Tomorrow's Transactions » Chyp events and notices http://tomorrowstransactions.com Thought leadership from Consult Hyperion Fri, 18 Jul 2014 06:22:13 +0000 en-US hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.9.1 BarCampBank London 7 was unpredictable and therefore great http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2014/02/barcampbank-london-7-was-unpredictable-and-therefore-great/ http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2014/02/barcampbank-london-7-was-unpredictable-and-therefore-great/#respond Thu, 20 Feb 2014 19:18:48 +0000 http://tomorrowstransactions.com/?p=3917 Our London Unconference, now an annual event held the day before Finovate Europe, was as unpredictable as always, which is why I like it so much. I really didn’t expect technology to feature so heavily, but it did. One of the reasons why I like the Unconference format so much is that even as one […]

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Our London Unconference, now an annual event held the day before Finovate Europe, was as unpredictable as always, which is why I like it so much. I really didn’t expect technology to feature so heavily, but it did.

One of the reasons why I like the Unconference format so much is that even as one of the organisers you have no idea what exactly is going to be discussed during the day. Once again, this proved true for the London event that has now become the annual precursor to Finovate. I thought that mobile payments might be up there again, and I thought there’d be shout for Bitcoin, but I was expecting a fair bit of non-bank and near-bank talk as well. But when I finished my introductory talk and went to look at the topics that people had chosen in order to start grouping them together I was rather taken aback to see so many topics around Bitcoin and crypto currency. This was a major change from the year before, when Bitcoin was still seen as being far from the mainstream.

We are going to gather together all of the post-it notes and organise them onto their roadmap (somehow, we haven’t quite worked is out yet) and then put online somewhere so that you can have a look at it but in lieu of that I thought I would post a few reflections on what turned out to be the three most popular topics of the day, because I think this helps to tell us something about directions within the industry.

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I thought we would have a few people wanting to discuss different aspects of Bitcoin but I was definitely unprepared for the amount of interest that this topic generated. Both sessions were packed and with a wide variety of different people talking from different perspectives. I don’t know how everyone else felt but I learned a lot from listening to people who knew nothing about the topic asking the most basic questions, forcing people like me to think clearly and try to find ways to explain the topic and expand our own understanding, as well as listening to people who are starting businesses using the technology and can write the code to do it! By far the most interesting discussion I was involved in was about the capabilities of the underlying block chain technology and the ways in which the technology is the genuinely revolutionary part of the story. I listened with great interest to discussions about scripting, coin “colours” and suchlike.

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There was a valuable discussion around Ethereum, just such an example of a block chain that uses all of this great new stuff to deliver something that will be way beyond payments and I’m going to see if we can juggle the Tomorrow’s Transactions Forum agenda to try and fit them in. Steve Mott and I are running a session on Bitcoin for bankers at BAI Payments Connect in Las Vegas next month and the unconference discussions have given me plenty of ideas to discuss with the industry there.

The second best attended pair of discussions concerned identity and authentication which served to reinforce my prejudice that these should be central aspects of the roadmap of any organisation looking to deliver retail financial services of any kind. I know that this prejudice will be reinforced further next week at GSMA where identity and authentication will be similarly centre stage. It looks as if the pressure for change is building to the point where something is actually going to happen to change. I found the more mature discussions about privacy (in the light of the NSA, Target and everything else) very useful indeed.

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Rather surprisingly, the third best attended set of discussions were heavily technology-centric. These were the discussions about spell out HCE and BLE interfaces. I’ve written before on the blog that Consult Hyperion’s work in this space both in the UK and elsewhere has convinced me that the use of proximity and vicinity interfaces in mobile handsets is about to undergo rejuvenation and change at the cost of disruption to the existing supply chain. The structure that has been built up around Secure Elements (SEs) and Trusted Service Managers (TSMs) is not really optimal and there is going to be some pain tearing it down and rebuilding it.

Finally, can I have a heartfelt thanks to everybody who came along. I’ve had some very kind comments from attendees who appreciated the quality and range of discussion and debate, the opportunity to meet some new people from different perspectives (we had “traditional” banks, start-ups, innovators, journalists) to help them to get new ideas and test some old ones out again! See you all again this time next year.

