Podcasts about fintech

While L2 rollups did help scale Ethereum, they also created siloed ecosystems, all fighting over the same liquidity, users and devs. t1 Protocol is building layer-2 infrastructure to achieve seamless cross-rollup interoperability through real-time proving, powered by TEEs. t1's low-latency with 1-second block times provides faster preconfirmations, significantly improving UX, all while maintaining full Ethereum composability.Topics covered in this episode:Can's backgroundWhy Enigma/Secret Network built on CosmosSolving Ethereum's liquidity fragmentationt1's rollup & real-time proving in TEEsSequencer setup inside the TEEDealing with other rollup trust assumptionsIntegrating new L2sPermissionless TEEsPotential attack vectorsTEE alternativesAsset issuance on mainnet vs. L2st1 developmentPartnerships & BDSolana vs. Ethereum UXTEE misconceptionsEpisode links:Can Kisagun on Xt1 Protocol on XSponsors:Gnosis: Gnosis builds decentralized infrastructure for the Ethereum ecosystem, since 2015. This year marks the launch of Gnosis Pay— the world's first Decentralized Payment Network. Get started today at - gnosis.ioChorus One: one of the largest node operators worldwide, trusted by 175,000+ accounts across more than 60 networks, Chorus One combines institutional-grade security with the highest yields at - chorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Friederike Ernst.

In this episode of the Wharton Fintech Podcast, hosts Sabrina Fathi and Wesley Aster speak with Yoonkee Sull, General Partner at ICONIQ, about building category-defining fintech companies through every market cycle. Yoonkee reflects on his journey from early ICONIQ associate to GP, lessons from backing leaders like Chime, Groww, Adyen, Wealthsimple, and Ramp, and what it takes to earn trust with founders over the long term. They unpack how startups can differentiate in a crowded space, how embedded finance is reshaping distribution, and why knowing your customer better than anyone else is the ultimate moat. With thoughtful takes on unit economics, financial inclusion, and the real use cases for AI and blockchain, this conversation is a must-listen for founders, operators, and investors navigating the next chapter of fintech.

 Lex chats with Edward Woodford - CEO of Zerohash. They discuss Zerohash's growth, the rise of stablecoins, and the evolving fintech landscape. Edward explains how stablecoins now make up half of Zerohash's volume, highlights regulatory shifts in the U.S. and abroad, and explores the distinction between crypto and stablecoins. The conversation covers usability challenges, emerging payment use cases, and the future of embedded finance, emphasizing the need for regulatory clarity and collaboration between fintechs and traditional financial institutions. Notable discussion points: 1. Stablecoins Overtake Crypto in Volume: Stablecoins now make up over 50% of Zerohash's volume, driven by regulatory clarity and real-world use cases like payments and treasury. Institutions prefer them for their centralized control and ease of integration.2. Brokerage and Payments Are Converging: Zerohash sees strong demand across brokerage and payment rails, with banks and fintechs embedding stablecoin infrastructure. Global payouts, account funding, and subscriptions are key growth areas despite UX friction.3. Regulatory Climate Is Rapidly Improving: U.S. policy has shifted from regulatory overreach to bipartisan support for stablecoin legislation. This change is unlocking institutional adoption, with banks now moving aggressively into crypto and digital assets. MENTIONED IN THE CONVERSATION Topics: Zerohash, MoonPay, Transak, Ramp, Stripe, BlackRock, Franklin Templeton, Hamilton Lane, Morgan Stanley, Charles Schwab, SoFi, Uniswap, fintech, web3, digital assets, blockchain, tokenization, rwas, stablecoin, crypto, regulation ABOUT THE FINTECH BLUEPRINT 

Ryan Phelan is a partner and patent attorney at Marshall Gerstein. He discusses his journey from a background in computer science and fintech to becoming a prominent IP attorney serving clients in the MedTech industry and beyond. He shares insights on the importance of protecting intellectual property, especially for startups, and the burgeoning role of AI in medical technology. This succinct yet fascinating conversation highlights the critical intersection of law, technology, and medical innovation. Guest links: https://www.marshallip.com | https://www.patentnext.com/  Charity supported: Sleep in Heavenly Peace Interested in being a guest on the show or have feedback to share? Email us at theleadingdifference@velentium.com.  PRODUCTION CREDITS Host: Lindsey Dinneen Editing: Marketing Wise Producer: Velentium   EPISODE TRANSCRIPT Episode 058 - Ryan Phelan [00:00:00] Lindsey Dinneen: Hi, I'm Lindsey and I'm talking with MedTech industry leaders on how they change lives for a better world. [00:00:09] Diane Bouis: The inventions and technologies are fascinating and so are the people who work with them. [00:00:15] Frank Jaskulke: There was a period of time where I realized, fundamentally, my job was to go hang out with really smart people that are saving lives and then do work that would help them save more lives. [00:00:28] Diane Bouis: I got into the business to save lives and it is incredibly motivating to work with people who are in that same business, saving or improving lives. [00:00:38] Duane Mancini: What better industry than where I get to wake up every day and just save people's lives. [00:00:42] Lindsey Dinneen: These are extraordinary people doing extraordinary work, and this is The Leading Difference. Hello, and welcome back to another episode of The Leading Difference podcast. I'm your host, Lindsey, and I am so looking forward to my conversation today with Ryan Phelan. Ryan is a partner and patent attorney at the Chicago based intellectual property law firm, Marshall Gerstein, where he counsels medtech companies on protecting their valuable IP. Ryan ultimately believes that AI is an important technology to embrace, but cautions medical device and related companies to approach it pragmatically, developing a policy to govern and protect intangible assets and innovation. All right. Well, thank you so much for being here, Ryan. I'm so excited to speak with you today. [00:01:29] Ryan Phelan: Yeah. Thank you for having me. Thank you, Lindsey. [00:01:31] Lindsey Dinneen: Of course. Well, I'd love if you'd start off by sharing a little bit about your background and what led you to medtech. [00:01:39] Ryan Phelan: Sure, absolutely. So I'm an attorney by trade. And I started off in probably a different place than most people in MedTech, but I have a computer science degree and I worked in industry first for Accenture, doing a lot of programming and consulting in the FinTech world. So, high frequency trading and programming some pretty complicated data algorithms in order to trade stocks and bonds and securities, and things like this. That let me see aspects of intellectual property that people were doing with respect to the code I was writing. So I got curious with IP and law, and that led me to law school, Northwestern Law, in pursuing a joint JD, MBA program, which I finished in 2010. And I went into IP law with a passion for technology, pretty much in the computing space. And then in the last decade or so, IP practitioners, not unlike doctors, like to practice in specific areas and one of the ones that I focused on is software medical devices. And so that, that kind of led me into the realm of medtech. [00:02:48] Lindsey Dinneen: Very nice. Okay. So you have had such an interesting career trajectory and I'm wondering, back in the day, say you're a six year old Ryan, could six year old Ryan have predicted that you would be a lawyer and particularly intellectual property? [00:03:04] Ryan Phelan: Absolutely not. I mean, first of all nobody in my family, at least immediate family, was a lawyer. And so going to law school was not on the radar. I grew up in Louisiana in a small town, basically farm life, so certainly technology and stuff like that wasn't available in the city. But I did have a passion for things that were tech. I was certainly a kid that loved to take things apart and put them back together and build all kinds of Legos and stuff like that. So that basic kind of STEM acumen or desire was always there from the beginning. And so, as I, I grew up and got exposed to more things, certainly in college, it became kind of a passion. And so, I ended up doing that. We did have some medical issues in my family, including cardiac and cancer and stuff like that. So, those types of things always hit home with me and you're getting to a chance to kind of lean into medtech, at least on the software side, with medtech devices that include or incorporate medical technology became very interesting to me personally. [00:04:07] Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, of course. And so going back just a smidgen when you decided to go into law and you know, you've come from this background that was the software engineering and you've got this fintech background and you have all of these amazing skill sets already, what led you specifically to say, "Okay, I want to focus on intellectual property, and so this is going to be my, my sweet spot." [00:04:33] Ryan Phelan: Yeah. So when you go to law school, you get exposed to a lot of different classes. In fact, in your first year law school, you're required to take a bunch of baseline courses like criminal law and all these things. And so you quickly figure out what you like and what you don't like. And so for me, a computer science degree is always kind of the beating heart of what I loved. And so I wanted to, I tended to like, classes that were up that alley, so to speak. And the IP course that I took was definitely there because it was all about technology, inventions, people making things, and how those inventions played out in court. So I found my greatest joy in law school to be in those classes. So I spoke up the most in class and did the best. There's common saying that "you should do things that you love because you never have to work a day in your life" kind of thing. So I always try to think about that, and certainly fun today because I practice in IP and picked that direction. [00:05:27] Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, absolutely. So, in addition to all of the other credentials you have, you are also a published author and you are a speaker. And I would love if you would share maybe a little bit more about how you got into being a thought leader as well in your industry and how that path has taken you. [00:05:51] Ryan Phelan: Yeah, for sure. It's the same kind of thing. I've always liked to write as well. And I feel that when I write about something, I really get to understand it. And so in my field, there's a lot of stuff happening all the time. Like a court will come out with a new case, an IP and medtech or AI or something like this, and I really like to dig into it to figure out how can I use this court decision as a tool for clients, or how does this change things up? What will clients ask me questions going forward, or how can this be an interesting topic to either write about or to speak about? And so, I try to learn when I'm reading, and then I write it, and that teaches me, and I think and hope that others get a benefit from that too when I publish, so. [00:06:34] Lindsey Dinneen: Yes, of course. Of course. And you are also, if I'm not mistaken, an adjunct professor. So, first of all, do you sleep? And second of all, tell me more about this as well, please. [00:06:47] Ryan Phelan: Yeah, so I'm an adjunct professor at Northwestern Law. I teach a course on patenting software inventions. I do sleep because it's only once a year for a power week. You know, I think it's like three days out of the year. There's the long classes, they're like a few hours each, but we pack in several 30 minute core sessions into a day. So one day, maybe we'll go for three hours or two hours. And, you know, we will get the benefit of several weeks of coursework by doing all of that at once in those three days. And so, I teach on that. We teach fundamentals of patenting softwares and inventions, which includes medtech software devices. For example, the FDA classifies software, medical inventions in, in, in certain ways, like their software as a medical device where you have the software only such as, you have database with medical data and you're either formatting it or storing it or processing in some unique way, or you have software in a medical device where you actually have a physical device. It's a cardiac device where the software is running or at least partially running that device. And so we talk about ways to, to patent those inventions primarily with US law. So. [00:07:59] Lindsey Dinneen: Very nice. So specifically thinking about your medtech clients, because I know you probably have clients in many industries, but specifically in medtech, what are some of the common mistakes you see medtech companies making? Especially say, you know, an earlier startup or something like that, when maybe they haven't thought through an aspect that really should be thought through a little bit earlier in the process. What are some common things that you see that people should be aware of? [00:08:27] Ryan Phelan: Yeah, I mean, easily one of them is not filing a patent application early. And if they are a startup company and they have their biggest selling product, or what they think will be their biggest selling product, and they don't file a patent application on it, that could be bad because you have one year to get to the patent office with that, at least in the U. S. to file something once it's been publicly disclosed. And if you miss that deadline, then effectively you're allowing your competitors to copy it. And if you're a startup company, the last thing you want is for your product to become extremely successful and then a big Fortune 500 company gets wind of it, figures out you don't have a patent, and then just starts making it themselves and it takes away your market share. So that would be, you know, I think that's every inventor of startups like worst nightmare, right? So, getting that patent on file before the deadline is pretty important. [00:09:22] Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, of course. Now, I noticed you had recently written an article on LinkedIn about when to file this patent. And I know part of maybe some concerns that might arise are, "Well, we don't necessarily want this to be in public awareness yet." So how do you walk that line between "This is our IP, we're really trying to keep it very tight," versus, "But I also need this protection, this legal protection." So how do you navigate things like that? [00:09:54] Ryan Phelan: Yeah, so the point at which you need to make your invention publicly available or to disclose it because you need to, you know, maybe you're going to pitch competition and you need to show your invention on like a PowerPoint deck in front of hundreds of people. Then that's probably a good point to start thinking about filing a patent application if you're still developing it, and it's like in your basement, so to speak, and nobody's seen it. It's still secret then. You don't need to necessarily file a patent application at that point. Although, there's a funny thing in patent law where, if you have an idea, sometimes there's somebody else thinking about it too, and the first one to get the patent office, wins, and so, you certainly don't want to wait around too long and find out years later that you filed your patent application the day after somebody else. This actually happened with Thomas Edison and the light bulb and he had lots of fights about the other person that was claiming the same thing that lost, and we don't remember his name today because of that. So anyway, so that's one thing to keep in mind when you're starting out. [00:10:54] Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. Well, and speaking of those kinds of stories, are there any that particularly stand out to you as you've worked with all of these incredible clients who have seriously life changing products they're creating. Are there any that really stand out to you in your memory as affirming, "Oh my goodness, this is why I'm here. This is why I'm doing what I'm doing." [00:11:17] Ryan Phelan: Yeah, for sure. One that stands out is one in the opioid or the narcotics market. In my family, we have an individual who is unfortunately affected by this. And so, I had a client that reached out to me to create a VR program that helps to eliminate or to reduce cravings in this field. And that one was really impactful because using technology and non pharmaceutical way in order to reduce cravings for people that are struggling with addiction of some type, I felt to be very important. So I thoroughly enjoyed working with that inventor and helping to, to create that patent application for that invention. [00:11:59] Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, of course. Yeah. Thank you for sharing about that. I think sometimes those really personal connection kinds of stories are the ones that really stick in your mind because it, it helps to have this moment of realization, like you know that what you do matters, of course, but then having that extra layer of confirmation that "Yes, this is helping somebody who could literally be a family member or a close friend or relative" is really impactful. [00:12:25] Ryan Phelan: Exactly. [00:12:26] Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. So considering all of the industries that you currently serve, and of course, you have this incredibly varied background, which can only be wonderful to draw on from this rich history and experience of yours. What are some interesting crossovers you see between industries that can be useful in terms of, maybe one industry approaches something in a way that you've seen could actually really benefit folks in medtech or vice versa. Are you seeing trends like that? [00:12:59] Ryan Phelan: Yeah, absolutely. I mean, one of the biggest ones that I can think of now is artificial intelligence coming into play with medtech. I mean, certainly, medtech kind of runs the gamut of, you know, like, like we mentioned before software only to physical devices that incorporate software. And so AI is interesting because you can load it and AI model onto one of these physical devices, or you can have an AI model that's medtech based sitting on a server somewhere that can help doctors look or find particular cause or whatnot like that, based on symptoms that a patient may walk into, or maybe there's a device, like a needle, that allows that has an AI model on it that helps with injection or something like this. And so, these AI tools are becoming smarter. And I think that they help in the field of medtech and they require a different level of expertise with these inventions to not only create them because they're complex, but also to bring them to market because they require specific FDA regulations. Even the FDA right now is trying to figure out AI. They have approved several AI devices, but it usually comes down to, you know, is your AI device going to change in the near future because you're going to update the model? And if so, does that change it enough to require like a new submission? So the fact that AI moves so rapidly doesn't really mix well with the FDA's process of approving the device and having it set in stone at that approval state. [00:14:30] Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah. So where do you anticipate that this will take medical devices? Do you think it'll become so naturally ingrained in many of them that it's just sort of part of our reality, or do you think we'll still have those --what do we want to call them-- not AI functionality devices? [00:14:48] Ryan Phelan: Yeah, I think both will exist. You know, certainly a spectrum of these devices, right? Certainly there's surgical tools that exist now that have hundreds of years, or a hundred years, just in different, maybe better forms. So, those will stay, stick around. The AI assisted ones, I'm sure will find their niche, and live alongside the the existing tools. [00:15:10] Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, absolutely. If you could narrow it down, what would be maybe your top piece of advice for a MedTech startup founder from your perspective, in your role? [00:15:23] Ryan Phelan: Yeah, I guess the number one would be again to, you know, make sure you're not giving away your crown jewels. Have your patent filed before you step out. If you're trying to raise money, just be careful that you're not sharing information publicly. You have to share with a potential investor, consider an NDA or if they won't sign an NDA, you can file a provisional patent application with the patent office. That shows that you have something on file before you talk to others. And as long as you describe the invention sufficiently in the four corners of your provisional application, then that's often the best way to protect yourself going out. So I think, as an IP attorney, that, that would be the number one advice that I would give a startup company in the medtech space. [00:16:10] Lindsey Dinneen: That's incredible. Thank you for that. That's really appreciated advice. So, it's so interesting because when I was looking at your LinkedIn profile, of course you have all of this incredible experience, and one thing actually really stood out to me, and that was that at least at some point you have been a and --I'm sure you've done this throughout your career multiple times-- but a pro bono lawyer for Lawyers for the Creative Arts. And I was curious about that and how you got involved, and can you share a little bit about that journey? [00:16:40] Ryan Phelan: Yeah. So LCA or Lawyers for the Creative Arts is an organization here in Chicago that deals with artists of limited means. You know, usually they have some type of basic issue that they want handled and it mainly deals with IP. Typically, I work on a different capacity for these because I see them as like kind of fun learning opportunities. I usually work in the copyright space and the clients that I work with need help either filing a copyright for maybe a piece of art that they've created, or maybe have a question about how their IP is being used or sold in some way, and they need to figure out if their IP has been infringed. And so, we'll work with them in a pro bono capacity to help write a letter to a company or to file a copyright registration and things like that. [00:17:28] Lindsey Dinneen: Well, as a, as my side thing as also an artist, I just want to say thank you because it is so great that you're doing things like that for the artist community. It is not always easy. So, oh, that's great, appreciate it. Yeah. So as you look towards your own future, what are you excited about say in the next year or two? [00:17:50] Ryan Phelan: Very excited to see how, I guess, AI is playing out with medtech. You're seeing regulations and guidelines coming out that The United States Patent and Trademark Office and also the Copyright Office about how these laws will impact artists. I've sat on a panel with the Copyright Office and the United States Patent and Trademark Office as they're thinking through these decisions and putting out these guidelines. There is questions about, is the new administration going to change things up with respect to guidance and guidelines that have come out. So, you know, artists are looking at AI is like a tool, like a paintbrush. And the law is kind of looking at it, obviously from the legal perspective and it doesn't seem like those two things are aligned yet. There's common in, in history that the law typically lags the technology by, you know, a decade or two or more. And so that's certainly the case with AI. For example, there is a famous -- I wouldn't call it a case-- but a denial of a copyright registration at the copyright office for a gentleman that had created an AI piece of artwork, won the Colorado state fair, I think in 2022, and tried to file a copyright registration, but was denied. And he told the copyright office, basically he had entered in 500 plus prompts in order to generate, or at least partially generate, this work of art, but was still denied . Not because of his effort, just because of the way the law is written under current copyright statutes. And so, things like that seem to be, at least from a policy perspective, incorrect. And so it'd be great to see exciting how this plays out. Will Congress care enough to change it or how will artists be impacted under these types of laws and policy considerations going forward? [00:19:35] Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, absolutely. So pivoting the conversation a little bit just for fun, imagine that you were to be offered a million dollars masterclass on anything you want. It can be within your industry or part of your amazing background, or it could be about something entirely different. What would you choose to teach? [00:19:55] Ryan Phelan: Yeah. Wow. You know, I guess I would teach what I'm currently teaching. Cause I, I do enjoy the class I teach now. I'm at Northwestern, my alma mater, which I love. It's down the street from the office, get to go in same place where I went to school and teach the law and things that I do every day, which is patenting software inventions, including the medtech space. If I could get a million dollars to teach what I do now, that would be wonderful, in this hypothetical, so. [00:20:22] Lindsey Dinneen: Right. I love it. Excellent. And how do you wish to be remembered after you leave this world? [00:20:30] Ryan Phelan: Wow. I hope people remember me as someone who was fun loving and enjoyed tech and hopefully brought some information to the world that helped them in some way. [00:20:42] Lindsey Dinneen: Yeah, of course. And final question, what is one thing that makes you smile every time you see or think about it? [00:20:51] Ryan Phelan: Oh, wow. I guess there's a lot of stuff. I also like to do some type of sports. Currently, the ski season is ending, so I certainly enjoy skiing, so when I see or think about that's one of those things, and now coming is the golf season, so I transitioned into that. We're looking forward to some good weather here, finally, in Chicago. It was 80 degrees last week, and it snowed yesterday, so things are changing from golf to ski season, but one of those is always fun, so. [00:21:17] Lindsey Dinneen: That's awesome. That's fantastic. Yeah. If folks who are listening are in a position, would there be a way for them to get in contact with you and then how early should they do that actually? [00:21:31] Ryan Phelan: Yeah. There's multiple stages. They can get in touch with me anytime they want. You can always find me at our firm's website, Marshall Gerstein. Or if you want to, you can go to patentnext.com, just patent and the word next. com. That's my blog that I write on typically, and it has my contact information there, including my email address. [00:21:51] Lindsey Dinneen: Perfect. Well, thank you so much. Well, Ryan, it has been a joy to speak with you today. I really appreciate you sharing a little bit about your career and your insights, your advice, especially appreciate that for MedTech founders who might, you know, not quite know where to start with this whole legal element that they really need to consider. So I really appreciate you sharing kind of when and how to do that. And we're excited to be making a donation on your behalf, as a thank you for your time today, to Sleep in Heavenly Peace, which provides beds for children who don't have any in the United States. So thank you for choosing that charity to support. And thank you again so much for being here. This has been a wonderful conversation, and I just wish you the most continued success as you work to change lives for a better world. [00:22:41] Ryan Phelan: Thank you, Lindsey. My pleasure. Happy to be here too. Thank you for having me. [00:22:44] Lindsey Dinneen: Of course. And for our listeners, thank you so much for tuning in. If you're feeling as inspired as I am, I'd love it if you'd share this episode with a colleague or two, and we'll catch you next time. [00:22:56] Ben Trombold: The Leading Difference is brought to you by Velentium. Velentium is a full-service CDMO with 100% in-house capability to design, develop, and manufacture medical devices from class two wearables to class three active implantable medical devices. Velentium specializes in active implantables, leads, programmers, and accessories across a wide range of indications, such as neuromodulation, deep brain stimulation, cardiac management, and diabetes management. Velentium's core competencies include electrical, firmware, and mechanical design, mobile apps, embedded cybersecurity, human factors and usability, automated test systems, systems engineering, and contract manufacturing. Velentium works with clients worldwide, from startups seeking funding to established Fortune 100 companies. Visit velentium.com to explore your next step in medical device development.

