The rise of financial technology (fintech) is happening across the globe on a number of fronts. Outside of business use, the piece most of us know about is the growing ability to instantly send and receive payments directly from our mobile phones or other devices. It may not be long before the wallet gives way completely to the smartphone—it’s getting much easier to get by all day if you left your wallet at home than it is if you’ve forgotten your phone.
Within the business sector, the Center for Financial Inclusion (CFI) is working to highlight fintech startups through its annual competition, Inclusive Fintech 50, that recognizes fintech startups focused on providing services for low-income customers, and on micro and smaller-sized enterprise businesses to get better leverage within a very competitive industry. Participation in the competition has led to many of these startups attracting investors and otherwise getting exposure they would have struggled to find otherwise.
Fintech has also captured the attention of much larger companies as well. In the face of major sanctions by the U.S. government against their smartphone and network equipment factions, Huawei has pivoted its efforts toward the fintech market.
Thanks to growing demand for cloud storage and artificial intelligence, Huawei’s enterprise business offerings grew 23 percent between 2019 and 2020. The growth beat out Huawei’s overall growth over the same time period –3.8 percent—by nearly 20 percent. Huawei’s president of global financial services, Jason Cao, says they hope to capitalize on this growth to springboard their new offerings for enterprise businesses. Based on their new partnerships, this looks like it will include a lot of investment into the fintech sector.
The Chinese company is seeking partnerships across the globe to leverage growing demand for digitalization in parts of the world where it’s currently underdeveloped, such as Latin America, Southeast Asia and the Middle East. The company has partnered with 25 businesses, including software developers, other fintech companies and risk managers to develop a platform that will offer a number of digital financial solutions. It will include everything from brand promotion to technical architecture to support for operations.
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