Fintech companies prove beneficial to IT contractors

Developers in the UK have been choosing to avoid traditional sources of finance such as banks in favour of borrowing from so-called ‘fintech’ companies who are keen to engage with the businesses of the future. With interest being expressed in investment for those who want to ensure that they are in at the ground-floor with new ideas, financial technology companies are making more companies viable than might otherwise be possible using more banks alone.

London, and the UK in general, are on track to take the place at the head of the world’s ‘fintech’ sector, according to Eileen Burbridge, a special envoy to the UK Treasury who is also a partner at Passion Capital, a firm of venture capitalists. Ms Burbridge was speaking at London Fintech Week and used this opportunity to explain why Silicon Valley can no longer dominate the financial technology sector, despite the long history of US providing the most significant proportion of investment to date.

She believes that the UK is uniquely placed to take advantage of the financial systems, IT infrastructure and government that are currently in place, meaning that they could be able to outmanoeuvre the US which could be at a disadvantage due to the sheer size of its market. Although there have been some start-ups emerging from Silicon Valley, the number pale into insignificance compared to the UK.

The UK summit was presented with figures which confirmed Ms Burbridge’s predictions, showing that fintech’s start-ups in the UK have enjoyed more investment than those in the whole of the rest of Europe put together. Between 2010 and 2015, the level of investment in ‘fintech’ in the UK reached around £3.5 billion, the equivalent of $5.4 billion, in comparison with just $4.4 billion in the whole of the rest of Europe, and although the US did raise $32 billion, this is a proportionately smaller sum given the size of the market.

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