Our monthly Holland FinTech meetup was held at ING’s Innovation Centre on last Friday with approximately 120 attendees. Don Ginsel, CEO of Holland FinTech and Annerie Vreugenhil, Head of Wholesale Banking Innovation at ING Bank kicked off the event. Frank Abbenhuis from ING shared his insights from the collaboration with startup Spaziodati. TransDocLink, Wealthinitiative, Newgen Payments and MatchingLink were pitching their solutions. This was followed by Capgemini’s introduction of the World Fintech Report 2018.

Opening the meetup, Don discussed the continuously growing Dutch fintech ecosystem and the role of Holland Fintech in providing knowledge and facilitating cooperation.
Annerie Vreugenhil described how ING perceives the role of innovation and the ways in which the bank supports the development of new ideas and startups as part of its approach to innovation. Next up was Frank Abbenhuis, who is also from ING. Frank elaborated on the manner in which ING reaches startups and the process that took place when the bank decided collaborate with Spaziodati, an Italian startup. The two companies are co-developing IntelMatch - a smart search engine for credit related information. This collaboration between an incumbent bank and a startup intrigued the audience and provided interesting insights regarding technology and upcoming trends such as NLP in banking.
The pitches:
TransDocLink
Robert Blanken from TransDocLink opened the pitches. TransDocLink provides a safe platform that enables buyers and sellers to meet, agree on terms and arrange import and export transactions. This platform allows transacting parties to arrange and schedule payments as well as controlling the logistical aspects, thereby mitigating risk.
Wealthinitiative
Up next was Daniela Galeote from Wealthinitiative who introduced a solution for non-bankable assets. This blockchain-based platform allows wealth management institutions to share network of deals on behalf of their clients in the fields of real estate, art, passion investments and business deals.
Newgen Payments
The third pitch was by Sunil Jhamb from Newgen Payments. Newgen Payments, a provider of global payments, fraud and e-commerce solutions, removes friction from e-commerce platforms and allows merchants to easily accept payments in a secure environment that can be adjusted to individual needs.
MatchingLink
The last pitch was from MatchingLink’s Friso Postma. MatchingLink offers a software that grants asset managers better insights into their portfolios. As existing trade processes increase the risk of human error, MatchingLink’s software automates the trade process and improves the existing tools at the disposal of asset mangers, allowing them to provide a higher level of service.

Before closing the event, Alexander Tiekink from Capgemini introduced the World Fintech Report 2018, written together with LinkedIn. Alexander highlighted the ongoing symbiosis between banks and fintech startups as each group complements the other’s weakness. Another key aspect discussed from the report was the threat of big tech companies as reflected in the expansion of Alipay in Asia.