Der neue Podcast mit Ralf Heim beleuchtet die Zukunft der Vermögensberatung. Es geht um digitale Tools, den Einfluss von Neobrokern, die Rolle von KI – und wie Banken auf den Generationenwechsel im Vermögen reagieren müssen.

Finance is undergoing a radical transformation that's redefining how we think about money, technology, and trust. The latest edition of Finance X Magazine pulls back the curtain on these changes, revealing a landscape where artificial intelligence has moved from experimental to essential.The numbers tell a compelling story: 85% of Belgian financial institutions now maintain dedicated AI units—a staggering jump from just 37% last year. This isn't superficial adoption; it's a fundamental strategic pivot affecting everything from talent development to organizational structure. Graph LLMs are emerging as particularly powerful tools, connecting complex data points to detect fraud patterns and personalize customer experiences with unprecedented precision.Beyond AI, we explore how geography and regulation are reshaping global fintech. Europe has become a magnetic destination for Asian fintech expansion thanks to its passporting system—one license unlocks an entire continent. Meanwhile, in Turkey, a startup called Midas achieved the seemingly impossible: doubling the country's investor base in just three years by slashing trade fees from $25 to $1.50 and eliminating minimum balances. Their story demonstrates how technological innovation can create "financial armor" against economic instability.For established players, adaptation is essential but complex. AXA Partners shows how embedding insurance directly into partner journeys creates seamless customer experiences. Yet Solaris serves as a cautionary tale of growth outpacing operational controls, resulting in regulatory fines and reputational damage. The striking parallel drawn between legacy banks and Yellowstone's John Dutton perfectly captures their challenge: leveraging valuable existing assets while avoiding obsolescence.As technology accelerates and regulations tighten—from NIS2 cybersecurity requirements to comprehensive crypto frameworks—financial institutions face a profound question: How do we balance innovation with stability, and ultimately, how do we maintain trust at the center of everything we do? Join us as we navigate these crucial questions reshaping the future of finance.Thank you for tuning into our podcast about global trends in the FinTech industry.Check out our podcast channel.Learn more about The Connector. Follow us on LinkedIn.CheersKoen Vanderhoydonkkoen.vanderhoydonk@jointheconnector.com#FinTech #RegTech #Scaleup #WealthTech

Emmanuel Daniel, founder of TAP International and author of "The Great Transition," explores the fascinating connections between ancient snake mythologies, humanity's quest for immortality, and the rise of artificial intelligence in the financial industry.• Mythologies across cultures show humanity's aspiration for godlike powers and immortality, with snakes symbolizing renewal without true immortality• AI represents our latest attempt to achieve godlike status but may contain built-in limitations that prevent humanity from self-destruction• Different governance approaches exist globally: European principles-based systems versus American rules-based frameworks• AI fundamentally transforms financial services by enabling unprecedented disintermediation between institutions and customers• Banks must redefine their intermediation role as agentic AI allows end users to build their own interfaces• Back-office operations are being dramatically simplified, reducing technology's status as a competitive differentiator• Financial institutions should prioritize adapting to AI's core impacts rather than just resisting disruptionFor more information, visit Emmanuel Daniel's blog at emmanueldaniel.comThank you for tuning into our podcast about global trends in the FinTech industry.Check out our podcast channel.Learn more about The Connector. Follow us on LinkedIn.CheersKoen Vanderhoydonkkoen.vanderhoydonk@jointheconnector.com#FinTech #RegTech #Scaleup #WealthTech

In this episode, I'm joined by Tim Newell, CEO and founder of GreenFi, a climate-focused fintech that emerged from the ashes of Aspiration's consumer banking business. Tim brings a fascinating fintech and climate tech pedigree, having previously sold a solar financing company to SolarCity, run financial products at both SolarCity and Tesla, and even survived five years working for Elon Musk. When Aspiration decided to pivot away from consumer banking to focus on global carbon markets in 2022, Tim saw an opportunity to acquire and restructure their consumer business. Through a complex licensing deal, he successfully transitioned over 98% of Aspiration's customers to his new platform while radically downsizing from 400 employees to just 40.GreenFi targets the 100 million Americans who cite climate as a significant worry, about 40% of U.S. adults, offering them banking products that guarantee their deposits won't support fossil fuels, automatically offset carbon from gas purchases, and enable tree planting through everyday transactions. We dive into how Tim thinks about the intersection of fintech and climate action, the challenges of building a sustainable business model in today's capital environment, and his ambitious vision to become "Patagonia for your bank account.”In this podcast you will learn:Tim's deep background in financial technology and climate tech.What was involved in Aspiration's pivot away from consumer fintech to the carbon markets.How Tim was able to spin out the consumer fintech business from Aspiration.How GreenFi grew out of that business.The product set for GreenFi and near term product roadmap.The huge percentage of deposits that moved over from Aspiration to GreenFi.The specific ways they are making their financial offerings carbon-friendly.Who makes up their target market.How the swing in Washington against climate initiatives is impacting GreenFi.How they restructured the business to a radically different cost base.How they are offsetting their own carbon footprint.The process for raising their $17 million seed round.Their different revenue streams.The scale that GreenFi is at today.Tim's vision for GreenFi.Connect with Fintech One-on-One: Tweet me @PeterRenton Connect with me on LinkedIn Find previous Fintech One-on-One episodes

Financial institutions are losing an average of $100 million annually due to a fundamental disconnect between fintech innovation and traditional financial systems. A phenomenon FIS and Oxford Economics have termed the "Harmony Gap." "We hear a lot from people about the challenges and friction they see in the money lifecycle," explains FIS CTO, Firdaus Bhathena, at his firm's Emerald Conference at the end of May in Orlando, Florida.. "But we had not been able to quantify that." His firm's collaboration with Oxford Economics is changing that, providing hard data on what many suspected but couldn't measure. The new research, based on surveys of 1,000 executives across the US, UK, and Singapore, reveals that disharmony in the financial system is a costly reality affecting everything from cybersecurity to operational efficiency. As Margaux McLoughlin of Oxford Economics puts it, "When there are disruptions across the money lifecycle, that's what we call disharmony." Understanding what the research describes as a Harmony Gap requires examining how the modern financial ecosystem operates, why the human cost extends far beyond corporate losses, and what organizations can do to bridge the disconnect between innovation and implementation. The path forward requires a rethinking of how financial institutions approach systemic challenges in an interconnected world.

Financial technology, known as fintech, is everywhere. If you send money by phone or invest with the help of robo-advisors, you're using it. Its proponents say by lowering costs, it can expand the range of financial services providers can offer and the pool of people who can afford them.  But fintech presents risks, including to privacy. Fintech companies aren't subject to the same regulations as traditional financial institutions when it comes to handling personal data. And some worry regulatory safeguards aren't keeping up with fintech advances.  Amid the uncertainty, fintech's role in financial services keeps expanding. How will fintech change the landscape for consumers? Can banks adjust? And will it make a real difference for those long shut out of traditional financial services?  Download the paper Harvard Business School professor Emily Williams presented at the Economic Conference, “Fintech, Financial Inclusion, and the Future of Finance.” Watch the session she spoke at, titled “Innovative Financial Technologies and Financial inclusion.”

What happens when you build direct connections to over 350 real-time banks and wallets worldwide? You create what Thunes CEO Floris de Kort calls "the smart superhighway to move money around the world."The limitations of traditional cross-border payments are all too familiar for businesses operating globally. SWIFT transfers take days, lack transparency, come with hefty fees, and stop completely on weekends and holidays. Thunes is revolutionizing this outdated model by enabling real-time payments across 130 countries and 80 currencies through direct connections to financial institutions and alternative payment methods.During this revealing conversation, Floris explains how Thunes has built a powerful competitive advantage through direct integrations with payment endpoints like GCash in the Philippines and M-Pesa in Kenya. Unlike competitors who rely on chains of aggregators, these direct connections deliver higher transaction success rates, more cost-efficient processing, and faster issue resolution when problems arise.Perhaps most compelling is how Thunes' services are enabling financial inclusion in emerging markets. By facilitating immediate payments to mobile wallets, they're helping unbanked individuals participate in the global economy - like ride-share drivers in Africa who can now receive instant payment, purchase fuel, and continue earning without traditional banking infrastructure.With licenses now secured in all 50 U.S. states and a new office opening in Atlanta, Thunes is positioned for aggressive growth in American markets, particularly serving U.S. companies with global payment needs.

