OTP Startup Partner Programme
published atMarch 5, 2020Tags:innovations
OTP Startup Partner Programme
OTP Bank’s third Startup Program holds several records, as it is the Banking Group’s most comprehensive startup collaboration initiative in terms of the number of applying startups, the number of startups selected for the pilot project, and the number of Group Members participating in the initiative. rom 370 applications, 13 innovative technology enterprises in a more mature growth stage were invited to a 3 + 6 month programme, in the framework of which they are given an opportunity to test their products and services with the support of a dedicated sponsoring organisation and to prove their suitability to commence a long-term cooperation with the Banking Group.
During the application period between 14 October and 22 November 2019, 370 startups from 56 countries submitted applications for the 2019–2020 OTP Startup Partner Programme. The global appeal of the programme is also demonstrated by the list of the top 5 countries providing the largest number of applicants: Great Britain, Hungary, Germany, the United States and Russia. Twenty-seven of the applicants were invited to the final selection event of the Programme, where, after consulting with the respective domains, the companies presented their pilot project proposals to be implemented in conjunction with the OTP Group. We are proud that this year 160 employees and startupers from close to 20 countries worked together at the two-day Selection Camp.
For the first time in the history of the Programme, the number of participating companies exceeded 10 in 2020, which can be partly attributed to the high level of expertise of the applying startups and to the growing commitment of banking domains to startup partnerships. As a result, 13 startup and scaleup companies will be able to participate in the programme period between 2 March and 20 May 2020, working together with banking domains in Hungary and four other markets of the Banking Group (Albania, Croatia, Russia and Serbia) to test the interfacing of their solutions with banking operations and to enhance their services based on feedback from their mentors.
OTP Startup Partner Programme
Interested companies once again were able to apply for the Programme in 5+1 topics: sophisticated data analysis solutions, customer experience and customer service, internal efficiency, product-specific innovations, corporate banking and banking-related, completely novel and disruptive solutions outside of the above categories.
The activities of the selected startups fit well into one of the above topics.
- Neticle, a company offering online media monitoring and an emotion analysis platform, provides data analytical solutions, while a startup called MostlyAI generates synthetic datasets from real data that contain no personal data and thus are suitable for testing.
- Support for better customer service is provided by EdgeTier, which has developed an intelligent assistant providing telephone customer service staff with response templates to answer incoming calls, Linistry, which allows customers to remotely set appointments for branch office administration, and The Waay, which offers lifestyle-based banking with relevant, quality content and offerings tailored to the life situation of individual customers.
- Combining state-of-the-art cloud and container technologies for more efficient internal operations, Banzai Cloud facilitates the rapid development, deployment and scalability of cloud-based applications. In addition, LutherOne and EDUardo optimise HR processes; the former providing a comprehensive platform for seamless and real-time feedback and employee performance measurement, and the latter developing an online business and enterprise management simulation platform that helps employees gain insights through realistic life situations.
- The renewal of specific banking products is supported by FINQware, the developer of an API aggregator platform for the Central and Eastern European region, Sanostro, which provides investment analysts with access to investment signals aggregated from a wide range of multi-hedge funds, and Realmonitor, which promises best-price real-estate purchase transactions via its real estate price monitoring application.
- Finally, enterprise banking is supported with new elements by Trustchain, which runs an online platform for B2B partners to identify business partners and manage all related documents online, and by Scolvo, which streamlines corporate advisors’ customer visits with an application that supports customer profiling and quoting.
'By elevating this Programme to the level of the Banking Group level this year, the opportunities for participating companies have multiplied: a solution tested in a particular market may be extended to other interested subsidiaries, and subsidiary mentors may provide valuable country-specific information to companies. Cooperation still continues after the pilot programme with most of the companies that participated in the Startup Programme closed last May. Our goal this year is to maintain or even increase this ratio. We trust that both group-level cooperation and the 6-month rollout period introduced this year will help achieve this goal,’ said András Fischer, Head of OTP Bank’s Retail Innovation Department.
The 13 startups that joined the Programme came from 7 countries (Austria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Ireland, Romania, Russia, Switzerland). During the three-month cooperation period, representatives of the participating companies will meet in person for three special weeks with mentors from their respective domains in Budapest or at the headquarters of the subsidiaries implementing the pilot. In addition, trainings, workshops and individual mentoring sessions corresponding to the maturity levels of the startups will help the teams in business development. The acceleration period ends on 20 May with the Demo Day event, where the startups will report on the lessons learned and the achievements of the pilot projects before management of the partners of the Banking Group and the Programme.
For more information on the Programme, please visit www.otpstartup.com.
Selection Camp summary video: