A little under a year ago when I started Fintech Melbourne, the word fintech (short for financial technology) itself wasn’t very well known. But now it seems to be in every newspaper you open. It’s at this point while explaining this in a conversation where I usually pull out my phone to demonstrate it via the Google Trends chart on the word ‘fintech’:
Prior to 2014, Fintech was barely mentioned at all in news articles and all of a sudden in the past year or so it’s been experiencing enormous growth. This chart is for the word ‘fintech’ worldwide and not just in Australia. The Australian chart is much more pronounced – ‘fintech’ was not used whatsoever prior to 2014.
But perhaps it’s just part of the overall interest in startups lately? Not if you compare fintech to the other ‘tech’ verticals:
So there you have it! Fintech is definitely a hot topic at the moment, seemingly more so than the other verticals. There’s certainly no better time to get interested and get involved!
If you’re in Melbourne and you’re keen on seeing what fintech is all about, register and come to Fintech Melbourne’s marquee pitch night at the Melbourne Town Hall on the 18th of November.
_______________________
Andrew Lai is the CEO of FinancialAsk and in partnership with Findex and Crowe Horwath helps to run ASK Crowe Horwath which is a service that allows anyone to ask a financial question which is answered by one of Crowe Horwath’s professional financial advisors.
My favorite chart on the FinTech trend | Andrew Lai | LinkedIn.