These are the personal opinions of Consult Hyperion and its guests and should not be misunderstood as representing the opinion of its clients or suppliers. To discuss how any of the technologies discussed in this post can benefit your business, please contact Consult Hyperion.

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Still going strong after 14 years http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2011/03/still-going-strong-after-14-years/ http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2011/03/still-going-strong-after-14-years/#respond Fri, 11 Mar 2011 01:53:00 +0000 http://ec2-54-201-142-57.us-west-2.compute.amazonaws.com/2011/03/still-going-strong-after-14-years/ [Dave Birch] The 14th annual Consult Hyperion Digital Money Forum was terrific. Many thanks to everyone who made this possible.

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The 14th annual Consult Hyperion Digital Money Forum was terrific. Here’s some of the feedback we’ve already had:

  • “Excellent! Thank you again”
  • “A most enjoyable event with a variety of speakers”
  • “It was very stimulating”
  • “A very informative conference which didn’t disappoint.”
  • “Very good – as always, so much new stuff”
  • “a terrific #dmf14 session on private vs public money”
  • “I saw the future, the past and, surprisingly, the freedom of cash.”
  • “Very good – as always, so much new stuff!”

First of all, and I can’t say this often enough, a very big thank you to the event sponsors who made it all possible: Visa Europe and Monitise. For an event like the Forum it’s really important to have sponsors who share our goals, and both of them were great, giving us the freedom to choose an eclectic mix of speakers and panelist who really helped the delegates (and us) to think in some new ways and to spark off new ideas about where to go next in the world of e-payments. This makes for a special event, unlike the commercial conferences that we attend throughout the year. The economist Diane Coyle, who was kind enough to chair the keynote session on day two, put it very nicely

As ever the Digital Money Forum proved itself a must for anyone interested in the intersection of technology and money

[From The Enlightened Economist :: Good money, digital or analogue]

And thanks also to our newest supporters, Olswang, who kindly sponsored to pub quiz (which was great fun) and the drinks that went with it.

I won’t go over everything that was discussed — the presentations are online if you want to download them — but I will highlight a couple of points that emerged over the two days. First of all, both of the opening sessions, which mixed history and future, worked very well and did, I think, help people to think more imaginatively about the discussions later in the day. The expert panels were popular as always, although I really should keep them to only four people per panel. I’ve had some interesting feedback about the panel on alternative currencies, which I think gave many organisations some unexpected directions to explore.

Mobile was, naturally, a key topic and pervaded many of the discussions. We may have to make it a bigger fraction of the agenda next year if we can find some new angles to approach it from. A lot of the delegates remarked on how juxtaposing lessons being learned in both developed and developing markets worked well, so that’s something to think about.

We’ve already started thinking about 15th Digital Money Forum and what we’re going to do to change things again. I can promise all of you that the event will keep moving forward. Next year will see a new venue (and, yes, there will be free wifi for all), some new ideas for interaction and some changes in the programme structure. One thing that won’t change is the art and design competition: given the outstanding presentations at the end of this years’ Forum, we’ll definitely do that again! If you weren’t there, I urge you to take a look at the competition winners and appreciate the imagination and invention that went into them.

If I had to highlight one presentation, it was Catherine Eagleton’s keynote. Catherine is the curator of Modern Money at the British Museum and co-author of the excellent Money-A History. She asked the delegates to send her examples of anything that should be preserved, particularly the intermediate forms of new payment systems that are forgotten in the long run. I hope some of them will take her up on that. But she also mentioned in passing how difficult it is to think of ways to preserve World of Warcraft gold pieces or Facebook credits for posterity, and I keep thinking about it now. It came up last year when Consult Hyperion were asked to provide a piece on mobile money for the Science Museum. We were enthusiastic, but soon realised that a phone in a glass case (with a dead battery) is not much of an exhibition, and I’m afraid the curators concurred. So if anyone has any ideas on that one, please get in touch (although it does give me an idea for next year’s competition!).

Oh, and I should finish by saying to everyone who mentioned it (and there were quite a few), yes, the hotel coffee was slop that I wouldn’t have fed to pigs and I swear with my hand on my heart that if we ever serve stuff like that to you again I will personally take all delegates to the nearest Caffe Nero and buy every single one of them a drink there myself.

These are the personal opinions of Consult Hyperion and its guests and should not be misunderstood as representing the opinion of its clients or suppliers. To discuss how any of the technologies discussed in this post can benefit your business, please contact Consult Hyperion.

