How your niche Fintech can become a super app with Currencycloud’s Richard Stockley
The Finterview - Fintech Exposed episode 2
What will be the main challenges for Fintech in the next 2 years?
Richard Stockley, Director of Partnerships at Currencycloud pitches in to provide his perspective.
Richard shares all - starting with his insights into the super app business model, the hardest parts and surprising benefits of being a founder, what the “North Star” of business should be, all the way to ideas on how to monetise a B2C digital bank business.
This episode is filled with golden advice on how to approach the founder life-style and understand the ecosystem we evolve in as Fintechs.
The struggles of banking throughout the world as an expat
Richard’s journey made him live in most of the continents in the world, and we go back to his banking experience then.
From the post-dated cheques practice in Vietnam to the Grab super app in Indonesia. We talk about how we take certain services delivered in the UK and Europe for granted, when there are prominent places in the world where you still need to sign the receipt when you pay by credit card.
The struggles and amazing journey of being a CEO
Richard bought a small company that he ended up selling to Procter and Gamble.
This experience of being a founder is one of the most beneficial ways to learn more about yourself, and the importance of surrounding yourself with (smart) people to advise you.
Richard also shared his story about how he pivoted from being a civil engineer to a founder. It came from his fascination in the non-linear business models - optimising for 1 unit of effort in creating multiple units of results out. Something you just can’t do as an engineer/ consultant selling your time.
What Currencycloud does, and why they partnered-up with the Fintech Foundation
Working with people you love. Sharing a common company culture. Partnering with best in class founders and start-ups.
These are all the motives that pushed Richard and Currencycloud to team up with us at Integrated Finance. In the Fintech world, going into a niche is super important to ensure you understand your customers intimately. For Currencycloud, that’s being the best at cross border payments and FX.
However, your customers will come back and ask you how you can help them achieve the next step. That’s where having a network of amazing fintechs in other niches will help. The Fintech Foundation can help you surround yourself with the best-in-class Fintech partners to deliver best-in-class services to your customers.
The criticality of continuing innovation
The times ahead will be filled with pitfalls, the end of “no-strings attached” money and a huge talent shortage for fintechs and startups at large. But thanks to all of that, it will be an amazing time for innovation.
Richard explains why these circumstances are the best to drive novelty, because the environmental pressures will bring new solutions into the light and foster a new wave of development and problem solving.
The North Star of business is understanding your customer, in the most intimate way
Don’t get too academic.
You need to understand your clients’ needs, ideally even before they have them.
This is enabled by having a clear, identifiable niche (such as the FX cross border payments niche for Currencycloud) that you clearly understand the customer for. That intimate understanding then needs to be mapped to your philosophy as a firm.
In this episode, you will also learn more about Richard’s view of how to monetise a B2C banking business in Europe (or not). How he began his career and ended up in the Fintech world. We of course discuss what he does at his company and how Currencycloud positions itself in the industry and towards startups.
Can’t wait to hear about all these topics and more? Then listen here 🎧or in your favourite podcast app👇
Links toward the topics we discussed during this interview:
- Currencycloud's Partners Portal