Fintech Week London 2015: It’s startups v banks in Fintech expo drinking session September 2, 2015 Caloo callay, it's nearly London Fintech Week, where startups from Shoreditch to Shadwell will be touting their wares to execs from some of the City’s most high profile firms in a bid to become the next big thing in business. Billed as the “world’s largest fintech-focused expo”, economists, bankers and brokers from companies old [...]
Where are UK companies founded? London has a startup rate over 14 times higher than Yorkshire August 28, 2015 The UK’s startup scene is booming, with a record-high number of new companies founded last year – and London has the biggest share. Over half a million, 581,000, new startups were started in 2014, according to data from Companies House. With almost 80,000 of these in London, the UK capital has the lion’s share of [...]
Changing career? How the MBA could help: From startup incubators to ensuring realistic goals are set, the MBA has a lot to offer August 27, 2015 If you're contemplating doing an MBA degree in order to alter your career trajectory, you’re not alone. Nearly 90 per cent of Cambridge Judge Business School’s 2014 graduates switched either sector, function (their job role) or region (where they’re based). A third of those did a “triple jump” – changing all three. Of [...]
Is this the UK’s next FinTech unicorn? Hank Uberoi of London-based tech startup Earthport slams outdated global payment infrastructure August 26, 2015 Could this be the UK’s next FinTech unicorn? After previous success stories like Monitise and TransferWise leading the way, a UK-based payment platform slamming today’s global payment infrastructure for being “decades” out of date is hoping to disrupt the way companies pay their bills. Hundreds of thousands of international payments are made every day. But [...]
FriendlyScore: This FinTech startup can analyse social media activity to prove creditworthiness August 26, 2015 When you're sharing a selfie at dinner or updating LinkedIn with your latest promotion, you're giving away more than you might think. A London-based startup has taken the huge amount of data we share every day on social media to come up with a way of assessing whether we can be trusted with a loan or [...]
Online personal styling service Thread is in fashion as investors pump $8m into one of the UK’s hottest start-ups August 23, 2015 Men’s fashion start-up Thread has closed a Series A funding round, raising $8m (£5m) from investors including the co-founders of Google’s DeepMind and a former president of Saks Fifth Avenue. Demmis Hassabis and Mustafa Suleyman, who along with Shane Legg sold DeepMind to Google in 2014, and Andrew Jennings, previously of Saks Fifth Avenue, were [...]
Amazon Web Services opens first startup support centre outside US in London’s Silicon Roundabout August 20, 2015 If you were looking for more evidence that Tech City is booming: Amazon has just announced it will open its first startup support centre outside the US – and is basing it in London’s Silicon Roundabout. Competition between cloud-based infrastructure providers has heated up recently, with Alibaba, Microsoft and Google all reporting rapid growth in [...]
Andy Murray invests in three British tech startups through Seedrs equity crowdfunding platform – Tossed, Trillenium and Fuel Ventures Fund August 19, 2015 Tennis ace Andy Murray is busy working on his investment portfolio off the courts, it seems – after he invested in three British startups through equity crowdfunding platform Seedrs. Murray, who is the world's fifth biggest earning tennis star and has millions sitting in the bank, became an investor in Seedrs itself and an advisory board [...]
Unilever and ad:tech open $50,000 search for startup innovations with Next Big Thing competition August 18, 2015 Unilever is on the hunt for fresh innovations, as the company is hoping to find new startups to team up with through the “Next Big Thing” competition, organised by ad:tech London. 15 startups will be shortlisted for the award, and at the final in October, they’ll get the change to pitch to brands and agencies. [...]
Career boost: Why an MSc will help give you the edge – you’ll benefit from specialised electives and startup support August 13, 2015 In today's competitive climate, there has never been a better time to consider graduate study. A globalised market and grade inflation means that an undergraduate qualification may simply no longer be sufficient, says Mark Taylor, dean of Warwick Business School. In 2013, the Sutton Trust found that “there is a significant wage premium for those [...]