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Join us at the International Payments Summit on 21st March in London http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2011/03/join-us-at-the-international-payments-summit-on-21st-march-in-london/ http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2011/03/join-us-at-the-international-payments-summit-on-21st-march-in-london/#respond Mon, 07 Mar 2011 09:57:21 +0000 http://ec2-54-201-142-57.us-west-2.compute.amazonaws.com/2011/03/join-us-at-the-international-payments-summit-on-21st-march-in-london/ [Dave Birch] We're working with the International Payments Summit this year, so come along and join in the discussion about the future of e-transactions.

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I really enjoyed the annual International Payments Summit last year, so this year we decided to work with them on a small experiment. On 21st March we’ve helped to put together a 1-day summit on the future of e-transactions, called (somewhat provocatively, I must confess) “cash is dead”.

The idea is to discuss the world of digital transactions (which, of course, in our world means digital money and digital identity) to help organisations who are putting together strategies make some realistic decisions about where future competitive advantage may lay. Naturally, reflecting my own prejudices, there will be plenty of discussion about opportunities for financial services organisations to either provide or exploit the coming range of digital identity services.

As organisers, Consult Hyperion have a couple of complimentary delegate places to give away, so if you plan to be in London on 21st March 2011 and you’d like to come along to the Lancaster London and join in the discussion, please e-mail me ASAP and I will arrange. Don’t pass up this offer as we have a great bunch of people coming along for panels, discussions and networking, see you there.

These opinions are my own (I think) and presented solely in my capacity as an interested member of the general public [posted with ecto]

These are the personal opinions of Consult Hyperion and its guests and should not be misunderstood as representing the opinion of its clients or suppliers. To discuss how any of the technologies discussed in this post can benefit your business, please contact Consult Hyperion.

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Talent http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2010/03/talent/ http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2010/03/talent/#comments Sat, 13 Mar 2010 21:58:43 +0000 http://ec2-54-201-142-57.us-west-2.compute.amazonaws.com/2010/03/talent/ [Dave Birch] Wow. The feedback that I’ve been getting about the Consult Hyperion Digital Money Forum is fantastic. I’d like to claim all the credit, but I just can’t. So for those of you who weren’t able to join us, I thought I’d try and explain why it worked so well and to give credit […]

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[Dave Birch] Wow. The feedback that I’ve been getting about the Consult Hyperion Digital Money Forum is fantastic. I’d like to claim all the credit, but I just can’t. So for those of you who weren’t able to join us, I thought I’d try and explain why it worked so well and to give credit where it is due.

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I’m always very clear and honest about our motives for running the Forum. Consult Hyperion is a consultancy, not a conference company. We run it as a not-for-profit event (which this year supported BUFFER, Action Medical Research, Jubilee Action and the Prostate Cancer charity) to reinforce this point. As a consultancy, we have a reputation for helping our customers — who range from Transport for London and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to Barclaycard and First Data — to deliver new products and services using new technology for secure electronic transactions. We can’t generate all of these new ideas ourselves, so we use the Forum to explore, to question, to connect, to understand and to play with the boundary between new technology and business, and I think we succeed in doing all of these things and having fun at the same time. But why was it so good?

First of all, it’s the sponsors. Visa Europe have been supporters of the Forum for some years and they share our commitment to genuine discussion and debate, genuine learning about the future. They’re not interested in a bunch of marketing slides any more than we are, and as the main sponsor they provided not only money but encouragement and ideas. I can’t thank them enough. Our supporting sponsors, ACI Worldwide (who paid for the entertaining pub quiz, drinks and prizes) and Olswang (who paid for the speakers’ dinner and the books we gave out) were fantastic and enthusiastic. ACI Worldwide have been with us for many years and their forward-looking attitude is much appreciated. Our content partner CGAP not only suggested some speakers and panelists who delivered outstanding input but helped us to develop an important part of our thinking about the role of electronic payments in attacked financial (and therefore social) exclusion. Thanks to all of them: their support gave the event a head start.

Secondly, it’s the speakers and panelists. I try very hard to choose people that I personally respect and I also try very hard to bring together people who can help to make us all think by their combination or juxtaposition in order to exploit the nature of the event. Since it is always limited to a hundred people, there is plenty of scope for interaction and discussion once the speakers have set the tone.

