Fintech Panel 2019: Scaling up Scotland's fintech ecosystem

As Scotland's financial services industry goes from strength to strength, new businesses in the sector eventually come to a point where the next step means scaling up.

Representatives from Deloitte (Kent Mackenzie), Burness Paull (David Goodbrand), the University of Strathclyde (Prof. Eleanor Shaw), LendingCrowd (Stuart Lunn) and ShareIn (Jude Cook) expressed their views on the matter at The Scotsman's October 2019 Fintech Panel at Burness Paull's offices in Edinburgh.

For a detailed breakdown of the topics raised at the event, you can read event chair David Lee's report and analysis here.

The topic of the panel discussion was businesses scaling up.

Professor Shaw told the room that when it came to business growth, “the journey was not linear and was different for everyone - but the growth pains are very similar”.

David Goodbrand broke down five factors that go into realising a business plan with merit: building the right people into a cohesive team; having great technology; identifying and delivering funding; having cheerleaders supporting you; and understanding the marketplace.

From Deloitte, Kent Mackenzie told the room to “never underestimate the complexity of the banking environment", appealing to young businesses to plan scaling up must with a detailed understanding of both the banking system and regulation.

Watch some highlights from the event in the video player above.