Analytics firm SAS has announced the launch of its incubator programme, designed to offer UK FinTech organisations free access to big data technology assets and industry expertise, in order to achieve their innovation goals.

Using technologies such as big data analytics and machine learning, the Confederation of British Industry estimates that the FinTech sector will be worth £300 billion by 2020. SAS has suggested that through use of its new programme, firms can cut the time to develop solutions by up to 50 per cent – saving them time and money.

Investors, however, are increasingly concerned about the risk due to development efforts and costs, as many FinTech organisations launch pilot projects using open-source software for proof-of-concepts to save money. By doing this, the firms frequently create a need to redesign solutions to support growth, which can negatively impact customer adoption and adds to operational costs.

The new incubator programme aims to solve these challenges, through providing access to data science expertise and rapid prototyping environments for testing innovations without the up-front financial costs. The programme is also designed to allow FinTech solutions to scale in accordance with rapid growth expectations.

Vincent Kilcoyne, FinTech innovation lead at SAS UK and Ireland, noted: “While technology is rapidly transforming the financial services industry, many businesses in this sector are focusing on compliance rather than innovation. As such, the majority of technology development is happening outside established banks and inside FinTech startup companies, leading to a growing need to validate the viability of these offerings for maximum success rate.”

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