Sometimes, though, even I am surprised by how well this works. I’ll give you two examples from this year.

The kick-off session that was a launchpad for the event so good that people were still talking to me about it two days later. It made us at look like geniuses for the brilliant juxtaposition of Tom Levenson and James Allan, but the truth of the matter is that James was due to present at last year’s Forum after I‘d blogged about him back in 2008 but was unfortunately ill on the day, which was why he was speaking this year instead! However it happened, though, it was an outstanding session. Novelist Martin Baker as chair and two speakers, with no Powerpoint, keeping an audience engrossed, entertained and stimulated for 90 minutes.

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Tom told the wonderful story that I touched on back in January, laden with resonance for these troubled times, of the collapse of England’s medium of exchange and the subsequent revolution at the Mint under Sir Isaac Newton, a short period in our history where the framework for today was laid down: the industrial Mint and the Bank of England. Commerce was crippled because there was no cash, but by the time Newton died the City was on incredible trajectory. James Allan’s decision to try and live in London with no cash, using electronic payments only, was voluntary but no less illuminating. Personally, I found the most surprising part of his story was that fact that one transaction in two years that he was forced to conduct in cash was not the desperate purchase of £1 bottle of water at a pop concert or the fiver to a desperate mate but the UKP2,000 deposit for apartment rental to landlords who didn’t trust e-banking (so they said: many in the audience voiced the suspicion that this was all about tax evasion).

The second example was the expert panel on innovating out of poverty: with CGAP’s help I had brought together DD Dedo, the largest branchless banking agent network in Columbia, easypaisa in Pakistan, Ghana’s main mobile operator, a key regulator from the Philippines and (again by utter chance) an expert researching London’s migrant communities. Together they provided such a comprehensive, fascinating and inspirational perspective on the incredible impact of new technology on financial services for the poor that you really could have heard a pin drop while they were talking and the questions could have gone on for days. Again, it was the different perspectives that made the session.

I won’t go through the entire programme, suffice to say that I, along with many other attendees, came away with a raft of new ideas to think about from smart banknotes through mobile-owned banks to energy-based currencies. Joe Di Vanna‘s helicopter view of the impact of digital money, Ignacio Mas’ passionate exposition of the Financial Services for the Poor programme, Michael Salmony‘s defence of cash all played their part. Enough from me: here’s what other people actually said about it:

  • “Thank you so much for the absolutely wonderful two day experience of the Digital Money Forum 2010.”
  • “A huge thank you for including me in the forum, I met some really interesting people.”
  • “An eclectic mix of speakers ensured there was no room for boredom and it was a really thought provoking and enjoyable day.”
  • “Your fantastic Digital Money Forum.”

The final piece of the jigsaw was everyone who came along. We have a very well-informed audience from a very wide spectrum of interests and they played their part too: if you scan the delegate list you’ll see banks, telcos, non-bank payment organisations, business people, charities and NGOs, inventors, entrepreneurs, lawyers, consultancies and even the IMF. It’s this mix that generates the energy clearly visible in the room and makes the coffee, lunch, tea and drinks breaks so pleasant. I’m passionate about the potential from cross-fertilization and I’m convinced to provides a direct benefit to our customers.

I’ve already been asked if there will be a 14th Forum next year and the answer is, of course, yes.

As part of the Forum in London we played “The Dragon’s Factor’s Got Talent“, which was really enjoyable. We had some startups come along and pitch their ideas to the audience and a panel of judges. At the end of the Forum the audience and the panel had a chance to question them about their ideas and pick a winner. I stress this wasn’t the Darwinian struggle we see on TV shows of this type, but all for fun and to expose new ideas to a wider audience. The panel was:

VC Roberto Bonanzinga, a partner at Balderton Capital.

Businessperson Sandra Alzetta, Senior VP Innovation and New Product Development at Visa Europe.

Social Entrepreneur Jof Walters of Shilling Investment.

Potential customer Alasdair Gray of the British Retail Consortium.

