Third Annual Fintech Mission to Switzerland Expands Scope

Every year for the last three years now, a major event in the European financial technology (fintech) markets has taken place. The UK Fintech Mission to Switzerland, as it’s known, has sought to bring together leaders in the UK fintech market with businesses in Switzerland. Now, the mission is expanding its focus, and bringing in not only Swiss businesses to talk to the UK fintech market, but also Austrian businesses as well.

The mission ran February 6 and 7, in both Vienna and Zurich. The UK companies involved in the mission were specially selected based on their offerings and the degree to which these offerings are representative of the wider overall fintech market in the UK.

Previous missions have generated collaborative efforts and various contracts, with new business from the previous missions bringing in about 30 million pounds sterling—about $42.04 million US—as of this writing.

One firm heading to the event this year is Global Processing Services, whose technology has appeared as part of the lineup in several firms from Curve to Glint to Starling Bank. Its chief commercial officer, Neil Harris, noted “…This trade mission provides a platform to demonstrate our technology and global capabilities to Financial Institutions based in Austria and Switzerland. It’s a true collaboration, we will learn more about their local market dynamic, and they will benefit in gaining added knowledge on existing technologies that could help them to improve their operations and innovate faster.”

The UK, and London in particular, has long traded on its name as a major financial services location, and fintech goes hand-in-hand with such operations. We’ve already seen success come out of this missionary effort, and it’s a safe bet—especially given the recent expansion of fintech of late—that further successes will emerge. Throw in the overall success of Austria as well as the financial fame of Switzerland—where do you think the term “Swiss bank” came from?—and the UK’s push into fintech should be well-received.

Hopefully there will be word after the fact about how the event went this year, especially as compared to previous years. Knowing the environment, though, it’s a safe bet that fintech companies will do well here, and Swiss—and Austrian—companies will have new fintech to put into play with their customers.