daily basis.
Not all of the presentations were aimed at the finance sector though.
Jay Aylmer also had some fascinating ideas to share with the crowd. The first, a service called Tag Team, is being built here in Guernsey but is focused on keeping crowds safe at large-scale events in the Middle East and beyond.
Jay and his team are working with the Saudi Government to keep pilgrims safe during the Hajj by issuing smart wristbands to pilgrims that will relay instructions for crowd management in more than 150 languages from a technologically enhanced central hub.
The nature of using technology such as coding and apps to find the next big idea means that the island’s young people have something of a head start. The afternoon session featured teams from three schools presenting their big ideas. These were a taxi app for Guernsey, an easy automated method of VAT reclaim and a platform to link small businesses with problems to large businesses with solutions.
As technological disruption becomes more commonplace in all industries, including those you might assume were too rigid to adapt, the presenters at FinVention gave the audience a vision of a future in which Guernsey continues to prosper.
We in the comms sector will also have a part to play in the rise of fintech in the island as some of these nascent ideas will soon be fully-fledged businesses wanting to tell their stories.
By linking these thinkers with investors, enablers and collaborators FinVention has performed a tremendous service to the island’s business sectors; it will be fascinating to see where these ideas go next and how many of them will make it to a computer somewhere near you very soon.