There were two prizes awarded. The audience’s vote went to Todd Veri of Midpoint & Transfer, a online f/x matching service that launches in April. The judges were split between Kachingle, an online payment system for blogs and other content, and Touch2ID, a contactless card/biometric combination for providing proof of age being trialled in Wiltshire. I gave Sandra Alzetta of Visa Europe, the principal sponsors of the event, the casting vote and in the end she came down in favour of Touch2ID and I handed over the Forum prize to Giles Sergant of Touch2ID. Linking back to our opening talk from Professor Levenson, the prize was a 1696 William III silver sixpence, one of the very coins minted under Newton’s direction.

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Thanks to everyone who took part in the competition, especially for not taking it too seriously: I hope that we were able to expose your ideas to a new audience and help you to meet some new people.

These opinions are my own (I think) and presented solely in my capacity as an interested member of the general public [posted with ecto]

These are the personal opinions of Consult Hyperion and its guests and should not be misunderstood as representing the opinion of its clients or suppliers. To discuss how any of the technologies discussed in this post can benefit your business, please contact Consult Hyperion.

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Showcase for new payment ideas http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2010/01/showcase-for-new-payment-ideas/ http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2010/01/showcase-for-new-payment-ideas/#comments Mon, 18 Jan 2010 08:26:16 +0000 http://ec2-54-201-142-57.us-west-2.compute.amazonaws.com/2010/01/showcase-for-new-payment-ideas/ [Dave Birch] As part of the 13th annual Digital Money Forum in London on 10th-11th March 2010, we’re going to have a some fun with “The Dragon’s Factor’s Got Talent”. We’re inviting new companies in the payment space to come along and showcase their ideas in the form of a competition: they will each get […]

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[Dave Birch] As part of the 13th annual Digital Money Forum in London on 10th-11th March 2010, we’re going to have a some fun with “The Dragon’s Factor’s Got Talent”. We’re inviting new companies in the payment space to come along and showcase their ideas in the form of a competition: they will each get to make a 10 “elevator pitch” to the audience (with no slides or visual aids). At the end of the Forum they will then be “judged” by an expert panel who will award a prize to the pitch they think most likely to succeed as a business. So we’ll have fun, we’ll see some new ideas and perhaps see a new business get international attention. We’ve already shortlisted a couple of companies, and we’re looking for more.

If you’re going to be in London on 10th-11th March 2009 and you’d like to present your idea for a new retail e-payment product or service to a great audience and distinguished panel, get your “application” to me as soon as possible and we’ll choose a somewhere in the region of six to eight shortlisted pitches. If you’re chosen for the shortlist, youll get a free delegate place at the Forum and we’ll even cover a room for the night at the conference hotel so that you can stay and join in the fun.

There will, of course, in true Consult Hyperion fashion, be a prize for the best pitch, but real prize will be the opportunity to showcase your startup to an informed audience that may well include just the kind of angel, VC or next round investor that you are looking for!

These opinions are my own (I think) and presented solely in my capacity as an interested member of the general public [posted with ecto]

These are the personal opinions of Consult Hyperion and its guests and should not be misunderstood as representing the opinion of its clients or suppliers. To discuss how any of the technologies discussed in this post can benefit your business, please contact Consult Hyperion.

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Raising the Bar http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2010/01/raising-the-bar/ http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2010/01/raising-the-bar/#respond Mon, 04 Jan 2010 10:34:37 +0000 http://ec2-54-201-142-57.us-west-2.compute.amazonaws.com/2010/01/raising-the-bar/ It seems to

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These opinions are my own (I think) and presented solely in my capacity as an interested member of the general public [posted with ecto]

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[Dave Birch] I thoroughly enjoyed the first two BarCampBank “unconferences” in London in 2008 and 2009. So much so that I have persuaded my colleagues at Consult Hyperion to support a third which is very kindly being hosted by PayPal UK at their offices in Richmond, west London, on Saturday 30th January 2010. I know that persuading people to travel to the far reaches of Greater London on a Saturday might be difficult, but let me tell you why I’ll be going.

James Gardner is absolutely correct that the lack of a set agenda is the power of the BarCamp format

[From Digital Money Forum: BarCampBank "near money"]

The agenda is set on the day by the people who come along. Personally, I’ll be interested in discussions about decentralised finance (community credit, local currency and so forth) as well as the innovative use of new technology to provide services via mobile devices, but my experience of the previous BarCampBanks was that I found myself sitting in on discussions I had no idea I would be interested in, and I’m looking forward to the same this year. I’m shameless about my motivation: our customers expect us to come up with new ideas, and one excellent way to obtain new ideas is by cross-pollination between sectors, products, services and strategies. The BarCampBank is, frankly, an easy way to do this. So if you have ideas about the future of financial services, thought on the changing role of the financial services sector or you just want to kick some ideas around with some different people, I look forward to meeting you there.

