Bank Execs Talk Partnering With Fintechs To Solve Customer Problems

Executives from JPMorgan Chase & Co. JPM, Wells Fargo & Co WFC and others described how banks and fintech companies are partnering to change the payments landscape at the 2018 Benzinga Fintech Summit in San Francisco.

Adam Carson, Chase's head of fintech partnerships; Erika Lunceford, the head of Bank of New York Mellon Corp BK's Silicon Valley lab; Spring Labs CEO Adam Jiwan and Nancy Selph, Wells Fargo's senior vice president of advanced technology and partnerships all contributed to the discussion. Ana Sirbu, CFO of small business lender BlueVine moderated the session.

Partnerships

Chase's Carson said partnering with banks is a question of education, not sales.

“Find the people who are the keys to matchmaking and the strategizers to the fintech space. When you actively approach a bank, you should be in education mode, not selling mode,” he said. 

At BNY Mellon, the company has initiated the use of dedicated focus groups on a global scale, Lunceford said. 

A Customer Focus

For Wells Fargo, the improvement of the customer experience and retail space through the use of applications is a top priority, Selph said. In terms of partnerships, the company remains focused on internal advancements, she said. 

“Some of the best innovations engaged within our own organization,” Selph said. “For large banks, the internal engagement is often underestimated.”

By making everyone feel engaged and excited, Wells Fargo is able to leverage new ideas and cohesiveness, she said. 

Chase's Carson said the most important aspects of financial services are security and privacy.

“We spend a lot of our time creating secure infrastructure and identity verification tools that are accurate and prevent the open sharing of customer data.”

The 2018 Benzinga Fintech Summit is bringing together leaders in the brokerage and payments space. Click here for more coverage.

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