Nirav Patel | Payments Innovation Forum

Position: Group CEO at Andaria

Nirav is an accomplished and high achieving payments and banking executive with 15+ years experience that includes developing strategies and leading organisations to maintain both growth and profitability. He has been instrumental in the set up of Andaria Financial Services across two jurisdictions, creating a robust governance structure through a 3 lines of defence model. This has been key in driving a solid foundation in order for the institution to develop an environment that promotes innovation with a structured approach to governance at the same time.

"Having experience outside of industry is key in order to approach innovation without the misconceptions or preconceived ideas. Furthermore, having successfully developed the regulatory foundations for Andaria in UK & Europe, I would like to explore and share the ideas, framework and creating an innovation sandpit underpinned by robust governance structure. I feel like innovation can be perceived to not have the structure required to grow in a regulatory framework and I would like to use the opportunity to address the issue. Additionally, the payments industry continues to expand exponentially and I feel it is imperative for a group or forum such as PIF to continue to have a key seat at the table with the likes of central banks and regulators. In addition innovation is key to the industry and I have the experience fostering such environments in difficult conditions which I believe are beneficial to the industry." - Nirav Patel

Get to know Nirav Patel

Tell me about Andaria and what is your role?

Andaria is a fintech company and an e-money institute (EMI) licenced in both London and Malta. This allows us to support customers across the UK and Europe, providing B2B payment solutions such as multi-currency accounts, dedicated IBANs, payment flows, and (coming soon) embedded payments solutions.

As a business, Andaria is on a mission to make digital financial services more accessible, simple and transparent for all businesses. As CEO, my role is to lead the company in that mission and drive the rapid growth that we have planned.

What do you think is the driving force behind the exponential growth in Fintech

Over the last decade, we’ve seen a perfect storm of factors come together to build momentum around fintech. Technology advancements and have led to increasing digitisation, which has driven consumer expectations of more innovative and convenient experiences. The ‘always on’ commerce environment we live in today brings with it a demand (from both consumers and businesses) that financial transactions can be handled easily, instantly and from any device. This is the demand that fintech is expanding to fulfil – particularly as customer expectations continue to grow and evolve.

Is it possible that regulation has fuelled the growth of Fintech?

Regulation will always have a mixed relationship with fintech. Regulation is vital for many reasons and the regulators have driven some critical initiatives that have spurred innovation. For instance, the introduction of EMIs and the foundations for Open Banking are largely thanks to regulations introduced to drive competition and innovation.

However, it is also true that fintech has grown in spite of an array of difficult regulatory challenges. The fintech industry dynamic has changed significantly in response to these challenges. For instance, partnerships between banks and fintechs – and among fintechs themselves – are stronger (and perhaps more complex) than ever. Partnerships have become vital for successfully navigating regulatory and technical challenges to deliver innovation and capitalise on market opportunities.

Regulation aside, what do you think are the biggest challenges facing Fintechs today?

Differentiation and scalability are both key challenges facing fintechs of all sizes. We’re in a highly complex, crowded and fragmented sector which is comprised of legacy providers, new entrants and many other types of companies in between. Creating your own niche and ensuring product-market fit can be a tough task, but it’s the first step in creating differentiation and building a proposition that will ‘cut through the noise’. It’s a particularly tricky time for fintechs looking for funding to scale their business, but those with the strongest brands, commercial models, partnerships and defined customer benefits will be those who come out on top.

How is the Payments Innovation Forum helping Fintech organisations face these challenges?

Fintech is constantly evolving and it can be difficult to navigate, especially for early stage companies. Collaboration and co-operation are vital to success in this industry and PIF helps provide a platform to share experiences, debate trends and tackle key issues.

How should the fintech sector respond to the cost-of-living crisis?

In some respects, fintech is inherently responding to some of the issues around financial inclusion and the underserved, by creating more accessible and flexible means to pay and be paid. As a broader financial services industry, there is an innate duty for us to ‘do right’ by customers (whether they are consumers or businesses) in terms of charging reasonable fees. Andaria is a B2B fintech, so we don’t interact with consumers. However, businesses are also being hard-hit at the moment, so it’s important for us to remain flexible and accessible as a business, making sure we offer each customer the right solution, without burdening them with excessive costs or mandated services.

There is undoubtedly a lot more we can do as an industry through collaboration. Andaria would certainly be open to participating initiatives that may help during these difficult economic times.

If you were prime minister for a day, what would you pledge in support of the industry?

There would be too much I would want to do in a single day – even just in support of our industry! However, one thing I would do is set out a defined plan to support investment in education, training and candidate accessibility for the industry. We desperately need new talent and to make sure we attract (and retain) diverse pools of candidates into the industry. This next generation of fintech pioneers need to take the industry to new heights – and they need to be equipped with the right approach, attitude, knowledge and skills to deliver.