You can signup for the BarCampBank London 3 at PayPal UK on Saturday 30th January 2010 from 10am to 4pm with lunch provided via meetup here. I’d hope to see 30-40 people there so that we can run 3-4 discussion simultaneous, but we’ll cut it off at 50. If you have any specific ideas for the agenda then please let me know in advance and I’ll do what I can to try and group together birds of a feather, so to speak. And once again, many thanks to PayPal UK for their generous hosting of the event.

These opinions are my own (I think) and presented solely in my capacity as an interested member of the general public [posted with ecto]

These are the personal opinions of Consult Hyperion and its guests and should not be misunderstood as representing the opinion of its clients or suppliers. To discuss how any of the technologies discussed in this post can benefit your business, please contact Consult Hyperion.

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Calling payment startups who want a bit of attention http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2009/12/calling-payment-startups-who-want-a-bit-of-attention/ http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2009/12/calling-payment-startups-who-want-a-bit-of-attention/#comments Wed, 23 Dec 2009 10:27:41 +0000 http://ec2-54-201-142-57.us-west-2.compute.amazonaws.com/2009/12/calling-payment-startups-who-want-a-bit-of-attention/ [Dave Birch] You know we like to try something new every year at the Digital Money Forum. As part of the 13th Forum in London on 10th-11th March 2010, we’re going to have a kind of talent show for entrepreneurs and inventors with new ideas in the retail electronic payments field. It will be called […]

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[Dave Birch] You know we like to try something new every year at the Digital Money Forum. As part of the 13th Forum in London on 10th-11th March 2010, we’re going to have a kind of talent show for entrepreneurs and inventors with new ideas in the retail electronic payments field. It will be called “The Dragon’s Factor’s Got Talent” and will involve a number of people making “elevator pitches” of 10 minutes each with no slides, sprinkled throughout the two days. At the end of the Forum they will then be “judged” by a panel comprising an entrepreneur, a VC, a business person and a payment expert. The panel will award a prize to the pitch they think most likely to succeed as a business, the audience will award a prize for the best pitch. The attraction, (I hope) for the contestants is that if their ideas are any good, they will get attention from people who can make them happen. So we’ll have fun, we’ll see some new ideas and perhaps see a new business launched.

We’ve already had our first contestant confirm, and that was after a mere mention of the idea in passing, so I think we may end up having too many contestants. Hence, if you’re going to be in London on 11th March 2009 and you’d like to present your idea for a new retail e-payment product or service to a distinguished panel, get your “application” to me as soon as possible and we’ll choose a somewhere in the region of six to eight shortlisted pitches. If you’re chosen for the shortlist, we’ll even cover a room for the night at the conference hotel so that you can stay and join in the fun.

I’ll make sure that the short list of contestants will be notified a month before the Forum so they’ve got plenty of time to make sure that their IP is protected appropriately, hire a top-quality coach to hone their presentation skills (no slides, Powerpoint, flipcharts allowed) and refine their pitch to ensure success. And remember: if you really do have a good idea, there will be plenty of people in the audience, not only the judges, who could help you to turn it into a big business. The panel will be.

Entrepreneur Alex van Someren, one of the founders of NCipher, sold to Thales in 2008 for a large amount of money.

Businessperson Sandra Alzetta, Senior VP Innovation and New Product Development at Visa Europe.

Venture Capitalist Jof Walters of Shilling Investment.

Potential customer Alasdair Gray of the British Retail Federation.

There will, of course, in true Consult Hyperion fashion, be a prize, but real prize will be the opportunity to showcase your startup to an informed audience that may well include just the kind of angel, VC or next round investor that you are looking for!

These opinions are my own (I think) and presented solely in my capacity as an interested member of the general public [posted with ecto]

These are the personal opinions of Consult Hyperion and its guests and should not be misunderstood as representing the opinion of its clients or suppliers. To discuss how any of the technologies discussed in this post can benefit your business, please contact Consult Hyperion.