Scott Kitun is a seasoned entrepreneur and investor. He currently serves as Advisor to the CEO at Republic, where he is building the infrastructure to enable retail investors to access private equity through tokenization. As a Strategic Advisor and Investor at KingsCrowd, Scott is helping to create the leading investment research and advisory firm for retail private markets, empowering everyday investors to make data-driven decisions in the private equity space. In this episode, KJ and Scott explore the impact of AI on the financial ecosystem and the need for investors to diversify to mitigate market volatility. Episode Highlights: 09:11 The Underserved Market and Private Infrastructure 16:18 The Future of Retail Investing 23:43 Simplifying Transactions with Blockchain 24:20 Tokenization and Real-World Assets 26:25 Challenges in Retail Investment Access 36:25 Resources for Learning About Private Equity Quote of the Show (16:00): “Private equity in general has beat public stocks 19 out of 20 years…”- Scott Kitun Join our Anti-PR newsletter where we’re keeping a watchful and clever eye on PR trends, PR fails, and interesting news in tech so you don't have to. You're welcome. Want PR that actually matters? Get 30 minutes of expert advice in a fast-paced, zero-nonsense session from Karla Jo Helms, a veteran Crisis PR and Anti-PR Strategist who knows how to tell your story in the best possible light and get the exposure you need to disrupt your industry. Click here to book your call: https://info.jotopr.com/free-anti-pr-eval Ways to connect with Scott Kitun: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kitun/ Company Websites: https://www.linkedin.com/company/republic.co/ https://www.linkedin.com/company/kingscrowd/ How to get more Disruption/Interruption: Amazon Music - https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/eccda84d-4d5b-4c52-ba54-7fd8af3cbe87/disruption-interruption Apple Podcast - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/disruption-interruption/id1581985755 Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/6yGSwcSp8J354awJkCmJlDSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

(NFHS - 5), 2019–21: https://dhsprogram.com/pubs/pdf/FR375/FR375.pdfStudies: https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/women-have-more-sex-partners-than-men-in-11-states-uts-nfh-survey-2019-21-122081900362_1.htmlhttps://www.indiatoday.in/lifestyle/relationship/story/55-of-indians-are-left-wanting-more-sex-survey-2664085-2025-01-13Guest Suggestion Form: ⁠https://forms.gle/bnaeY3FpoFU9ZjA47⁠Disclaimer: This podcast episode contains discussions on sensitive topics, including bestiality, for the sole purpose of spreading awareness, fostering informed dialogue, and promoting compassion toward animals. We do not endorse or condone any form of animal abuse. Listener discretion is advised. The views expressed are solely those of the guest and do not reflect the views of the podcast or its creators.Subscribe To Our Other YouTube Channels:-⁠https://www.youtube.com/@rajshamaniclips⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@RajShamani.Shorts⁠(00:00) - Intro (02:23) - Weird Sexual Disorders (10:40) - Sexual Suppression & Outburst (13:09) - Who Are Sexologists (14:16) - How to Get Orgasm (21:24) - What Is Good Sex (23:29) - Missionary Position(25:57) - Dark Side of Supplements & Condoms (38:05) - Masturbation (46:52) – Great Sex (49:35) – Beast in Bed (54:09) - Studies About Women & Partners (1:06:07) - Kegel Exercise (1:09:33) - States & Problems (1:10:46) - Sugar Daddies & India (1:14:08) - Sexless Marriages (1:18:07) - Compatibility & Marriages (1:22:14) - Positions & Sex Toys (1:25:19) - Performance Anxiety (1:29:03) - Paid Sex & Safety (1:31:06) – Penis Size (1:32:25) – Are Sexual Fantasies Inherited? (1:34:25) – Gut Health & Sexual Performance (1:38:54) – Increase Testosterone (1:43:16) – Sex Before Gym(1:44:50) – Fertility(1:48:05) – Milk, Lactose & Sex Drive (1:56:48) – OutroIn today's episode we have Dr. Sankalp Jain, Certified Sexologist and Founder of AskDrJain, Arunveda, ErectiCare Pro & Fertimacy. With clinical experience, he discusses how suppression, misinformation, and unrealistic expectations are shaping sexual behaviour today.He discusses premature ejaculation, erectile dysfunction, masturbation limits, overuse of enhancement sprays, and the psychological roots behind disorders like paedophilia and aphrodisiac imbalance. He also addresses issues like performance anxiety, sexless marriages, and compatibility questions in arranged marriages.In the final segment, he talks about the rise of paid sex, insecurity around size, hormonal myths, and the impact of tech habits on fertility. The episode closes with practical advice on pelvic exercises, nutrition, and the one sex tip everyone should know. Subscribe for more such conversations!Follow Dr. Sankalp Jain Here: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dr_sankalp_jainYouTube: https://youtube.com/@askdrjain?si=14mRN_6rNJYbV9CdFacebok: https://www.facebook.com/AskdrjainDrSankalpErectiCare Pro: https://askdrjain.in/erecticarepro/Check Out Arunveda:https://arunveda.com/products/arunveda-kondrion-kithttps://arunveda.in/product/gut-health-kit/About Raj ShamaniRaj Shamani is an Entrepreneur at heart that explains his expertise in Business Content Creation & Public Speaking. He has delivered 200+ speeches in 26+ countries. Besides that, Raj is also an Angel Investor interested in crazy minds who are creating a sensation in the Fintech, FMCG, & passion economy space.To Know More,Follow Raj Shamani On ⤵︎Instagram @RajShamani: ⁠https://www.instagram.com/rajshamani/⁠Twitter @RajShamani: ⁠https://twitter.com/rajshamani⁠Facebook @ShamaniRaj: ⁠https://www.facebook.com/shamaniraj⁠LinkedIn - Raj Shamani: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/rajshamani/

In this episode of FinTech's DEI Discussions, Nadia speaks with Gemma Roe, CTO at The Zebra, about her incredible journey from self-taught technologist to C-suite leader. In this inspiring conversation, Gemma shares how curiosity, resilience, and a values-driven approach helped her navigate Wall Street, embrace leadership, and build inclusive cultures that empower every individual to thrive.From embracing discomfort to creating psychological safety, this is a must-listen for anyone passionate about equity, tech, and authentic leadership.FinTech's DEI Discussions is powered by Harrington Starr, global leaders in Financial Technology Recruitment. For more episodes or recruitment advice, please visit our website www.harringtonstarr.com

What if one platform could handle your startup's banking, accounting, and invoicing—all automated? In this episode of Startuprad.io, we talk to Blas Pegenaute, CEO of Sequence ERP, a Swiss fintech startup redefining what accounting software can do for small businesses and freelancers. Blas shares his founder story—starting in nightlife, moving through hospitality, and eventually building an AI-driven accounting platform that now holds a FINMA license to act as a light bank.

Il Private Growth Equity è una asset class relativamente nuova ed emergente, complice unaserie di fattori, tra cui la maggiore maturità delle aziende che scelgono di fare una IPO.Questo concetto è meno famigliare rispetto al Private Equity e al Venture Capital, assai piùconosciuti da chi si occupa di startup e idee innovative. Abbiamo approfondito il tema conSilvia Conti, country head per l'Italia di Baillie Gifford.

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On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks about the launch of a new series of podcasts exploring the Venture Client Model which is turning corporate innovation on its head. Instead of merely investing in startups and crossing fingers, big companies buy from startups to drive innovation – today, not years from now. Imagine a world where a major fortune 500, an automotive manufacturer, an insurance giant or a bank can plug in a cutting-edge startup solution as easily as adding a new app to your phone. The questions Sabine tackles include: What if your company's next breakthrough isn't built in-house, but bought from a startup in an early pilot? And what if being a startup's customer is more powerful than being its investor? KEY TAKEAWAYS At its core, a venture client is a corporation that purchases and uses a startup's solution to gain strategic benefit. No equity stakes, no controlling shares – just buying the solution early, when the startup is still a venture. The company becomes the startup's client (often the first or an early client), giving the startup revenue and feedback, while the corporate gets to solve a problem with a cutting-edge product. Insurance is traditionally conservative – heavy on compliance, cautious with new tech – slow, one might say. But that's exactly why venture clienting is so powerful here: it creates a safe sandbox for insurers to experiment with startups. – Zurich has no corporate VC arm at the group level, so everything they do with startups ends up as a venture client relationship or partnership. That means all the effort goes into tangible pilots and deployments, not minority stakes in startups that might not align with the business. It's a bold approach, but clearly paying off. Imagine car insurance: traditionally, if you buy a policy in many countries, an agent might physically inspect your car, or if you have an accident, an adjuster needs to assess damage. CamCom replaces a lot of that with a DIY solution – the customer can just take a video of the car, and the AI will spot scratches, dents, cracked windshields, you name it, and even estimate repair costs. That means faster claims, smoother policy underwriting, and less hassle. BEST MOMENTS ‘The Venture Client Model flips the usual script: instead of investing in ten startups and hoping one succeeds, you pay a startup to solve a problem and start benefiting immediately.' ‘This isn't just theory. It's happening now.' ‘The model turns the corporation into what I like to call an innovation magnet – attracting the best startups because the word is out: “This company loves to buy new tech”.' ‘By the end of this series, you'll know the ins and outs of the model, from big-picture strategy down to on-the-ground tips, like why having a one-page startup contract can save you months of headaches, or why “impossible” should be banished from your vocabulary.' ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. ⁠Twitter⁠ ⁠LinkedIn⁠ ⁠Instagram⁠ ⁠Facebook⁠  ⁠TikTok⁠ ⁠Email⁠ ⁠Website⁠ This Podcast has been brought to you by Disruptive Media. https://disruptivemedia.co.uk/

At #NoVacancyNews we caught up with Amit Aghara, CTO of Fintech, to get a closer look at how they're transforming invoice management for hoteliers — and it's not just about #alcohol anymore. We broke down how Fintech streamlines the complex world of payments, regulations, and vendor management — all via automation and smart tech.

In this conversation, Dylan Silver interviews Robby Rydinski, a seasoned professional in the real estate and financial services industry. Robby shares his journey from FinTech to real estate lending, discussing the evolution of Anchor Loans, the intricacies of the fix and flip market, and the challenges faced by real estate investors. He emphasizes the importance of understanding the numbers in real estate investing and the need for lenders to be flexible and supportive partners. The discussion also covers niche markets in real estate lending and identifies hot markets for fix and flips across the country.   Professional Real Estate Investors - How we can help you: Investor Fuel Mastermind:  Learn more about the Investor Fuel Mastermind, including 100% deal financing, massive discounts from vendors and sponsors you're already using, our world class community of over 150 members, and SO much more here: http://www.investorfuel.com/apply   Investor Machine Marketing Partnership:  Are you looking for consistent, high quality lead generation? Investor Machine is America's #1 lead generation service professional investors. Investor Machine provides true ‘white glove' support to help you build the perfect marketing plan, then we'll execute it for you…talking and working together on an ongoing basis to help you hit YOUR goals! Learn more here: http://www.investormachine.com   Coaching with Mike Hambright:  Interested in 1 on 1 coaching with Mike Hambright? Mike coaches entrepreneurs looking to level up, build coaching or service based businesses (Mike runs multiple 7 and 8 figure a year businesses), building a coaching program and more. Learn more here: https://investorfuel.com/coachingwithmike   Attend a Vacation/Mastermind Retreat with Mike Hambright: Interested in joining a “mini-mastermind” with Mike and his private clients on an upcoming “Retreat”, either at locations like Cabo San Lucas, Napa, Park City ski trip, Yellowstone, or even at Mike's East Texas “Big H Ranch”? Learn more here: http://www.investorfuel.com/retreat   Property Insurance: Join the largest and most investor friendly property insurance provider in 2 minutes. Free to join, and insure all your flips and rentals within minutes! There is NO easier insurance provider on the planet (turn insurance on or off in 1 minute without talking to anyone!), and there's no 15-30% agent mark up through this platform!  Register here: https://myinvestorinsurance.com/   New Real Estate Investors - How we can work together: Investor Fuel Club (Coaching and Deal Partner Community): Looking to kickstart your real estate investing career? Join our one of a kind Coaching Community, Investor Fuel Club, where you'll get trained by some of the best real estate investors in America, and partner with them on deals! You don't need $ for deals…we'll partner with you and hold your hand along the way! Learn More here: http://www.investorfuel.com/club   —--------------------

Embedded finance offers a chance for fintech firms, vertical SaaS companies, and marketplaces to drive revenue growth and build a sticky offering.  Always strapped for cash and with their owners juggling multiple responsibilities at once, small businesses increasingly adopt vertical SaaS platforms to run their operations, the demand for integrated banking, payments, and lending solutions continues to accelerate.   For firms that can successfully navigate this landscape, embedded finance offers a powerful pathway to differentiation in an increasingly competitive market while addressing the critical financial needs that traditional institutions have struggled to meet effectively. On the show today, I am joined by three leaders in the space sharing insights into what it takes to succeed: Yoseph West, Co-founder and CEO of Relay which is a digital business banking platform serving SMBs, Sol Lax, CEO of Revenued, a leader in revenued-based financing and  Caleb Avery, founder and CEO of Tilled, a modern embedded payments provider for software companies Tune in to hear us plot the market shift from embedded payments to lending, underwriting challenges for thin-file customers, and strategic partnership models that create comprehensive solutions for small businesses.  In this episode we will examine two case studies: how  Relay and Tilled are implementing embedded lending in their platforms through their work Revenued and sketch out a plan for fintechs that want to mature their embedded finance offerings to offer sophisticated products like lending and working capital to their SMB customers. If you're a platform serving SMBs, embedded lending isn't just a feature – it's a way to make your product indispensable.  As customers look for financial solutions that meet them where they are, platforms that deliver seamless, flexible capital access will win. This episode is a must-listen for any SaaS, fintech, or ma

Welcome to a powerful new episode of the FinTech Hunting podcast, hosted by Michael Hammond. In this insightful conversation, we're joined by Nick Rutherford, mortgage tech expert and VP of Sales & Product at Milo—a cutting-edge customer retention platform for mortgage professionals.This episode was recorded following the NJMBA Conference in New Jersey, where industry leaders gathered to discuss the future of mortgage lending and technology.In this episode, we cover:• The importance of up-funnel engagement to boost client retention• How white-labeled home value reports drive monthly interaction• Why “point of thought” is the new battleground for lenders• Smart CRM integrations that deliver loan officer alerts in real-time• AI's fast-moving impact on mortgage marketing and borrower behavior• How personalized data, not generic drip content, drives conversionsWhether you're in New York, New Jersey, California, or serving clients across the country, this conversation delivers must-know strategies for loan officers, lenders, and fintech innovators.

IT-Risiken betreffen nicht nur die Technik – sondern die gesamte Unternehmensführung.

Sabine VdL talks to Lou Smith, a true trailblazer in the world of financial services and insurance. In today's episode, we'll dive into Lou's incredible journey, explore the vision behind Neuron, and discuss the key takeaways from the latest report that insurance providers need to consider.    KEY TAKEAWAYS We all have moments in life where the last thing we want to look at is out credit rating and history, but those things can affect how you access financial services in the future. Lou was part of the team that delivered the first end-to-end mortgage renewal online, started to break down investments and getting it to the hands of the many rather than the few. Everybody says insurance is behind the rest of the financial services industry, and it's a funny statement. It doesn't matter. What I'm seeing in insurance in the last 5-6 years is that this conversation has circled around about what do we do? But in the last 12-18 months I've seen a passion for how do now think about using digital, distribution models, digital, analytics and AI and thinking of all of those things together and deliver distribution models that start to move industry forward. The challenge is always in leadership, culture and change adoption. This is because it's really difficult to step into an unknown and think it's going to be better than what you're doing today. You want to power people with the data and capabilities so they can do what they're brilliant at, which is focusing on the best product and position for their client. Neuron and others enable brokers to do that. You also want to attract a new generation into the brokering sector, but rather than have them focus on the admin of that sector, they should be having great conversations with clients. All the work we're doing enables brokers to do that.   BEST MOMENTS ‘When starting my career I had a real passion for how to make the services we were offering more successful for clients and customers.'‘We care about the customer and making financial data accessible to you through the narratives we use.'‘I'd love to say this was all planned out, we didn't call it anything or know what it looked like, we just started to bring data and technologies together to build ‘workflow' and that's now become cool.'‘We want to be the easiest, most predictable and consistent broker to work with.'   ABOUT THE GUEST Louise (or Lou) Smith is a trailblazer in the financial services and insurance industries, with a career spanning leadership roles across digital transformation, data, product innovation, distribution, technology, and operations.  Her journey has been marked by groundbreaking achievements, including delivering the UK's first steps into digital distribution at Barclays, leading the digital transformation of the Royal Bank of Scotland (including NatWest) during its turnaround to profitability, and becoming the first-ever Chief Digital Officer at Lloyd's of London.  Currently, Louise is at the helm of Neuron, a transformative initiative aimed at redefining the insurance and financial services landscape. Through Neuron, she is driving innovation, collaboration, and growth, focusing on creating a more connected and customer-centric industry. WTWCO LinkedIn ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website This Podcast has been brought to you by Disruptive Media. https://disruptivemedia.co.uk/

Cross-border payments. Mobile money. Stablecoins. Crypto. Elizabeth Rossiello has lived through every cycle, not from a trading desk, but the front lines of African markets. Now, the founder of AZA Finance is selling her company to global fintech giant dLocal, a signal that the line between crypto and traditional finance is blurring fast. In this episode, she talks about: How stablecoins are powering 24/7 commerce in emerging markets Why new entrants keep failing to gain traction And how liquidity, not tech, will determine who wins this new game All that, plus the inside story of AZA's journey from a Nairobi-based Bitcoin exchange to one of the most important fintech players in Africa. Visit our website for breaking news, analysis, op-eds, articles to learn about crypto, and much more: unchainedcrypto.com Bitwise Human Rights Foundation Xapo Bank Elizabeth Rossiello, CEO and Founder of AZA Finance Previous appearance on Unchained: BitPesa's Elizabeth Rossiello on Necker Island dLocal announces intention to acquire AZA Finance to strengthen AZA Finance: dLocal announces intention to acquire AZA Finance to strengthen presence in Africa and expand capabilities Bloomberg: Uruguay's DLocal to Buy AZA Finance in Africa Push American Banker: What experienced payment execs can pass to a new generation The Startup Leap: Building A Remittance App for Africa's $1tr Market | Elizabeth Rossiello | Aza Finance Jack Zhang of Airwallex tweet saying he doesn't see “a single use case” for crypto Timestamps:

For episode 533, Brandon Zemp is joined by Bundeep Singh Rangar, CEO of Fineqia, a digital asset business that builds and targets investments in early and growth-stage technology companies. Fineqia provides investors with institutional grade exposure to opportunities emanating from convergence of blockchain based Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and Traditional Finance (TradFi). Bundeep is a thought leader in blockchain technologies and has spoken at influential events, including Paris Blockchain Week, Insurance 2025 in London, the South Summit in Madrid, the FinTech & InsurTech Digital Congress in Warsaw, and Rakuten's Technology Conference in Tokyo. Learn more about the company’s products and portfolio at www.fineqia.com. ⏳ Timestamps: 0:00 | Introduction1:26 | Who is Bundeep Singh Rangar?8:34 | What is Fineqia?12:36 | Fineqia vetting process14:25 | ETFs vs ETNs22:55 | Regulations in Europe vs U.S.30:04 | ETNs and Bitcoin36:38 | Bitcoin and AI38:37 | Fineqia portfolio companies41:26 | Fineqia roadmap50:28 | Fineqia website & socials51:22 | Events and conferences

Step into the world of payment innovation with Pierre Aurel, Chief Product Officer, and Norman Frankel, Chief Growth Officer at Stanchion Payments as they demystify SoftPOS technology - the revolutionary software turning ordinary smartphones into powerful payment terminals.SoftPOS fundamentally transforms how merchants accept payments, enabling any NFC-capable Android or iOS device to process contactless transactions without specialized hardware. This breakthrough eliminates barriers for small businesses, sole proprietors, and mobile vendors who previously couldn't justify the expense of traditional payment terminals. As Norman reveals, one European bank reported that 25% of all their acquired transactions came from SoftPOS applications just one year after launch - a testament to the technology's rapid adoption.Security concerns have been meticulously addressed through rigorous standards including PCI MPOC, creating a protected environment for processing sensitive payment data on everyday devices. While implementation requires significant investment from software providers to meet these standards, the end result delivers enterprise-grade security with consumer-grade simplicity.The technology has found unexpected champions across diverse sectors. Churches embraced it during the pandemic for contactless donations, government mandates in countries like Romania and Greece accelerated adoption for tax compliance, and major retailers including Walmart and Decathlon deploy it for queue-busting and business continuity during outages.Looking ahead, Pierre envisions improvements in NFC antenna technology to enhance the payment experience, deeper integration into everyday applications, and the blurring of lines between e-commerce and in-person payments. For merchants considering the switch, the benefits are compelling - potential savings of $300+ compared to terminal rental costs, enhanced payment flexibility, and no more missed sales due to uncharged or malfunctioning hardware.

Au programme :Le premier téléphone « américain » coute 1999$Netflix et TF1 signent un accord majeurLe reste de l'actualité : temps des ados sur Tiktok, évolution des shorts, le journal de l'IA…Infos :Animé par Patrick Beja (Bluesky, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok)Co-animé par Guillaume Vendé (Bluesky).Co-animé par Siegfried Thouvenot alias Captain Web (Twitter).Produit par Patrick Beja (LinkedIn) et Fanny Cohen Moreau (LinkedIn).Musique libre de droit par Daniel BejaLe Rendez-vous Tech épisode 624 – En tech, rien n'est simple – Purism Liberty Phone, Netflix

In this episode of Couchonomics with Arjun, we sit down with Tim Levene, CEO of Augmentum Fintech, the UK's only publicly listed fintech venture capital firm.From going public to backing infrastructure instead of hype, Tim shares what permanent capital allows that traditional VC structures don't and why he believes the next decade of fintech will be won with discipline, not just disruption.What we cover:

In this episode of the Data Science Salon Podcast, we sit down with Sasibhushan Rao Chanthati, AVP and Senior Software Engineer at T. Rowe Price, where he's building the future of finance through intelligent, scalable technologies. Sasi specializes in creating secure digital ecosystems and real-time analytics platforms that power AI-driven decision making at scale. With a background that spans research, software engineering, and cloud architecture, he's pushing the boundaries of what's possible at the intersection of fintech, automation, and enterprise AI. In this episode, Sasi shares insights from over a decade of experience building next-gen systems across the financial sector, his passion for ethical innovation, and what it really takes to build future-ready, inclusive AI infrastructure. Key Highlights: Sasibhushan walks us through the technical backbone of modern financial infrastructure and how AI is redefining intelligent automation. Real-world examples of building decision support systems using ServiceNow, AWS, and LLMs. Thoughts on balancing academic research with enterprise-scale engineering—and why that blend drives better innovation. Insights on the ethics and governance challenges facing enterprise AI adoption. Advice for up-and-coming engineers and researchers entering today's fast-evolving AI landscape. This episode is a must-listen for data scientists, engineers, technical leaders, and anyone interested in how automation, AI, and cloud technologies are transforming the global financial ecosystem.

Finom, an Amsterdam-based challenger bank for SMBs that claims to have doubled its revenue in 2024, closed a €115 million Series C equity round (around $133 million). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Guest Suggestion Form: https://forms.gle/bnaeY3FpoFU9ZjA47Disclaimer: This video is intended solely for educational purposes and opinions shared by the guest are his personal views. We do not intent to defame or harm any person/ brand/ product/ country/ profession mentioned in the video. Our goal is to provide information to help audience make informed choices.Order 'Build, Don't Talk' (in English) here: https://amzn.eu/d/eCfijRuOrder 'Build Don't Talk' (in Hindi) here: https://amzn.eu/d/4wZISO0Follow Our Whatsapp Channel: https://www.whatsapp.com/channel/0029VaokF5x0bIdi3Qn9ef2J(00:00) - Intro(01:58) - How Nucl*ar B*mb Works(04:35) - M.O.P – Father of All B*mbs(06:35) - Stealth Fighter Jet & the U.S.(09:18) - Countries & Their W*apons(11:58) - India & Retaliation(13:20) - Can We Stop Nuclear B*mbing?(15:58) - Impact of Nuclear B*mbs & Operation Sindoor(19:45) - Iran vs Israel & M*ssiles(24:35) - How World War 3 Will Start(25:40) - Stages of War(27:19) - Iran vs Israel Explained(34:09) - U.S. Demand to Stop M*ssiles(35:32) - Conflicts Between Countries & the Global Power Shift(37:43) - U.S. Influence in Iran-Israel War Dynamics(39:03) - Which Country Is Safest During a Nuclear War?(40:27) - India vs China: Weapons & Military Mindset(42:27) - India's Most Powerful Weapons(43:21) - Weaknesses in China's Military(44:22) - How Bomb Diffusers in Army Are Trained(44:36) - How a Bomb Suit Is Made(47:30) - How a Grenade & B*mb Jacket Blast(51:31) - How Army Officers Practice B*mb Defusal(53:22) - The Mindset Required to Defuse a B*mb(1:10:59) - Terro* Group Analysis(1:13:15) - Strengths & Weaknesses of Iran(1:14:36) - Strengths & Weaknesses of Israel(1:18:19) - Most Dangerous Border(1:18:35) - Defensive & Tactical Driving(1:24:00) - OutroIn today's episode, we have Lt Col Narender Singh Thakur, NSG Commando, Indian Army Logistics Expert, and Bomb Disposal & Post Blast Analysis Specialist. He talks about the realities of modern warfare, the technology behind advanced weapons, and what a nuclear conflict would mean for the world today.He breaks down different types of bombs, including nuclear, ballistic, stealth, and ground-penetrating explosives and which countries currently lead in military technology. He also covers the destructive impact of a nuclear blast, India's nuclear doctrine, and whether any defence is possible once a missile is launched. Geopolitical questions around Iran, Israel, China, Russia, and the US are discussed along with India's tested military strength and evolving global role.In the final segment, Lt Col Thakur explains the precision, training, and risk behind bomb detection and disposal. He walks through how bomb suits work, how defusing is practised, and what happens when dealing with real explosives in life-or-death situations. He also gives insights into defence driving, bomb detectors, and what truly makes a soldier stay calm under pressure. Subscribe for more such conversations!Follow Narendra Thakur On:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lt_col_naren_thakur/LinkedIn: https://in.linkedin.com/in/lt-col-narinder-singh-lssgbYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ColNarenderThakur_OfficialAbout Raj ShamaniRaj Shamani is an Entrepreneur at heart that explains his expertise in Business Content Creation & Public Speaking. He has delivered 200+ speeches in 26+ countries. Besides that, Raj is also an Angel Investor interested in crazy minds who are creating a sensation in the Fintech, FMCG, & passion economy space.To Know More,Follow Raj Shamani On ⤵︎Instagram @RajShamanihttps://www.instagram.com/rajshamani/Twitter @RajShamanihttps://twitter.com/rajshamaniFacebook @ShamaniRajhttps://www.facebook.com/shamanirajLinkedIn - Raj Shamanihttps://www.linkedin.com/in/rajshamani/• • •#Podcast #FiguringOut #RajShamani #army #armypodcast #podcastclips #narendrasinghthakur #india

Greetings Glocal Citizens! I met this week's guest last month as a fellow AfroTalks 2025 (https://afrotalks.com) speaker. Our collective charge for the event was to present our ideas about the "how" of Pan-African progress from mindset, to skills development to migration policy and the future of work. While I shared insights from the future of work salon series, our guest this week, David Hutchful participated on a panel discussing skills development. Born in Ghana, David is a passionate technologist, entrepreneur, educator, and design thinking expert dedicated to building tech-driven solutions in emerging markets. With over 25 years of experience in software development, he has led teams to create award-winning innovative platforms that drive business and social impact in Ghana and abroad. As Co-Founder and CTO of Yemaachi Biotech (YC21) (https://www.yemaachi.com/company/), he is working to build the most diverse genomic database to advance precision oncology. Previously, he co-founded Bloom Impact, led technology innovation at Grameen Foundation, and worked at Microsoft Research. His expertise spans Fintech, Health tech, and Biotech, with a focus on leveraging technology for meaningful change--all topics we touch on in our conversation. Where to find David? On LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/dhutchful/?originalSubdomain=gh) On Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/dkhutchful/) On Facebook (https://web.facebook.com/dhutchful) On YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hz-BUKLGAqE) What's David watching? Dept. Q (https://www.netflix.com/title/81487660?source=35&fromWatch=true) on Netflix What's David riding and a few motorcycle clubs in Accra: Yamaha XSR900 (https://yamahamotorsports.com/models/xsr900) Ultimate Riders MC (https://www.instagram.com/ultimate_riders_mc/) Hotwheels Ghana MC (https://www.facebook.com/hotwheelsghanamc/) Biker Girls GH (https://www.instagram.com/bikergirlsgh/?hl=en) Other topics of interest: Apam, Ghana (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apam) Adukrom, Ghana (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adukrom) About Abelempke, Accra (https://www.foxsports.com/stories/soccer/abelemkpe-a-tale-of-two-cities-within-a-city) What is the Africa Rising Movement (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Africa_Rising) about? About Ahaspora (https://www.ahaspora.com) Why did nurses and midwives in Ghana go on strike? (https://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/BREAKING-Nurses-and-midwives-suspend-nationwide-strike-1987698) Community-based Health Planning and Services (CHPS) in Ghana (https://www.modernghana.com/news/849705/community-based-health-planning-and-services-chps-in-ghana.html) About Kasapreko (https://kasapreko.com/our-story/) About WACCBIP - West African Centre for Cell Biology and Infectious Pathogens (https://www.waccbip.org) GDPR - General Data Protection Regulation (https://gdpr-info.eu) +233 Jazz Bar and Grill (https://www.instagram.com/233jazzbarandgrill/) Empire of AI (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/743569/empire-of-ai-by-karen-hao/) by Karen Hao Special Guest: David Hutchful.

