Entrepreneurs showcase cutting edge technologies at Partnership Fund’s 2014 FinTech Innovation Lab Demo Day

Enigma, Kasisto, LMRKTS, pymetrics, RevolutionCredit, Standard Treasury Chosen for Top-Level New York-Based Technology Mentoring Program

Leading-edge mobility, data analytics and credit risk solutions were among the six technology innovations demonstrated for top financial services, venture capital and technology executives at the fourth annual FinTech Innovation Lab Demo Day in New York today. The Lab is a 12-week mentoring program created by Accenture (NYSE: ACN) and the Partnership Fund for New York City and supported by more than a dozen of the world’s leading financial institutions to promote financial services technology (“fintech”) innovation and high tech job growth in New York City.

This year’s entrepreneurs were chosen by chief technology officers from 15 participating financial institutions. The companies included Enigma, Kasisto, LMRKTS, pymetrics, RevolutionCredit and Standard Treasury. The group has spent the last 12 weeks receiving high level mentoring, product and business development advice and exposure to senior financial industry, technology and venture capital executives.

Since the Lab was founded in 2010, the 18 previous alumni companies have raised a total of more than $76 million in financing after participating in the program. One alumni company was recently acquired for $175 million. Financial services companies supporting the Lab include: Ally Financial, American Express, Bank of America, Barclays, Capital One, Citi, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Guardian Life, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, New York Life, State Street Corporation and UBS. Supporting venture capital firms include Bain Capital Ventures, Contour Venture Partners, Rho Ventures, RRE Ventures and Warburg Pincus.

The 2014 FinTech Innovation Lab participants are:

• Enigma provides access to thousands of disparate sources of public data on companies, people, and locations. It pulls together tens of billions of records from sources as diverse as SEC filings, government spending contracts, and asset-ownership records – conveniently indexes the information so it can be used to support business decisions, such as underwriting, prospecting and trading. Financial institutions use Enigma as a supplement to proprietary databases to increase access to credit for small businesses, and assess real estate portfolio risk.
• Kasisto is a new spin off from SRI International, the creator of Siri. Kasisto provides a next generation, digital banking experience through a conversational user interface that lets consumers easily and quickly access financial information and perform complex transactions on their smartphones and tablet devices. The Kasisto Conversational AI Platform allows banks to rapidly and cost-effectively integrate branded intelligent virtual personal assistants into their mobile applications. From retail to private to commercial banking, the Kasisto platform can be used to provide breakthrough customer experience, reduce costs and drive better user engagement on mobile channel.
• LMRKTS’ platform enables market participants to report, reconcile and reduce counterparty credit risk across a variety of asset classes. As a neutral third party, LMRKTS helps financial institutions net their existing derivatives exposures by applying algorithms that recommend changes in counterparty exposures when institutions are both long and short. This can help significantly reduce counterparty risk and related capital charges for banks, and can be employed as a central platform for minimizing systemic risk.
• pymetrics is the next generation job marketplace. Using proven neuroscience and big data, they match candidates to jobs and companies where they’ll perform at the highest levels. pymetrics assesses career aptitude in candidates with neuroscience games, the latest scientific innovation in cognitive and personality assessment. They create proprietary, data-driven profiles from top employees’ performance on the games to find top-suited job candidates. Companies using pymetrics see massive efficiency gains in recruiting and overall performance management.
• RevolutionCredit is the first B2B credit data and decisioning platform to combine behavioral data and gamified financial education to benefit both consumers and financial institutions. Lenders, creditors, utilities, and subscription service providers partner with RevolutionCredit to assess consumer credit worthiness, improve customer acquisition and retention, and decrease loan losses. Through RevolutionCredit creditors identify consumers who will perform one to two credit score bands better than their credit score would otherwise indicate.
• Standard Treasury builds, maintains, and supports white-labeled and co-branded developer platforms for banks worldwide. Standard Treasury partner banks see material top-line growth through decreased costs to service their customers, decreased churn, and increased transaction volumes, while delivering tremendous value to their customers.