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For all you utter bankers http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2009/10/for-all-you-utter-bankers/ http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2009/10/for-all-you-utter-bankers/#comments Thu, 29 Oct 2009 22:15:34 +0000 http://ec2-54-201-142-57.us-west-2.compute.amazonaws.com/2009/10/for-all-you-utter-bankers/ [Dave Birch] Wow, that was excellent fun. Nothing really to do with electronic payments, but I’ve been playing a fantastic new card game called “Crunch: The Game for Utter Bankers” with the kids and some friends. Crunch is a satirical card game for 2 to 4 players that places you at the head of the […]

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[Dave Birch] Wow, that was excellent fun. Nothing really to do with electronic payments, but I’ve been playing a fantastic new card game called “Crunch: The Game for Utter Bankers” with the kids and some friends.

Crunch is a satirical card game for 2 to 4 players that places you at the head of the boardroom as a CEO of a global bank juggling the conflicting demands of your ailing bank and your future retirement fund. An average game sees you bribing your way out of government investigations, fending off aggressive takeovers and forcing debt onto the unsuspecting public. Meanwhile, reward your hard work by taking inappropriate bonuses and – when no one’s looking – brazenly embezzling your bank’s own funds and hiding them about your person.

[From Crunch - the game for utter bankers | BoardGameGeek | BoardGameGeek]

The game served a dual purpose, both of which left me delighted with it. First of all, it was fun to play. Basically, you build up your bank’s lending against assets (ranging from shares in listed companies to Nazi gold) and then when a crunch comes you trade in trust for government bailouts. It didn’t take long to learn, and both the kids and adults enjoyed it. It had an unexpected second purpose, though. I bought it for fun, but in playing it the kids asked a lot of questions about the credit crunch, about the relationship between assets and debt, and about the idea of deliberately growing your workforce and assets to become too big to fail (adding “workforce” cards also gains you “trust” cards).

Run, don’t walk, to your nearest games shop — I got mine from Playin’ Games in Museum Street opposite the British Museum — and pick up a copy of this super game.

Federal Trade Commission disclosure. I have no affiliation with Terrorbull Games, the creators of “Crunch”, and have received no payments nor any other form of remuneration related to this endorsement. No animals were harmed during the writing of this blog post.

I happen to have a spare copy of the game in front of me right now, and I will cheerfully send it to the first person to reply to this post with the name of the noted Scottish accountant who became famous throughout the land for his dashing stewardship of Royal Bank of Scotland until a year ago, when an unfortunate turn of events meant that the British government had to take a majority stake in the bank to save it from collapse.

In the traditional fashion, this competition is open to all except for employees of Consult Hyperion and members of my immediate family, is void where prohibited and has no contraindications with common prescription medicines. The prize must be claimed within three months. Oh, and no-one can win more than one of the Digital Money Blog prizes per calendar year.

These opinions are my own (I think) and presented solely in my capacity as an interested member of the general public [posted with ecto]

These are the personal opinions of Consult Hyperion and its guests and should not be misunderstood as representing the opinion of its clients or suppliers. To discuss how any of the technologies discussed in this post can benefit your business, please contact Consult Hyperion.

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Bear market http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2009/10/bear-market/ http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2009/10/bear-market/#comments Thu, 22 Oct 2009 09:36:30 +0000 http://ec2-54-201-142-57.us-west-2.compute.amazonaws.com/2009/10/bear-market/ The management consultants keep telling us to focus on the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) for our next growth markets, but it's important to understand that their mass, retail, e-payment markets are just not going to be like ours, partly because of industry structures, partly because of government direction and partly because of the technology starting point. ...Singapore has shown that some judicious government steering can help to migrate to a contactless environment that is convenient for consumers who will... ...now have two payment cards to choose from to use on buses and trains, to pay for road tolls and carparks, and to make purchases from stores, eateries and entertainment outlets.

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[Dave Birch] Russia is looking like a pretty interesting market for e-payments. The management consultants keep telling us to focus on the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) for our next growth markets, but it’s important to understand that their mass, retail, e-payment markets are just not going to be like ours, partly because of industry structures, partly because of government direction and partly because of the technology starting point.