In this episode of Crazy Wisdom, I, Stewart Alsop, speak with Andrew Einhorn, CEO and founder of Level Fields, a platform using AI to help people navigate financial markets through the lens of repeatable, data-driven events. We explore how structured patterns in market news—like CEO departures or earnings surprises—can inform trading strategies, how Level Fields filters noise from financial data, and the emotional nuance of user experience design in fintech. Andrew also shares insights on knowledge graphs, machine learning in finance, and the evolving role of narrative in markets. Stock tips from Level Fields are available on their YouTube channel at Level Fields AI and their website levelfields.ai.Check out this GPT we trained on the conversationTimestamps00:00 – Andrew introduces Level Fields and explains how it identifies event-driven stock movements using AI.05:00 – Discussion of LLMs vs. custom models, and how Level Fields prioritized financial specificity over general AI.10:00 – Stewart asks about ontologies and knowledge graphs; Andrew describes early experiences building rule-based systems.15:00 – They explore the founder's role in translating problems, UX challenges, and how user expectations shape product design.20:00 – Insight into feedback collection, including a unique refund policy aimed at improving user understanding.25:00 – Andrew breaks down the complexities of user segmentation, churn, and adapting the product for different investor types.30:00 – A look into event types in the market, especially crypto-related announcements and their impact on equities.35:00 – Philosophical turn on narrative vs. fundamentals in finance; how news and groupthink drive large-scale moves.40:00 – Reflection on crypto parallels to dot-com era, and the long-term potential of blockchain infrastructure.45:00 – Deep dive into machine persuasion, LLM training risks, and the influence of opinionated data in financial AI.50:00 – Final thoughts on momentum algos, market manipulation, and the need for transparent, structured data.Key InsightsEvent-Based Investing as Market Forecasting: Andrew Einhorn describes Level Fields as a system for interpreting the market's weather—detecting recurring events like CEO departures or earnings beats to predict price movements. This approach reframes volatility as something intelligible, giving investors a clearer sense of timing and direction.Building Custom AI for Finance: Rejecting generic large language models, Einhorn's team developed proprietary AI trained exclusively on financial documents. By narrowing the scope, they increased precision and reduced noise, enabling the platform to focus only on events that truly impact share price behavior.Teaching Through Signals, Not Just Showing: Stewart Alsop notes how Level Fields does more than surface opportunities—it educates. By linking cause and effect in financial movements, the platform helps users build intuition, transforming confusion into understanding through repeated exposure to clear, data-backed patterns.User Expectation vs. Product Vision: Initially, Level Fields emphasized an event-centric UX, but users sought more familiar tools like ticker searches and watchlists. This tension revealed that even innovative technologies must accommodate habitual user flows before inviting them into new ways of thinking.Friction as a Path to Clarity: To elicit meaningful feedback, Level Fields implemented a refund policy that required users to explain what didn't work. The result wasn't just better UX insights—it also surfaced emotional blockages around investing and design, sharpening the team's understanding of what users truly needed.Narrative as a Volatile Market Force: Einhorn points out that groupthink in finance stems from shared academic training, creating reflexive investment patterns tied to economic narratives. These surface-level cycles obscure the deeper, steadier signals that Level Fields seeks to highlight through its data model.AI's Risk of Amplifying Noise: Alsop and Einhorn explore the darker corners of machine persuasion and LLM-generated content. Since models are trained on public data, including biased and speculative sources, they risk reinforcing distortions. In response, Level Fields emphasizes curated, high-integrity inputs grounded in financial fact.

As payment methods diversify and customer expectations increase, the traditional collection and lockbox processing model must evolve. The growing complexity of incoming payments—especially non-conforming mail and unstructured transactions—coupled with the change in expectations, demand smarter, scalable solutions. This situation of complexity and expectations has ushered in a new era of modern collection processing, focused on eliminating manual inefficiencies and using intelligent automation tools to improve accuracy and data quality, driving faster payment processing and improved operational throughput and scalability. Deluxe's Dave Boyce sits down with Craig Jeffery on the Treasury Update Podcast to talk about the latest capabilities lockbox providers can use to improve their existing processes and meet the growing needs of corporations. In this episode, we'll discuss some key features of modern collection solution sets: Virtual batching Machine learning-driven recognition Historical learning Intelligent character recognition (ICR) technology  

Khalid Saad is a seasoned venture capitalist and FinTech entrepreneur with a proven track record of launching new ventures and accelerating existing ones. Over the years, he has partnered with startups and established companies on digital strategy, business development, partnerships, and market-entry plans—spanning payment systems, remittance services, crypto platforms, open banking, and more  .He is the Founder & Managing Partner of Bunat Ventures, a Bahrain-based regulated venture-builder VC focused on nurturing and investing in high-growth startups across the GCC.Khalid serves on the board of CoinMENA, a Central Bank–regulated crypto-asset exchange, and is a board member of Oqal – Bahrain Chapter, the region's largest and most active angel investment network  . Additionally, he advises 01 Systems, a leading regional financial technology and digital transformation firm, and contributes to the Finance, Insurance & Tax Committee of the Bahrain Chamber.Until recently, Khalid was the Founding CEO of Bahrain FinTech Bay (BFB)—the largest FinTech hub in MENA, recognized by S&P Global Ratings as one of the region's two most advanced FinTech ecosystems  . Under his leadership, BFB united ~100 public and private stakeholders (regulators, banks, telcos, asset managers, family firms, educational institutions, etc.) and hosted around 50 companies working across payments, blockchain, crypto assets, data analytics, robo-advisory, crowdfunding, and AI  .Before BFB, Khalid was a Business Development Manager at the Bahrain Economic Development Board, where he promoted the financial services sector and attracted major institutions—from banks and wealth managers to FinTechs and insurers—to Bahrain  . Prior to that, he worked with Ernst & Young, conducting feasibility studies, market research, and implementing a governance, risk & compliance platform in Bahrain, and with SEI Investments in London managing UK and European equity portfolios  .Khalid holds an MSc from Imperial College London and a First Class BSc from the University of Exeter  .LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/khalidesaad/

Traditional banking services alone aren't enough to serve the diverse needs of small and medium-sized businesses. Banks need to go further and think of their digital footprint as a launching pad for SMB owners by adding value-added services. On the show today, Mark Valentino, President of Business Banking at Citizens, and Taira Hall, EVP and Head of Enterprise Payments at Citizens, join to talk about how the bank is building more comprehensive solutions through value-added services for SMB customers. Valentino and Hall dive into how the bank is moving away from a purely transactional relationship to become more of a command center for SMB owners, highlighting how SMB owners' needs and the broader focus on CX is leading this change. Tune into the show to explore how traditional FIs can evolve to become modern digital hubs for SMB owners through the addition of Value Added Services like spend management, a focus on APIs, and a robust partnership-first strategy. Both Valentino and Hall provide a strategic overview and practical examples – melding the worlds of business banking and payments together to forge a powerful narrative about how Citizens is evolving to meet the changing expectations of small business owners.

"Toutes les qualités rares mais nécessaires pour un entrepreneur sont des qualités normales pour un immigré."(Vidéo ici)Je reçois Rooh Savar, journaliste, podcasteur, entrepreneur et bien plus.Sa dernière aventure en date : Welcome Account - une néobanque dédiée aux nouveaux arrivants en Europe.Welcome Account, c'est son histoire, et celle de millions de personnes qui doivent fuir leur pays.Avant de devenir entrepreneur, il était journaliste et activiste politique en Iran - il a su mobiliser des millions de personnes lors des élections de 2009. Il a ensuite été en prison pour avoir défendu la démocratie.Lorsqu'il a dû fuir en France, il a su transformer son vécu en une série de projets entrepreneuriaux à fort impact.Dans cet épisode on aborde le rôle d'un CEO versus celui d'un fondateur, le leadership et sa mission de vie née en Iran - qu'il incarne aujourd'hui en tant qu'entrepreneur,On discute aussi de son passage dans l'émission "Qui veut être mon associé ?" et comment cela a influencé Welcome Account.Rooh est devenue une figure entrepreneuriale, pourtant il le martèle : l'importance d'une mission durable c'est le produit, bien au-delà de sa genèse personnelle, qui doit occuper le devant de la scène.

As the summer tour of European crypto conferences landed in Berlin, one of crypto's cradles, we couldn't miss DappCon 25, where we got to sit with Jerome de Tychey, Nixorokish & Joshua Dávila to discuss Ethereum's restructure and whether its culture is still relevant to the wider crypto community. Join us for a fascinating discussion on the impact of crypto politicization and how Ethereum's ecosystem evolved amidst a society with ever-changing values.Topics covered in this episode:Jerome, Nixorokish & Josh backgroundsEthereum Foundation restructuringEthereum's culture & crypto politicizationDAOs & the evolution of Ethereum's ecosystemIs privacy still a societal value?User experience & account abstractionFuture hopes for EthereumEpisode links:Jerome de Tychey on XNixorokish on XJoshua Davila on XDappCon on XSponsors:Gnosis: Gnosis builds decentralized infrastructure for the Ethereum ecosystem, since 2015. This year marks the launch of Gnosis Pay— the world's first Decentralized Payment Network. Get started today at - gnosis.ioChorus One: one of the largest node operators worldwide, trusted by 175,000+ accounts across more than 60 networks, Chorus One combines institutional-grade security with the highest yields at - chorus.oneThis episode is hosted by Friederike Ernst.

