Fintechguide.ch: mapping the Swiss fintech ecosystem
Analysis and presentation of the strengths of tomorrow's financial center
On August 6, 1991, a stone's throw from Geneva, Tim-Berners-Lee launched the first website from CERN. This event is often used as a keynote for any presentation on the Swiss innovation ecosystem. But what about the other great firsts? The first website to accept credit card payments was books.com, an American site launched in 1992, three years before Amazon. In August 1994, the first secure online commercial payment was accepted by US retailer NetMarket.
Initially cautious about its strong potential for innovation, and in view of the missed opportunity that the Web could have brought to the country, Switzerland has been mobilizing brilliantly in recent years around a most promising digital revolution: that of Fintechs.
The key to Fintech thinking can be summed up in these few words from writer and financial commentator Chris Skinner, written in his latest book Digital Human: how can I take an existing market with an intermediary and replace that intermediary with technology? A FinTech will answer this question by starting with a technology, then looking for a way to use it for a financial market or structure.
The fields of application here are vast, as is the growing number of companies offering their avant-garde solutions. So the time had come to map out this ecosystem in real time, the linchpin of tomorrow's Swiss financial center. Vincent Pignon, founder and CEO of Wecan Group, and Pascal Favrod Coune, Ph. Fintech in Switzerland published by Schulthess. The book summarizes the Swiss fintech ecosystem, from both an economic and legal perspective.
Philippe Reynier, head of Digital Strategy at UBS, prefaces the book, saying: A 2019 Ernst and Young study of 27,000 people in 27 different countries on consumers' global adoption of financial technologies shows that 64% have already adopted services from Fintech companies. Globally, 96% of consumers are aware of at least one Fintech alternative to their bank for transferring money or making payments in everyday life.
Following the example of the Business Model Canvas invented by A. Osterwalder and Y. Pigneur, a matrix outlining the innovative business models of Swiss fintechs, the regulatory issues essential to their implementation, and any necessary authorizations. And this across a variety of applications and activities (participatory finance, tokenization, asset management, payment infrastructures and banking infrastructures).
Several companies are analyzed, along with their business models and disruptive solutions. These include Swiss flagships such as Lend.ch, Foxstone, Crowdhouse, Wecan Fund, DGLD, Daura, Wecan Tokenize, Yova, Flink AI, Algotrader, Bity, Revolut, Neon, B Sharpe, Sonect, Ethereum, the blockchain initiated by Facebook Diem (formerly Libra), Bancor, Seba, Metaco and Bitcoin Suisse.
As an extension of their approach, the authors of La Fintech en Suisse have also launched a website listing all the players in the Swiss fintech ecosystem- over 320 companies spread across the Confederation. The strong potential of this forward-looking sector is clearly evident.
But unlike the USA, where the interests of innovation players, venture capitalists and strategic policymakers are aligned around a clear vision, Switzerland must not neglect its fabric of startups, entrepreneurs and pragmatic yet committed players in these fields.
Initiatives such as the one mentioned above are key elements in the construction of this ecosystem. On this depends the opportunities that the Swiss financial center will be able to transform into an undeniable asset, just as banking secrecy once was.
The book La Fintech en Suisse is available on fintechguide.ch.