Russian central authorities are reportedly considering plans to set up an electronic payments network… The main objective of the prospective electronic payment system would be to challenge the dominance of established brands such as MasterCard and Visa, which currently hold around 85 percent of the Russian cards market. The plans for a Russian-operated electronic payment network come after in June 2008, Russia’s two largest banks – Sberbank and VTB Group – have teamed up to create the United Russian Payment System (URPS).

[From The Paypers. Insights in payments.]

What might the Russian “third scheme” look like, compared to a European “third scheme” (eg, PayFair)? Well, one reasonable prediction might be that the lack of infrastructure in Russia (Russia is a very big place) means that their third scheme might well jump ahead of the European third scheme in terms of its technology platform. Indeed, there are already strong indications that mobile and contactless technologies will be moving ahead quite quickly in that environment.

The head of Russia’s largest bank briefed the country’s President Dmitry Medvedev on the concept of mobile contactless payments last week — and explained that he is looking to launch a non-contact mobile payments system by 2011/12.

[From Russia looks to introduce mobile contactless in two to three years • Near Field Communications World]

A national contactless purse (perhaps a bit like NETS in Singapore or Touch n’Go in Malaysia) in a country the size of Russia would be a really interesting development. Singapore has shown that some judicious government steering can help to migrate to a contactless environment that is convenient for consumers who will…

…now have two payment cards to choose from to use on buses and trains, to pay for road tolls and carparks, and to make purchases from stores, eateries and entertainment outlets. On Friday, Nets (the Network For Electronic Transfers) launched its long-awaited multi-purpose contactless card… EZ-Link launched a similar contactless multi-purpose card in January.

[From Nets, more uses than one]

Transit is the vanguard, as always, but the point here is that competition to provide interoperable e-purses is at least a good step forwards.

I’m looking forward to learning more about the Russian payments world in Moscow in a couple of weeks time. I’ll be talking about the role of new technology, and how mobile phones are having an impact on digital money in different developed and developing markets, at the E-Money in Russia and CIS conference in Moscow on 12th-13th November 2009. One area that I am keen to explore is kiosks. I’m told that the use of kiosks in metropolitan areas in Russia is quite unlike any other market.

The first machine appeared in a Moscow shop back in 2002. Today around Moscow, there are somewhere between 150,000 and 300,000 of these “cash-in” terminals in operation. While not having a bank account in the United States can be a costly problem for everyone with monthly bills, that is definitely NOT the case in Russia.

[From Non Bank Payments: America vs. Russia (part 2) | NowPublic News Coverage]

With innovation at both “ends” of the payment marketplace — cash at one end and super-advanced mobile/NFC at the other end — the Russia e-payments world is going to be very different from the European e-payments world.

These opinions are my own (I think) and presented solely in my capacity as an interested member of the general public [posted with ecto]

These are the personal opinions of Consult Hyperion and its guests and should not be misunderstood as representing the opinion of its clients or suppliers. To discuss how any of the technologies discussed in this post can benefit your business, please contact Consult Hyperion.

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Paris match http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2009/09/paris-match/ http://tomorrowstransactions.com/2009/09/paris-match/#respond Tue, 08 Sep 2009 08:29:55 +0000 http://ec2-54-201-142-57.us-west-2.compute.amazonaws.com/2009/09/paris-match/ [Dave Birch] We still have a couple of places left for the (free) CSFI Roundtable discussion on “Innovation and the Internal Market” at the OECD in Paris on Friday. See the research fellowship invitation for all of the details. banking and finance, innovation, SEPA and PSD The reason for choosing this topic for the Paris […]

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[Dave Birch] We still have a couple of places left for the (free) CSFI Roundtable discussion on “Innovation and the Internal Market” at the OECD in Paris on Friday. See the research fellowship invitation for all of the details.

The reason for choosing this topic for the Paris discussion is that I want to explore the feelings of the industry on the impact of SEPA, PSD and so forth on the innovation process. Does the creation of an internal market spur innovation on, or do assumptions made in the regulatory process subsequently limit options? Come an join in the conversation: it’s under Chatham House rules, so you can say what you think!

These opinions are my own (I think) and presented solely in my capacity as an interested member of the general public [posted with ecto]

These are the personal opinions of Consult Hyperion and its guests and should not be misunderstood as representing the opinion of its clients or suppliers. To discuss how any of the technologies discussed in this post can benefit your business, please contact Consult Hyperion.

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