As a property manager, have you ever worked with foreign investors? If not, what is stopping you? Is it because you don't know another language or because you don't know where to find foreign investors? What if there were a service that handled that piece for you? In this episode of the #DoorGrowShow, property management growth expert Jason Hull sits down with the founder of HomeAbroad and Ziffy to talk about how property managers can connect with investors living outside of the United States.  You'll Learn [01:49] Building a Platform that Helps Foreign Investors Find Properties  [08:21] Helping Investors in the U.S. Find Investment Properties  [14:46] How HomeAbroad and Ziffy Can Benefit Property Managers  [25:23] Using Real Estate Investing and Property Management to Move to the U.S.  Quotables “No one wants to be a landlord… They're looking for a good way to maximize return on their investment or return on their cash.” “If you are a smart investor, if you are running this as a business, right, you got to have property management.” “You can't build a portfolio of a hundred properties by managing each property yourself.” “You grow together. It's a small industry, you know, we got to help each other and we grow as a business together.” Resources DoorGrow and Scale Mastermind DoorGrow Academy DoorGrow on YouTube DoorGrowClub DoorGrowLive Transcript [00:00:00] Client finds the property through a platform. We do the mortgage financing, so we will introduce the property manager at the right time and say, "Hey, by the way, you can find the right property manager to help you manage this property, so, we'll kind of introduce you in the right point in that journey to make sure that you have a high conversion as well.  [00:00:20] All right, I'm Jason Hull, the founder and CEO of DoorGrow, the world's leading and most comprehensive coaching and consulting firm for long-term residential property management entrepreneurs. For over a decade and a half, we have brought innovative strategies and optimization to the property management industry. At DoorGrow, we have spoken to thousands of property management business owners, coached, consulted, and cleaned up hundreds of businesses, helping them add doors, improve pricing, increase profit, simplify operations, and build and replace teams. We are like Bar Rescue for property managers. We have rebranded over 300 businesses and we run the leading property management mastermind with more video testimonials and reviews than any other coach or consultant in the industry. [00:01:06] And if you are wanting help with any of that stuff, then reach out to us at DoorGrow. So we believe at DoorGrow that good property managers can change the world, and that property management is the ultimate high trust gateway to real estate deals, relationships, and residual income. At DoorGrow, we are on a mission to transform property management business owners and their businesses. [00:01:28] We want to transform the industry, eliminate the bs, build awareness, change perception, expand the market, and help the best property management entrepreneurs win.  [00:01:38] Now let's get into the show. All right, so my guest today, I am hanging out with Amresh Singh, welcome to the DoorGrow Show.  [00:01:46] Thanks, Jason. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.  [00:01:49] It's good to have you. So I would love to get into your background so people understand, like who are they listening to or viewing on this, and tell us a little bit about your journey into entrepreneurism and how you kind of got started and that will lead us into your business. [00:02:04] Awesome. So my background has been at the intersection of mortgages and technology. I used to work for a leading international bank before I started HomeAbroad. And originally I'm from India, so I moved to the US 10 years back, working for this big bank who moved me from India to the US to work closer to the headquarters over here. [00:02:25] I managed their international customer acquisition. And you know, in that journey, you know, I realized that two things that we have. Or I should say two really fascinating things about the US real estate market, which is, you know, 30 year fixed state mortgages, which we, in the US you know, we tend to ignore and we take it for granted. [00:02:45] It does not exist in most places around the world. It's a superpower, 30 year fixed state mortgages. Right? Yeah. Plus combine that with, you know, higher rental leads in the US market. You know, you're really looking at a true wealth building too. Right? So that realization coming from, you know, an international market into the US market, seeing the superpower of the, you know, how real estate in the US can really help you build generational wealth. You know, gave me the idea to start HomeAbroad, you know, which was a company that was focused on global investors investing in USD asset market, right? You know, and taking the advantages of, you know, some of these superpowers, I will speak later in your podcast. [00:03:24] Right? But that's how the journey started. And then, you know, as part of that journey, we realized, you know, some similar gaps exist in the domestic market as well that led to formation of Ziffy, which I'll talk about as well as we progress in the podcast. So that's kind of in nutshell, my know, my entrepreneur journey, my background, so.  [00:03:40] Very cool. I've noticed, you know, every now and then I get clients that they've got some special connection to an international market. You know, I've got a client from Israel and he's able to pull in Israeli investors and they're wanting to get into the US market, and he helps them handle all of that. [00:03:56] I had a client that same thing with China you know, and other different foreign countries, you know, and so that's a competitive advantage that each of these property management business owners have, but it's not one that every property manager can just create because they don't know a different language. [00:04:14] They don't have a network or connections overseas, and so that could be a challenge. But I see how that could be a competitive advantage for building up your own portfolio if you could access international investors. And I didn't really realize that, but I just grew up in this bubble of the US but 30 year fixed rate mortgages sounds so normal. You know? Yes. So, okay. So cool. So, so tell us a little bit about what you've got going on.  [00:04:40] Yeah, so, you know, as I mentioned, you know, we operate two brands. HomeAbroad is where we started, right? And that's a shop, that's a PropTech and FinTech shop that's focused on helping global investors invest in the US real estate market. [00:04:52] Right? If you think about, you know, real estate, right? It's kind of, you know, wealth building tool or is a mode of, you know, building generational wealth around the world. People invest in real estate for stability, right? For, you know, that that ease of mind, okay my investment is going to grow, right? [00:05:08] But you know, in most places around the world when you're investing in real estate, you're not doing that with leverage. You know, you are buying that in cash and you are, you know, mode for return on that investment is really banking on the capital appreciation on that property, right? What changes in the US market is because of 30 year fixed rate mortgages, there's no payment shock. [00:05:28] The rate is fixed for the term of the loan. That's 30 years. Since it's amortized for a 30 year period, your monthly payments are lower, right? Rental liens are higher. So what ends up happening in the US market is rent covers mortgage in majority of the scenario. [00:05:44] Yeah. It cash flows day one. Absolutely right. And that is something. So think about it, right? So you are generating cash flow from day one with leverage. I'll repeat that with leverage, right? So 20-25% of your money is able to help you buy a hundred percent of the property with cash flow or passive income from day one. [00:06:05] It just does not happen in most places around the world. Now imagine this: you explain this to someone who has no idea about the US state market, right? And then you tell them, Hey, not only you know the value prop, but as a company HomeAbroad, we are going to give you mortgage financing with no US state history. [00:06:25] Right. And we are going to underwrite you not based on your personal income or assets from your home country. We are going to look at the property's income, right? And we're going to underwrite based on that, right? Suddenly someone who has no affiliation with the US, you know, market or financial market is able to invest or buy US real estate for the obvious benefits I mentioned, right? [00:06:49] Cash flow with leverage, but also you're putting your money in the largest economy in the world. USD is still the reserve currency, right? So you're shielding yourself from currency risk that's might exist in your home country, right? And suddenly when you explain this to a global investor, it's an aha moment for them, right? [00:07:04] Because this is something that does not exist in their home market. You know, they want to, you know, kind of diversify their assets and dip into what US has to offer this kind of opening American dream to the world. Yeah. Without them having to live or work in the US. You can live and work in your home country and dip into what America or American dream has to offer, you know, while you sit in your home country. Right. And that's kind of what was a game changing phenomena for us. Great traction, great, you know, reserves. But what we saw, Jason, you know, these people were coming in and we're like, okay, great. I want to invest in USA asset market. But I don't know where to invest. [00:07:40] Right. I don't know the US market, I don't know which city to invest in. Right. And my team, you know, we found ourselves going onto Zillow doing investment analysis and coming back to them and saying, "okay, this is a good place to invest." And then we said, "okay, wait a minute. Let's just build a tech platform, and that's what led the evolution of Ziffy, which is kind of, you know, Zillow for investment properties, ziffy.ai, where you know, as an investor you can kind of just say, okay, this is my investment objective. [00:08:05] I want to generate X dollar cash flow every month. I want to generate Y percent in rental. I want to find all the rent properties. And the algorithm mines everything that is listed on MLS right now from an investment perspective gives you detailed investment analysis and helps you take the data driven recommendation. [00:08:21] And then we realized only 8% of Americans own investment properties. If it's such a good thing that global investors want to put their money in the USA market, why Americans are not building generational wealth by investing in real estate. Right? Because people don't want to be a landlord, right? [00:08:37] Right. But once you put this data in front of them, suddenly the perspective changes. And that's what we are right now. We are launching ziffy.ai where it's going to be the Zillow for investment properties to really help more Americans buy and invest in US real estate.  [00:08:50] Okay, great. And what's that tool called? [00:08:52] It's Ziffy, Z-I-F-F-Y, dot A-I.  [00:08:56] ziffy.ai. Okay. And you mentioned the big other z name Zillow, you're like, you're trying to take their lunch, I guess. Right? We'll see how...  [00:09:06] not really. Thing about it, zillow is focused on primary market, right? Yeah. It's a much bigger market. Right. And, you know, investment, of course, 16% of the transactions are investment properties. [00:09:17] Right. But having said that, it's a huge market and there's lot of, you know, scope for growth because a lot of Americans still, you know, what they don't know about is there are specialized loan products that exist, you know, that can underwrite based on the rental income of the property. [00:09:32] So if I have a mortgage, I have a car loan, I think, okay, there's no way I can buy investment property. No one's going to give me a loan. I'm going to walk in my local bank or my local branch, and they're going to say, "okay, Jason, you know, what's your current mortgage? What's your car loan? Oh, you don't qualify based on your debt to income ratio." [00:09:49] They don't know that this specialized loan product called DSCR loan, which is debt service coverage ratio loan, where I'm qualifying you for the mortgage based on the rental income of that property versus your personal income. Right. So suddenly now you can build portfolio of hundred of investment properties because each property qualifies based on its own merit. [00:10:11] You buy one investment property, right? Rent covers mortgage from day one generates you cash flow. You wait three, four years, you gain equity in the property, do a cash out refinance, take that money to put down payment on other property. That property is cash positive from day one and the cycle repeats. [00:10:27] So if you're a smart investor can really help that first investment property, help you build a portfolio of investment property over 10 to 15 year period and build that generational wealth for you and your family. And people just don't know about it. And that's what we're trying to democratize.  [00:10:41] All right. [00:10:41] I love the idea. You know, we've leveraged a DSCR loan and it's nice because you don't have to give them all your personal info. You know, it doesn't matter how much debt you already have leveraged with properties you already have. So the rates are a little bit higher. [00:10:55] Right. But if you're able to cash flow it effectively, then I guess it doesn't matter.  [00:11:01] It doesn't matter. But also, I'll tell you, Jason, it's not that much higher either. No. If you think about an investment property loan from Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae conventional loans the rates are going to be higher than what you're going to pay for a 30 year fix it mortgage for a primary home. [00:11:14] Right. If you compare an investment property loan from an, from the jcs versus a DSCR loan, the rate difference you're talking about is 0.25%, or, you know, like, so it's not, it's very competitive.  [00:11:28] So. A lot of the people listening run property management companies. They've got a pool of investors. [00:11:33] These are their clients. How do they leverage  [00:11:37] HomeAbroad or Ziffy? That's a great question. Right? So we are also opening a marketplace for property managers, right? Because think about these foreign clients that are coming over to us, right? Think about domestic clients, right? A lot of these clients, you know, no one wants to be a landlord, as I mentioned earlier, right? [00:11:52] They're looking for a good way to maximize return on their investment or return on their cash. Right. And they don't want to take the day-to-day hassle of being a landlord. Right. Right. That's where property management comes in. Right. And if you are a smart investor, if you are running this as a business, right, you got to have property management. That's what we tell our clients. You can't build a portfolio of a hundred properties by managing each property yourself. You got to get property management in, right? Yeah. And what we are doing is we are trying to, you know, open up a marketplace where, you know, foreign investors, of course, they have no idea about whom to work at in the US so they can connect to property managers in the US through a platform. [00:12:31] Right. But in addition. If you're a property manager and if you have clients who are looking for next investment and so forth, you can white label our Ziffy platform for your clients. Right, okay. To give them as your own tool. And if they come back to us, you know, for a mortgage, we give you a referral fee. [00:12:50] You know X, we give up to 40 to 50 basis point on the loan amount as their referral fee. So that could be not only you're servicing your clients, you're giving them tools to help them find their next investment, which by the way, you will end up managing as well. But you're also increasing your value prop by helping your client find the next investment and adding additional revenue stream to your overall portfolio, right? [00:13:12] So it's a win-win situation for everyone.  [00:13:15] So becomes absolutely profit center. Okay, so. And they can white label Ziffy. What about is the Ziffy and HomeAbroad databases, are these linked? Like, are these properties, because you know, I think a lot of property managers listening are like, "how can I get access to these foreign investors because I don't have that capability?" [00:13:32] They're linked. It's just the branding, right? Because for foreign investors, you know, we go with the brand name HomeAbroad, okay? And for domestic, of course, you know, HomeAbroad will not resonate with the US based customers, right? So that's where Ziffy comes in. And we are kind of actually actively going through a rebranding exercise where HomeAbroad will become powered by ziffy.ai. [00:13:52] You know, so at the end of the day, Ziffy is the overall umbrella brand, right? Ziffy.ai is our AI powered investment property search platform and HomeAbroad is the portion of Ziffy that's focused exclusively on foreign investors. But if you're part of our network, you get access to both clients, you get access to foreign investors, you get access to local investors. [00:14:13] Okay, perfect. So it sounds like property managers, if they're listed in this marketplace, it sounds like 1. You might be feeding them some free business from. Absolutely. HomeAbroad brand. Yep. They wouldn't be able to access otherwise. And they're able to support boots on the ground helping with the property locally. [00:14:32] Yep.  [00:14:33] And then they can also leverage Ziffy and do a white label thing for their existing clients and help get them and facilitate getting them into more property.  [00:14:41] Absolutely. Yep.  [00:14:42] Awesome. Okay, cool. Yeah that's very cool. So how does a property manager get into this marketplace?  [00:14:49] What are your qualifications? [00:14:51] So we of course, want to make sure that our clients are taken care of, you know, so we do initial vetting, just to understand, you know, you have the I would say capabilities and infrastructure to help service our clients. So everyone has a good positive experience, right? And then once we kind of have that initial meeting to vet you out, you will become part of our network. [00:15:10] We'll sign a good partnership agreement. You'll be part of the network and then, you know, you'll be listed prominently. If the customer is looking in that particular area, you know, you'll be listed prominently within that ecosystem. Now, good news is we are vertically integrated shop, right? [00:15:24] So client finds the property through a platform. We do the mortgage financing, right? And you know, we know exactly when the customer, you know, is closing that transaction, right? So we will introduce the property manager at the right time. There's no point introducing a property manager right when they're starting their journey to find an investment property, right? [00:15:42] But as soon as they close on that transaction, we'll introduce the property manager. We will expose our, you know, marketplace to them and say, "Hey, by the way, you can find the right property manager to help you manage this property from our vacant property management, based in say, Phoenix, Arizona, or say, you know, Dallas, Texas, like wherever the client is, you know, closing that transaction. [00:16:03] Right. So, we'll kind of introduce you in the right you know, point in that journey to make sure that, you know, you have a high conversion as well.  [00:16:11] So how do you, at Ziffy and HomeAbroad, how do you determine which markets you want to be in and focus on?  [00:16:21] So the cool thing, Jason, you know, like as the customer decides for us, right? [00:16:24] We are operating in 43 states, right out of 50 states in the US right now, right there are of course hot markets, right? But you know, we let our algorithm, because now, it's data, right? We know the data. We know what's the expected rent, which is our for algorithm to calculate the expected rent across every plus property listed on the MLS right now for sale. What's your monthly mortgage payment is going to be? We are the mortgage shop. So we know what the monthly mortgage payment is going to be. Yeah. Rent minus mortgage is your cashflow. Right? So you can basically punch in those numbers and you say, okay, I want to generate $500 in cashflow every month. [00:16:59] Show me properties in entire us. Show me properties in Midwest us. Show me properties in California. Show me properties in Texas. Right? Whatever is your appetite, right? But you can kind of, you know, find that right investment property with right investment objective, you know, and I would say market agnostic. [00:17:16] Right? Yeah. Find that property and then say, okay, yeah, this makes sense, this doesn't make sense. And what we are adding to our AI layer. You can ask AI question, show me population growth trend in this area in the last five years. Show me rent you know, growth in this area in the last five years. [00:17:30] Show me you know, is this a landlord friendly state? You know, like our AI will help you basically California, evaluate that property.  [00:17:36] So basically, California's out. Florida and Texas are in, or?  [00:17:40] Yep. Yep. And that's what we see. That's what we see. You know, Florida and Texas are two hot markets. Yeah. [00:17:45] Midwest is really picking up, you know, because the property prices are lower, taxes are lower, rents are higher, right? So Midwest US is the new hot market from a rental standpoint Okay. Is what we are seeing a lot of fixed and player opportunities as well. But Florida and Texas continue to be two hot states, you know, from a rental property standpoint. [00:18:03] Got it. Okay. Now, these people that are, you know that they're global investors. They're around, you know, around the world. They're watching the news, they're seeing all this stuff that's going on in the us. I don't know what their perception is, but when they're watching all this, I'm sure that factors into their decision making in which states they want to be in. [00:18:23] Absolutely a hundred percent.  [00:18:25] So they're like, it does, I don't want to be in California. They look like they're crazy there and they're watching the news and they're seeing these, you know, sanctuary cities with homeless people everywhere. And then they're like looking at like areas where it's more conservative and there's like more freedom and more options. [00:18:41] Then they're like, maybe, maybe there. So perception, I would imagine affects where they're choosing to invest as well.  [00:18:49] Yeah, it totally does. Right? And what we tell our clients, you know, you got to think of real estate as a long-term investment game, right? For example, you know, the rhetoric around current administration, right? [00:19:00] From global investor standpoint, you know, like, do I really want to put my money in the US at this point? You know, what happens if like X happens? Y happens, right? And what we tell our investor, right? The basics why US, you know, is a good market for real estate investment has not changed, will not change, right? [00:19:15] It's going to be still remain a good market for US estate investment. The question is, where do you invest, right? And what are your objectives, right? You want to invest in a landlord friendly state, right? You want to invest in, in states with, you know, job growth, population growth, right? And you want to invest in state you know, in a market where you're getting good ROI on your cash investor, right? [00:19:36] And that's a function of, you know, appreciation and function of cash flow, right? That you're generating. Right. So until you have those data points figured out, right, you know, in long term it's going to be a viable investment. Right. And you're going to make money, right? Is what we tell our investors, right? [00:19:51] And when we explain them from that perspective, from that lens, you know, I have not seen someone that has said, okay, USDS investment is off my list. Right? Is something that just still motivates and drives them.  [00:20:04] Very cool. All right. I like it. And the best property managers, they're DoorGrow clients, like we help them figure out how to actually do a good job. [00:20:10] Most property managers suck in most markets. This is... absolutely, yeah. The admission of property managers, they're like, I get a room of property managers. I'm like, how many of you believe all your competitors suck or most of them do? And everyone's hands go up. And everybody that comes to me and says, "Hey, I'm thinking of starting a property management business." [00:20:27] I say, cool. And they tell me their story. It's they have investment properties and they tried property managers and most of them were terrible and they decided to finally start a good company. And so there's this issue. So yeah, maybe we should get all the DoorGrow clients getting into your marketplace. [00:20:43] So  [00:20:43] A hundred percent, you know. Let's talk about that a hundred percent.  [00:20:46] Alright, cool. Have you heard a Blanket, have you heard of these guys? Not really. So I think I should connect you to Lior over at Blanket. They've got a really cool platform as well, and I think there's some synergy. [00:20:59] They're basically like a retention platform. Okay. For property managers. They were one of our sponsors at DoorGrow live. And they've created a platform that allows their clients to see all of... they're basically a white label portal for all their clients to have their portfolios. And it allows them to keep the properties in their portfolio by helping them find and access other owners when that owner wants to sell. [00:21:25] Awesome. Okay. I think there'd be some awesome synergy between these two tools. Yeah. And I'm always making connections. You guys don't see this, those that are watching the podcast behind the scenes, I'm always trying to connect different vendors to each other when I see some synergy. So, but I think that might be a cool connection. [00:21:40] So, because I think what you're doing would work really nicely with that and it'd be a really cool synergistic thing. So we'll just get HomeAbroad, Ziffy, Blanket, DoorGrow, and then some other vendors, we'll just start stacking, we'll create Voltron. Yep. This ultimate, you know, superpower to help.  [00:21:57] This very exciting. [00:21:58] Hey you grow together. You know, that's how I've always believed. You know, you grow together. It's a small industry, you know, we got to help each other and we grow as a business together.  [00:22:06] Yeah, absolutely. So, well, I like what you're doing. What's the easiest way for a property manager to reach out? [00:22:14] Which of the websites should they go to? How do they start getting vetted so they can get into this marketplace? And is this like a free thing because they're providing value or do they pay to become part of the marketplace or how does that work?  [00:22:27] It's a free thing, right? They will be listed on a platform for free. [00:22:31] So it's a two way street, as I mentioned here, right? So we are going to pay a referral fee to our property manager partners, when they refer clients over to us, we're going to give them free tools to help facilitate that process and vice versa. You know, we'll collect a referral fee if our existing client signs up with them as well. [00:22:47] You know, it's a revenue stream for us too.  [00:22:48] So if let's say I have one of those clients that has, a bunch of connections in a particular country like Israel or China or something like this, would there be an advantage to them to leveraging HomeAbroad to facilitate that rather than having to figure out all this work themselves? [00:23:05] Absolutely. Absolutely. Because we are, as I said, you know, we are one stop shop, right? So say for example, you have an Israeli client that is just thinking about investing in US real estate, right? So what we do, we start. From setting up the LLC, right? If you are US based, you know, setting up an LLC, receiving an EIN is pretty easy, straightforward process, right? [00:23:23] If you're a foreign national who has doesn't have an SSN or an IT number, just getting an EIN number from a IRS, you know, you're talking about faxing, you're talking about mailing, you're talking about six months, six to eight weeks to get, you know, your number in mail. Now, you know, we kind of have developed that expertise in this segment so we can get an EIN and with an analysis set for a foreign national not living in the US within a week. Right. Wow. We can help them open a US bank account while they're in their home country. Right. Of course, you know, we'll need the US Bank account as part of the mortgage process, but also they will need a US bank account to manage their property, right. [00:23:58] When they invest in the US market, right? We can, of course, financing for Foreign National, which is our bread and butter, right? So we help them with 75% LTV or 75% leverage to purchase an investment property in the US. So they only need to put 25% down payment on that investment property, as I mentioned, we don't look for any US history. [00:24:18] We don't look for trade lines or create history from their home country as well. It's a pretty straightforward process for foreign nationals. You know, all we are looking for is, you know, they have enough assets to close, which is 25% down payment plus closing costs. Right? And if the appraisal comes in right where we want it to be, right. [00:24:36] So whether they meet the ratio or the DSCR ratio where rent covers mortgage, right? Even if it does not, we have a sub ratio DSCR program for them. So one way or the other. You know, we'll be able to do the loan just based on the property's income versus considering their personal income or assets in their home country. [00:24:52] Right? So we covered them right from helping setting up an LLC you know, opening US bank account mortgage financing, connecting them with a local realtor, which is not just any realtor, but a realtor with CIPS, which is certified International Property Specialty Designation by now. Right. So they have gone through specialized training to work with foreign national, global investors, right? [00:25:13] And then property management connections, you know, through a marketplace, right? So we are kind of one stop shop for everything that foreign national would need to do to invest in the US real estate.  [00:25:23] Interesting. So here's another random idea that comes up. And I don't know if this even relates, maybe this is just completely out of left field, but occasionally I get clients that they've come from a foreign country to the US. [00:25:36] And in order to, you know, to immigrate and to become integrated in the US, they have to start a business. And so they will buy a franchise sometimes, which usually in this industry, buying a property major franchise, I'm pretty outspoken about that. I think it's generally a bad idea. I get a lot of franchisees coming to me that have struggled like, you know, a gal that came, bought into a franchise, she's already invested $100k into this and the franchise gave her poor strategy and she only has one unit under management and she's $100k in and over half a year in invested into this. And she's like, you know, concerned and freaking out. I've got another client, he's immigrated from the uk. [00:26:16] He's built a property management business. They both built their business in Florida, by the way. Nice. So the land of freedom and humidity. So is there some sort of advantage for some of these people that are overseas also? They're like, "you know what? I like the idea of investing in, you know, the US but I want to be in the US." [00:26:37] Is there a way that they could build a business leveraging this and could that be something that is facilitated as well?  [00:26:45] Yeah, that's a great question, Jason. You know, and something like a lot of, you know, foreign clients ask us, right? So I'll give you a two part answer to this question, right? [00:26:52] One, if you are part of E3D countries, right? So US has a E3D, you know, with I think UK, Japan you know, Australia, Canada, and the few other countries on that list, right? Yeah. So if you're part of one of these countries where the, where you have a E3D you know, with the US you get a visa called E2 Visa. [00:27:12] E2 Visa, where, you know, where you can start a business in the us, get that visa to come manage the business. And a lot of our clients in from these countries would start up LLC to manage two to three properties. Show that okay, they're managing a real estate business. Right. To kind of get that E2 visa, right? [00:27:29] And so it's a great way for them to not only build you know, a profitable business in the US right? And kind of benefit from the US estate investment, but then also, you know, try get a residency visa, you know, based on this business. Property management kind of falls under the same aspect as well. [00:27:46] Okay? Then other countries which are not part of the E3D, where you have something called an EV5 Visa, which is you know, which were one of the key differences is that you have to show that you generate 10 employments and invested at least around a million dollars in the US to generate those employments. [00:28:03] Now that is where, you know, it becomes a little bit trickier, right? Because you know, you have to show that you brought that money in, you putting that money in real estate qualifies. Right. But the the important aspect is creation of 10 jobs. You have to show that you've created 10 jobs through that investment, you know, for that purposes. [00:28:21] If you buy, you know, like 10 properties or buy a multifamily unit and you know, you have a property management around it that employs 10 people to take care of it, technically it qualifies. Right. You can also you know, buy a hotel, you know, buy 2 commercial property that employs, you know, 10 people to kind of, you know, to qualify on the, that, that visa rule. [00:28:44] Right? But again, you know, you're talking about a million dollar investment. You know, from your end, you know, which is not, you know, applicable for everyone, right? Yeah. So there are a couple of ways, right? But for E2 Visa, you know, it becomes really easy, right? Because that job requirement criteria is not there. [00:28:59] You have to show that it's a functional business. It's an active business, which could be a real estate business, right? And it becomes, the qualification becomes a little bit easier on from that perspective.  [00:29:09] Got it. Okay. Interesting. If you run into these people, we should totally be homies and... [00:29:15] absolutely. [00:29:15] If you run these people one of the things we're really brilliant at DoorGrow is helping people avoid all the mistakes they make when they get their business started. We help them clean. We're like bar rescue for property managers, as I said in the intro. And for startups, we're ideal. [00:29:29] We help them avoid all the pitfalls of the franchises. We help them come up with their own brand, their own website. We help them build out their hiring process. We help them make sure they get good people, like we help optimize the business and get the right systems and installed. And so we really are like the ultimate franchise alternative. [00:29:46] And I've just gotten tired of seeing the franchises hurting people. And so my mission. Is to get people to sign up with DoorGrow instead of going to these franchises and set ourselves up as a franchise alternative because we can help them get going with a lot less cash involved and a lot more help. [00:30:05] And and then we can help them give them real strategies for growing their portfolios. And it sounds like this might be a really nice addition to any of my client's strategies for growth is to leverage HomeAbroad because they would love to have people that are hands off. Yeah. In another country trusting you to just take care of stuff that, that's a easy, no-brainer type of client they would love to have. [00:30:25] Yeah, absolutely. Jason, and we should talk after this podcast. We'll talk, you know, this. I think there's a lot of synergies.  [00:30:31] Okay. Very cool. So, well, what else should property managers or investors listen to the show know about HomeAbroad or Ziffy that we haven't covered? Or what questions do people tend to ask that they're concerned about? [00:30:45] Yeah, I think, you know, one of the things, you know, that we also advise our clients, right? You know, it's not about, you know, property management eating into my cash flow, right? Because that's something that we see, you know, people concerned about, or people you know, like want to kind of, you know, want to do it by themselves because they want to make sure they maximize their cash flow, right? [00:31:05] But what we tell our clients, you know, at the end of the day, you got to think of it as a business, right? And what's your net return and how do you value your time? Right. What's the hourly rate that you assign to yourself, right? And what would else you'd be doing if you're not managing five properties on your own? [00:31:21] Right? That's an opportunity cost, right? So think about this more from an opportunity cost standpoint versus, you know, okay, it's eating into my cashflow because that opportunity cost can help you buy five more properties, right? That can, you know, overall amplify your return on your cash invested versus nickel and diming, you know, the money that you're trying to save, right? [00:31:42] And you know, when we kind of, you know, talk to them about your, their ROI return cash, we want them to kind of consider this as an expense that goes into it. Because at the end of the day, even though we are not the property management providers, right, we partner with your clients, so to speak, Jason, right? [00:31:58] We are trying to do what's in best interest of that client in order to build that real estate investment portfolio. Right. So that's something that, you know, just want to reiterate to you, to the listeners of your podcast. Right. Why partner with us? You know, because that's something that we inherently, you know, advise our clients, you know, and we position property management as one of the pillars, they need to really succeed to build a successful real estate investment portfolio. [00:32:22] So you kind of insulate, because I know there's some property managers listening and they're like, man, some of these foreign investors are such cheapos. They're like so cheap and they complain about everything and they're really difficult. You kind of insulate them from that. Yep. With your organization and you know, and property management really, yeah. It is a no brainer. I mean, there's a lot of properties that a lot of these investors on their own probably wouldn't even accurately raise rent. And so if they didn't raise rent over the last two to three years, for example, they're probably 10% below market rate anyway. And so if the property manager just kept rent where it actually is in the marketplace, the property management basically is free. [00:33:01] Yeah, it pays for itself. Hundred percent. It's a no brainer. And so, yeah, I think the biggest mistake investors can make period, if you're an investor listening to the show, is to not use a property manager, a good one. Because there are bad ones. But if you can find a good one, that is the biggest game changer because it takes all the work off your plate and you make just as much money. [00:33:22] Absolutely. And another thing for your listeners, Jason, right. You'd be surprised how few people know about the specialized loan products for DSCA investor, right? So if your client is with you managing one property and is thinking in my head, oh, I already have a mortgage in my primary, I have another investment property here. [00:33:38] No way in the world I can buy another investment property. It's an education gap. It's a knowledge gap, right? Yeah. So they can help educate and that's where like and HomeAbroad comes in. because we will educate them on your behalf. You know, you retain the relationship, you retain your brand, right? We'll white label it, but like not only show them properties that will give them their next cashflow investment. [00:33:58] But also educating them, okay, for this loan to qualify, I don't need to see your debt to income ratio. I'm going to qualify based on that property's income. And you know, the only upfront cost is an appraisal cost, right? But us being the mortgage shop, you know, vetting that, okay, this property gives you cash flow, or from a conservative standpoint, it's good for you at the end of the day because you know, you won't invest if the property is not cashflow policy from day one, right? [00:34:24] So something that people don't know, you know, and there's a gap there.  [00:34:27] Yeah, we've had some lenders on talking about DSCR loans in the past, and yeah, a lot of people just aren't aware of it as an option. Yeah. So property managers, if they can have a partner like yourself to, you know, educate them on these alternate sources of funding and methods of getting cash to invest in real estate. [00:34:46] Yeah, it's going to open up the door. Not only that, but I like the idea of those because it kind of creates this veil of protection. So it's not an asset in your name if there ever is a liability with the rental property. Absolutely. They don't even know who the owner is. It's an entity and there's kind of a shield there of protection. [00:35:05] And so there's some additional advantages to going that route as well.  [00:35:09] So, absolutely. And like majority of our clients request the title in an LLC. What's the reason that you just mentioned you always need to have that, you know, protection around you in a litigation rich country, so. [00:35:21] Got it. Cool.  [00:35:22] Well, hey, I think this is a really awesome idea Amresh. It's great to have you on the DoorGrow Show. Any parting words or how can people get in touch and how can they find out more?  [00:35:32] Sure. You know, so if you're a property management company, you can get them in touch with us at partner@homeabroadinc.com or partner@ziffy.ai. [00:35:42] You know, my personal email address is amresh.singh@homeabroadinc.com. You can shoot me an email as well. Website is HomeAbroadinc.com for HomeAbroad and Ziffy.ai for our Ziffy brand. Okay.  [00:35:56] Awesome. Alright, thanks so much for coming to the show. So those of you listening, if you've ever felt stuck or stagnant, you want to take your property management business to the next level, reach out to us at doorgrow.com. [00:36:07] Also, be sure to join our free community just for property management business owners at doorgrowclub.com. We reject 60 to 70% of the people that apply to join that group. And if you found this even a little bit helpful, don't forget to subscribe. Leave us a review. We'd really appreciate it. Until next time, remember, the slowest path to growth is to do it all alone, so let's grow together. [00:36:30] Bye everyone.