“The FinTech Innovation Lab leverages New York City’s position as the largest market in the country for enterprise-grade financial technology,” said Maria Gotsch, President and CEO of the Partnership Fund for New York City. “Because of this regional advantage, the city’s core banks and other financial institutions are able to commit their time and resources to building the local tech sector. Their involvement adds expertise and insight to help accelerate new product development for the six participating companies at a speed that would otherwise not be possible. The result is faster product launches, local job creation and the establishment of New York City as a hub for innovative financial tech.”

“FinTech entrepreneurial innovations are becoming a valuable strategic lever for the financial services industry,” said Bob Gach, global industry managing director of Accenture’s Capital Markets practice. “New technologies have made it possible for small ventures to research and develop powerful solutions for industry ‘pain points’ and create growth opportunities. By opening their doors to these ideas, banks can accelerate their own innovation agendas and drive growth and efficiency. We are proud of the impact that the FinTech Innovation Lab is having on the FinTech ecosystem and of the work that has been done by the entrepreneurs and financial institutions in this year’s program.”

The FinTech Innovation Lab has developed an extensive network of experienced entrepreneurs to provide advice to participants. Pro bono advice was provided to the 2014 class by members of the newtork, including three distinguished executives-in-residence: Andy Brown, former group chief technology officer at UBS; Cristóbal Conde, former CEO of SunGard; and, Dr. David Mordecai, Visiting Scholar at New York University’s Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences.

“Ally Financial is committed to providing its customers with advanced technology solutions. We’re proud to work with the FinTech Innovation Lab to identify emerging technologies and help shape their products for the financial services market,” said Michael Baresich, Chief Information Officer at Ally Financial Inc.

“It is important we continue to work with and support start-ups,” said David Reilly, Bank of America Technology Infrastructure executive. “Not only are these companies’ ideas and solutions addressing real customer needs and issues, they also are providing the opportunity for financial institutions to think in a non-traditional way about approaching change as a form of innovation across their organizations.”

“We continually explore and invest in emerging technologies to keep pace with the rapid rate of change,” said Skip Potter, Vice President, Engineering at Capital One. “The impact and digital disruption of cloud and social technologies, widespread mobility and data analytics is on display every day, and supporting the FinTech Innovation Lab is one way we stay connected and engaged with some of the latest thinking in banking technology.”

“Each year, the pool of applicants and entrepreneurs selected improves,” said Nigel Faulkner, Credit Suisse’s CIO of Investment Banking. “And I am impressed with both the innovation they bring to the table and the value this program generates for the startup firms, financial institutions, and New York City overall. We’re proud to be global sponsors and look forward to next year’s entries.”

“JPMorgan Chase is excited to partner with the FinTech Innovation Lab to mentor this year’s class of innovative startups in NYC,” said Larry Feinsmith, Managing Director, Global Technology Strategy and Partnerships, JPMorgan Chase. “We are in a unique position to work closely with these emerging companies on disruptive solutions for our critical business challenges.”

Based on the success of the FinTech Innovation Lab in New York, Accenture launched the FinTech Innovation Lab London in 2012 and recently launched the FinTech Innovation Lab Asia-Pacific in Hong Kong.

About the Partnership Fund for New York City
The Partnership Fund for New York City is the $110 million investment arm of the Partnership for New York City. The Fund’s mission is to engage the City’s business leaders to identify and support promising NYC-based entrepreneurs in both the for-profit and non-profit sectors to create jobs, spur new business and expand opportunities for New Yorkers to participate in the City’s economy. The Fund is governed by a Board of Directors co-chaired by Richard M. Cashin, Managing Partner of One Equity Partners, and Charles “Chip” Kaye, co-president of Warburg Pincus LLC. Maria Gotsch serves as President and CEO of the Fund.

About Accenture
Accenture is a global management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company, with approximately 289,000 people serving clients in more than 120 countries. Combining unparalleled experience, comprehensive capabilities across all industries and business functions, and extensive research on the world’s most successful companies, Accenture collaborates with clients to help them become high-performance businesses and governments. The company generated net revenues of US$28.6 billion for the fiscal year ended Aug. 31, 2013.