Winners announced for the 2020 Finnies Awards
The 2020 winners of the fourth Finnies Awards were announced on October 28. The Finnies, hosted by FinTech Australia, celebrates the achievements of startups and individuals who have made a major contribution driving innovation within financial services.
For the second consecutive year, Stone & Chalk were proud sponsors of the event, this time for the Excellence in Fintech Support Services award.
No fewer than 13 Stone & Chalk residents and alumni featured as finalists across the 19 categories, with Brighte, Meeco, Joust and LoanDolphin, Birchal, and Frankie Financial all claiming awards.
The outstanding contributions of this years’ nominees is even more remarkable considering the unprecedented economic turmoil and market uncertainty caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
FinTech Australia CEO Rebecca Schot-Guppy was full of praise for the finalists, stating: “Despite the toll COVID-19 has had on our industry, the calibre of entries this year was outstanding.”
Stone & Chalk winners
Best Workplace Diversity
Brighte
Female FinTech Leader of the Year
Katherine McConnell (Brighte)
Excellence in Industry Collaborations & Partnerships
Meeco
Deal of the Year
Joust and LoanDolphin
Excellence in Crowdfunding
Birchal
Excellence in RegTech
Frankie Financial
It was a trophy-laden evening for Brighte, receiving two awards in the People, Culture and Talent category. The Sydney-based startup won Best Workplace Diversity, with Founder and CEO Katherine McConnell (a Stone & Chalk alumni) also collecting Female FinTech Leader of the Year. An award fitting for a leader who openly credits her team for the company’s rapid ascent – in her own words: “a dream without a team is just a dream”.
Brighte’s digital platform provides businesses and individuals with affordable payment solutions for solar, batteries and home improvements, providing easy access to their marketplace of accredited vendors.
Meeco, pioneers of the rapidly emerging personal data economy, collected the award for Excellence in Industry Collaborations & Partnerships in recognition of their enterprise with major banks in Belgium, including KBC.
Meeco’s mission is to provide absolute control to the ‘digital citizen’ over how their personal data is used by people and organisations. In 2019, they worked with KBC on the ‘Digital Safe powered by Meeco’ initiative, enabling the bank’s customers to securely capture, store and share personal data and documents.
Deal of the Year was awarded to current Stone & Chalk residents Joust following their merger with LoanDolphin in May. The two mortgage providers have combined in a bid to become Australia’s leading home loan auction platform.
Their reverse auction model connects borrowers with lenders and brokers who bid for the customer by offering the most competitive home loan rates.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Australia’s leading crowdfunding platform Birchal took home the award for Excellence in Crowdfunding.
The investment startup has led from the front since the commencement of Australia’s crowdsourced funding in 2018, raising $1.789 million in their first year. This rocketed to $18.2 million in 2019, with their 2020 figures expected to rise further still.
Melbourne-based startup Frankie Financial received this years’ Excellence in RegTech award. ‘RegTech’ is the coined term for the use of technology in the management of regulatory processes within the financial industry.
Frankie’s platform provides an API integration hub that enables banks and fintechs to manage KYB, KYC, AML and fraud more easily, via a single intuitive dashboard.
Congratulations to all those who entered this years’ Finnies, and to our residents and alumni finalists who continue to epitomise the innovative thinking and creative startup spark that is driving the Australian fintech industry forward.
Special mention to Stone & Chalk’s other finalists
Female Fintech Leader of the Year
Debra Taylor – Open Sparkz
Excellence in Establishing Market Presence: Global
Verrency (alumni)
Excellence in Industry Collaborations & Partnerships
ID Exchange – Personal Data Economy
Excellence in Business Lending
BUTN
Trade Ledger (alumni)
Valiant Finance (alumni)
Excellence in Support Services
Basiq
Best Partnership of the Year
Accurassi (alumni)
Excellence in Blockchain/Distributed Ledger and Digital Currencies/Wallets/Exchanges
Elbaite (alumni)