Nine months into her role as Chief Product and Technology Officer at Temenos, Barb Morgan is focused on a simple principle when it comes to product strategy: quality over quantity. "We want to build less, but build it better," Morgan said during a conversation at the Temenos Regional Forum Americas 2025 held May 28-30 in Miami. Temenos' approach centers on co-creating meaningful solutions with bank customers rather than rushing to market with multiple products. Morgan emphasized that the company is "really focused on making sure that whatever we put out there is meaningful," as the industry navigates what she calls the "AI hype curve." Morgan's insights reveal why many banks struggle with AI adoption despite the technology's promise. The real barriers aren't about computing power or algorithms — they're messier problems involving decades-old data systems that were never designed for AI and organizational cultures that haven't caught up to the pace of technological change. Her conversation also detailed Temenos' bet on bringing innovation closer to customers, such as through its new hub in Orlando designed for co-creation, and why the company is taking a strategic and deeply integrated approach to AI that enables banks to deploy AI-powered solutions faster and safer.

According to research from G2, 63% of buyers like to be introduced to new products or solutions. So how can you effectively equip reps to sell your new offerings so they can turn that interest into real business impact? Shawnna Sumaoang: Hi, and welcome to the Win-Win podcast. I’m your host, Shawnna Sumaoang. Join us as we dive into changing trends in the workplace and how to navigate them successfully. Here to discuss this topic is Danica Bangert, the senior director of revenue enablement at ProducePay. Thank you for joining us, Danica. I’d love for you to tell us about yourself, your background, and your role. Danica Bangert: Thanks Shawnna for having me. It’s great to be here to talk through this subject. I think it’s very relevant in today’s world and especially in this world of AI and new things that are always coming for a lot of our go-to market reps. But like you mentioned, I’m the senior director of revenue Enablement at Produce Pay. I spent the last decade. In, you know, high growth SaaS companies like Zendesk, like Gong, and now kind of in the FinTech world, in the produce industry, where I get to kind of bring a, I would say, more modern enablement strategy to a very traditional industry, which is unique. And I’m really passionate about enablement in general, having come from the individual contributor side, having done sales and now moved to the enablement world. So love scaling, you know, sales teams and sales enablement teams with, for me, a lot of it’s around frameworks. A lot of it’s around consistency, messaging, and you know, programs like you said, that drive real behavioral change and not just kind of check boxes for enablement. SS: We’re excited to have you here, Danica and you actually recently were featured in an article that offered a glimpse into a day in the life of an enablement leader. Can you tell us what this looks like for you at ProducePay, and what are some of the key initiatives you’re focused on driving as an enablement leader? DB: Yeah, well, no two days are the same, especially a startup. So I’m sure many of our listeners can agree to that point, but especially navigating rapid growth and change is something that I deal with. So some days I’m deep in strategic planning and prioritization, figuring out how to scale things like the onboarding program, if we’re in a hiring phase. Or in my case a lot more is on field execution. So how do I balance the ever boarding for the different roles and different teams in the field? And then other days I’m building hands-on, right with the team, whether it’s tightening our messages on current products, building, you know, LMS courses and certifications for, you know, programs that require maybe a little less behavioral change. Launching, you know, competitive plays or just in general refining manager coaching motions. So I think it’s a mix of thinking big to collaborate with my cross-functional partners, but also for me rolling up my sleeves and helping the team. I. SS: And one of your key initiatives I know, is enabling reps to effectively sell the new predictable commerce program. What are some challenges that reps might face when learning to sell a new solution and how have you been helping your team overcome them? DB: Yeah. Like you mentioned, one of our biggest initiatives is driving adoption for our predictable commerce program. In our case, it’s a offering that gives a bundling almost of our services. It is a definite. I would say new product, but it’s really a shift in how we have gone to market in the past. And of course in that case, enablement has been critical in translating that into something that the field can actually execute on. So, you know, trite as it sounds, the analogy of building a plane while we’re flying it is. Is certainly something that we have to balance here at ProducePay. So we’re figuring out what the motion is to sell, to market this offering, this product, but at the same time, to try to go to those, go to market teams and give them what they need to get in front of customers during the right cycle, during the right part of the customer journey. And so for me and my team, we focused on. A lot of the like packaging of what is that narrative? And the challenge there is designing it to be really prescriptive and make sure that there’s action against, like how can we actually put these pieces into place and embedding it into the different motions that we have in our enablement cadence today. Things like onboarding or on our ongoing coaching and things like that. So it’s so for me it’s about consistency. It’s about clarity of the message for things like new product offerings and giving people the confidence they need to go and speak to their customers or their new business prospects about that potential value. SS: I love that. Consistency, clarity, and confidence. I think those are fantastic things to drive for your sales team. From your perspective, what unique value does an enablement platform provide though when it comes to equipping reps to effectively sell a new solution? DB: Yeah, I mean, for us, it’s about change management, right? Because change management is a big one, and I think when you’re asking sellers to pivot the way that they’ve always sold something, or you have to communicate and over communicate, oftentimes the why, giving them the space to either practice. Or create quick wins or come back to being intentional and being aligned. We really need to be able to have the tools in order to do that. Of course, you know, Highspot helps us along our journey with this in order to enable against any sort of initiative. So for us it’s been a game changer. Right? And it’s a critical, I think, central source of truth, but more importantly, it gives the reps. What they need in their flow of work. I’m very big on like operating in the operating rhythms of the go-to market teams and the tool sets that they’re in. So whether it’s. Pitch decks, talk tracks, objection handling. It should all be at their fingertips. And so, you know, we’ve also leaned into those components. We’ve leaned in heavily to Digital Rooms specifically because of our use of those with our customer. So in customer facing, we can use those Digital Rooms to guide reps kind of through that structured buyer journey and kind of ensure consistency across those touch points. SS: I’d love to actually double click into that because as you mentioned, I know you’re leveraging digital rooms to help reps land the new solution. What are some of your best practices for leveraging Digital Rooms and how are you planning to use them to drive success of your new solution launch? DB: Yeah. One area that, like I said, we’ve really leaned into Digital Rooms. Like I said, it’s not just about the content sharing, it’s about creating this guided. Buyer experience that really mirrors how we want the reps to have conversations. With our customers, especially for us post initial sales, right? A lot of times we see our customer success team who is going in there. There’s so much for us in terms of our product and our offering that they have to be able to anticipate and really guide the customer through when they’ve already signed up with us and become a member and start to utilize our products and services. So we really wanna make sure that they feel equipped to have the conversation, the CSMs, and that the customers don’t have any surprises, right? So that anticipation and the use of guiding them through that journey in digital rooms is really important. So for us, each room is really tailored to the stage of the deal. And for us, post-sales, that curated content is really important and which is why it’s a huge piece of the multi-threaded sales, post-sales journey and, and use utilizing that live on the call with our customers. So from the sales leadership perspective, I think it also gives us visibility. When we think about using the digital rooms, and we can see when a buyer ultimately engages, when a customer engages with it, what they’ve clicked in that room, what interests have been spiked and what drops off. Ultimately, that helps us kind of coach the reps that are using those, our CSMs that are using those in real time and kind of adjust the strategy and what we’re seeing in terms of, you know, buyer disengagement. So, you know, we’ve used the Digital Rooms, especially with our new product offering and ultimately with our current offerings, some of our products that have been around for a long time that are really consistent and that we know we need that customer success support for. So that making sure everyone is kind of aligned in the interactions. SS: Amazing. You touched on visibility and when I think about that, I immediately think about kind of the underlying data behind that. How are you leveraging data to continuously optimize and improve your enablement programs? DB: Yeah, I mean, data’s so important. And of course we’ve seen real results in just utilizing those kinds of capabilities. Shorter time to first deal, or in our case, like higher attach rates for key products. Are things that I would wanna look at, um, and that we’ve seen impact for, from a lot of our enablement programs, but especially this, when we think about post-sales on new products or post-sales on existing products, I would say stronger deal progression is something I wanna look at and utilize the tools sets for the field. But you know, we also track field readiness scores. And you know, since rolling out things like our multi-product offerings and this type of program using, you know, Highspot and coaching cadences, we’ve seen a pretty significant lift in rep confidence and kind of tying that into pipeline conversion. So a lot of things that we’re looking at there. SS: Amazing. And since implementing Highspot, what business results have you achieved and do you have any wins you can share? DB: Yeah. I mean, I would say, again, just looking at the engagement piece, you don’t have to go crazy, right? And especially with tools in general, but Highspot especially, there’s so much you can do in the tool itself that I think it’s important to think about, like the basics. And if you wanna start off with just attributing your enablement success to engagement. That’s absolutely okay. Right. You don’t have to go as far as, okay, let’s tie in directly to the deal conversions or to the qualified pipeline, or to the close rates, or to the a RIO or whatever it is that you’re measuring, right? It’s okay to go straight to, you know, engagement. It’s okay to go straight to rep confidence, like some of those are easy, big wins. And for me, with a smaller team in terms of enablement and also a smaller go-to-market team. You know, that’s something that still gets me buy-in and alignment with my team. So with at least these tools getting, you know, an 18% lift in rep engagement, even just looking at some of the numbers today, like those are good for me. SS: I mean, to your point, it’s about the, the people and, and you’ve mentioned this, you mentioned this in the article, that enablement isn’t just about tools or processes. It really does come down to the people at the end of the day. And how do you keep your people and their needs at the center of your enablement strategy? DB: I think keeping people at the center of enablement strategy is easily done by just remembering that we are dealing with people, right? Sometimes we forget in this world of Zoom and post COVID, like we’re always on, you know, our laptops we’re always on, in general, in emails or in slacks, or in messages, et cetera. Zoom, especially, I think it’s easy to forget that there is a person on the other side of the screen. So much so in even podcasts, right? So we’re always looking at that, I think from a numbers perspective, but coming back to building relationships, right? We get into the roles we’re in, or the companies that we work for because of the relationships we have and the communities that we built behind. So I think it just comes back to remembering that there’s humans involved and what do people care about most is building those connections. So not just, you know, they’re not just numbers, they’re not just APIs or metrics that there’s people behind it. SS: Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. Danica, last question for you. If you could give one piece of advice to enablement leaders preparing to roll out a new solution or a new product offering, what would it be? DB: Hmm. This is a good one. I think for me, it goes back to what I just mentioned in terms of even metrics and maturity level. It’s okay to be a team of one. It’s okay to start small, don’t chase perfection. I would say chase adoption. Right. Your content, your programs, your tools, they only matter if people actually use them, that they’re engaged with them. So keep things simple, keep things repeatable and tied to the major business outcomes of, you know, your industry, your business, and just never forget that the best enablement is built with the field, not for them. SS: I couldn’t agree more. Danica, thank you so much for joining us today. You landed some fantastic advice for our audience. DB: Awesome. Well, thanks for having me. It was great. SS: To our audience, thank you for listening to this episode of the Win-Win podcast. Be sure to tune in next time for more insights on how you can maximize enablement success with Highspot.

In This Episode Live from the main stage at Arizent's Digital Banking 2025, this high-energy episode of Breaking Banks brings the regulatory heat. Host Jason Henrichs is joined by Alex Johnson (Fintech Takes) and Dara Tarkowski (Actuate Law) for unfiltered, rapid-fire takes on the most urgent—and divisive—issues shaping digital finance regulation today. In a fintech twist on the classic ‘90s game FMK, the trio tackles which regulatory bodies to "love, leave, or reform"—from the CFPB and OCC to the NCUA and beyond. No topic is off-limits as they debate the shifting landscape around Section 1033, Open Banking implementation, UDAP enforcement, and the growing tensions between innovation and compliance. Plus: what do the STABLE Act, the GENIUS Act, and Stablecoin policy have in common? They all point to a regulatory future that's as complex as it is critical to get right. This episode is not for the faint of heart, but essential listening for anyone working at the intersection of fintech, policy, and consumer protection.

In this episode of Healthy Mind, Healthy Life/AiBiz, guest host Sana sits down with Mhamud Charania, an entrepreneur who transformed a small maize milling operation into a leading food manufacturer and expanded into multiple sectors across Africa. Mhamud shares his 26-year journey, starting from selling snacks as a teenager in Rwanda, to building companies in Mozambique, Kenya, and beyond. His ventures span manufacturing, paints, fintech, and mobile banking. Mhamud discusses the challenges of scaling businesses in emerging markets, the role of discipline and mindset, and how to stay steady amidst political and economic uncertainties. His insights offer valuable lessons for anyone navigating entrepreneurship in unpredictable environments. About the Guest: Mhamud Charania is a serial entrepreneur with business operations across East and Southern Africa. From food manufacturing to paints (Crown Paints) and fintech (M-Pesa distribution), Mahmoud has built diversified enterprises that employ over 2,000 people. His practical approach blends resilience, strategic partnerships, and a deep understanding of emerging markets. Key Takeaways: Entrepreneurship is a long-term game with inevitable failures. Discipline and adaptability are crucial when operating in unstable markets. Leveraging local gaps can open new sectors, as seen in his shift from trading to manufacturing. Building trust and helping others along the way creates long-term opportunities. Every chaotic situation holds hidden opportunities if approached with the right mindset.   Connect with Mhamud Charania:Email: mhamud.charania@gmail.com  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mhamud-charania-24670057/   Want to be a guest on Healthy Mind, Healthy Life? DM on PM - Send me a message on PodMatch DM Me Here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/avik Tune to all our 15 podcasts: https://www.podbean.com/podcast-network/healthymindbyavik Subscribe To Newsletter: https://healthymindbyavik.substack.com/ Join Community: https://nas.io/healthymindStay Tuned And Follow Us!• YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/@healthymind-healthylife• Instagram – https://www.instagram.com/healthyminds.pod• Threads – https://www.threads.net/@healthyminds.pod• Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/podcast.healthymind• LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/reemachatterjee/ | https://www.linkedin.com/in/avikchakrabortypodcaster #podmatch #healthymind #healthymindbyavik #wellness #HealthyMindByAvik #MentalHealthAwareness #StorytellingAsMedicine #PodcastLife #PersonalDevelopment #ConsciousLiving #GrowthMindset #MindfulnessMatters #VoicesOfUnity #InspirationDaily

In this episode of the Wharton Fintech Podcast, host Sabrina Fathi chats with Seth Rosenberg, General Partner at Greylock, about what it takes to build and back enduring companies at the intersection of fintech and AI. Seth shares lessons from launching Facebook Messenger, insights on founder-market fit, and how great early-stage companies validate ideas, build defensibility, and navigate market shifts. With deep takes on AI, blockchain, and the future of financial services, this episode is packed with practical wisdom for builders and investors alike.

FINTECH With Jeptum K. Bullut | The Legal Insider sn06e8 by Capital FM

Samir Kaji is the Co-founder and CEO of Allocate.This conversation is a deep dive into the private markets, the evolution of venture capital as an asset class, and how there are now 10x more private investment firms than public companies.We also unpack why 90% of venture funds simply can't raise capital right now, advice for anyone raising a fund today, how to stand out as an emerging manager, why secondaries have become a primary driver of liquidity in venture, and how to navigate SPVs as a GP and LP.We also talk through the AI products they built to evaluate fund managers at Allocate, and how AI is changing venture and company building.A special thanks to Bolt and Warp for supporting this episode.Bolt: Join the world's largest hackathon - up to $1m in prizes. Sign-up here.Warp: Automates payroll, handles multi-state tax compliance, and streamlines international contractor payments, so founders can focus on building, not busywork. Try it here.Timestamps:(5:31) Evolution of the private markets(17:55) VC markets post-2020(21:09) Risk / return profiles of various fund sizes(24:04) Secondaries will drive future venture returns(33:17) Creative ways to return capital(36:27) “Curiosity Revenue” in AI(41:52) Allocate's Beyond Summit(43:42) Samir's AI fund analyzer(46:15) Fintech only 1% of financial services revenue(50:13) Triple-layered SPVs(54:50) Breaking down returns in venture(58:27) How to gauge a fund manager's access(1:00:14) Determining appropriate fund size(1:05:02) 90% of venture funds cannot raise right now(1:09:50) How to raise a fund today(1:15:37) ChatGPT roasts Banana Capital(1:19:56) Traits of the best VCs(1:22:41) Vetting grit, hustle, and obsession(1:31:12) Why using AI is table stakes(1:36:49) Value of podcastsCheck out AllocateThe Peel episode with Eric Vishria Samir's Venture Unlocked PodcastFollow SamirTwitterLinkedInFollow TurnerTwitterLinkedInSubscribe to my newsletter to get every episode + the transcript in your inbox every week.

Join Theo and a panel of industry thought leaders including Julie Muhn, Tiffany Montez, Millicent Tracey, and Tammy Bangs, as we unpack the first half of 2025 and predict what's to come. From discussions on the evolving role of AI in financial services and the rise of stablecoins, to the impact of regulatory changes, we cover it all. Discover the trends, challenges, and promising advancements shaping the future of FinTech. Whether it's exploring the strategic shifts in banking, the application of AI agents, or the cautious optimism amid economic uncertainties, this episode is for you. Tune in now!   

Azin Radsan Van Alebeek is a co-founder and managing partner at Emmeline Ventures. This early-stage fund invests in and supports female-led start-ups in tech-enabled, FemTech, FinTech, and Sustainability sectors. With over 30 years of experience as an executive and board-level advisor, she leverages her strategic planning and coaching skills to help entrepreneurs scale their businesses, achieve their goals, and create returns for investors. Azin is passionate about empowering women to achieve financial sovereignty and make a positive impact in the world. She volunteers regularly to mentor other women on financial literacy, angel investing, and playing big.   In today's episode, Azin shares how an invitation to do something she knew little about led to betting on herself and ultimately becoming an investor in women's health, wealth, and overall well-being. Azin breaks down her role as Co-founder of Emmeline Ventures and the firm's focus on improving women's lives. She describes the meandering journey that took her career from consultant to PTA leadership to firm partner. Azin offers a digestible overview of venture capital, helping us identify who can benefit from VC support and who is better off without it. Check out Emmeline Venture's website and the resources Azin mentioned: I Relaunch, Golden Seeds, Portfolia, How Women Invest, and Show Her the Money. Follow on Instagram: @azinradvan. Please follow us at @thisislibertyroad on Instagram; we want to share and connect with you and hear your thoughts and comments. Please rate and review this podcast. It helps to know if these conversations inspire and equip you to consider your possibilities and lean into your future with intention.