VAST Data has raised around US$1 billion in a Series F funding round that values the AI infrastructure company at US$30 billion, more than triple its US$9.1 billion valuation from its Series E round in 2023. The round was led by Drive Capital, with Access Industries as co-lead investor. Existing investors including NVIDIA, Fidelity Investments and New Enterprise Associates also participated, alongside new investors. The financing included both primary and secondary capital. VAST Data said the primary proceeds will support global expansion, strategic transactions and the development of its AI Operating System platform. Founded in 2016, VAST Data develops data infrastructure systems designed to support large-scale AI workloads. Its platform combines data storage, computing and real-time processing into a single architecture intended to support AI model training, inference and related applications. The company said its technology is used by organisations including CoreWeave, Lowe’s, the United States Air Force and Cursor. Renen Hallak “We are already supporting AI environments spanning millions of GPUs globally, operating across every layer of the AI stack,” said Renen Hallak, Founder and Chief Executive of VAST Data. “Applications, models and infrastructure now operate as a single system through data.” VAST Data said it has surpassed US$4 billion in cumulative bookings and ended fiscal year 2026 with more than US$500 million in committed annual recurring revenue, alongside positive operating margins and free cash flow.     Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by mrsiraphol via Freepik The post VAST Data Hits $30B Valuation After Raising $1B in Series F Round appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Swiss startup competition program >>venture>> has announced the semi-finalists for this year’s competition, unveiling the 60 startups the Round 1 jurors selected from a record-breaking 451 submissions. These 60 teams represent six verticals – Consumer Solutions, Industrials and Engineering, Medtech and Healthcare, Pharma and Biotech, Social and Environmental Impact, and Business and Finance – and were selected for proposing the most innovative business idea across these categories. 2026 >>venture>> semi-finalists, Source: >>venture>>, Apr 2026 The 10 Business and Finance Semi-Finalists In the Business and Finance categories, the ten selected companies span artificial intelligence (AI) agents, regtech, alternative financing, and cybersecurity. These businesses and solutions are: AmelioRatio builds self-improving software using AI agents, enabling companies to integrate AI into their products with the best possible performance; ConFlip helps employees and organizations resolve workplace conflicts and integrity violations through a confidential, AI-guided support platform; Do Me A Favour Buddy (DMAFB) is a digital wellbeing app that can predict employee burnout a week in advance, giving companies evidence-based prevention alerts and intervention tools to reduce turnover costs; Link Genetic builds infrastructure for persistent links, preventing broken references and content drift across documents, websites, and AI systems; NativeAI Guard is a security layer for AI usage that sits between an organization and external AI models, protecting sensitive data, enforcing policies, and monitoring activity to prevent misuse or leaks; Navi is an AI-powered hiring platform that automates candidate screening through interviews and role simulations to help companies shortlist top talent before human interviews; RegCheck is a platform that orchestrates an organization’s entire compliance process, learns from every review, and gets smarter with every file; reilo is climate-fintech company that enables smallholder farmers to access microloans by using “biodiversity” as collateral, creating returns for investors while incentivizing forest conservation; Surelio.ai is an AI audit and security company that tests and certifies AI systems to ensure they are safe, reliable, and behave as intended in real-world use; and UAC Labs pioneers the Coordination State Machine, which enables “Unified Finance”, a financial architecture where cross-border payments, foreign exchange, and collateral movements are orchestrated with the same consistency guarantees across traditional finance, centralized finance, and decentralized finance. Competition timeline These 10 semi-finalists, along with the 50 others, will now receive mentorship from experts representing organizations like Innosuisse, Thomson Reuters, Rothschild and Co Bank, Swiss Life Group, and Novartis Venture Fund. Starting May 2026, they will attend pitch training sessions with investors and McKinsey and Company leaders. These experts will help them refine their pitches and prepare for the next stage competition. Eventually, the 60 semi-finalists will present their idea to an industry-specific jury consisting of seasoned investors and entrepreneurs. Jurors will select a total of 18 finalists consisting of three per vertical, to advance into the final round. On June 15, 2026, the final pitch and award ceremony will see these finalists face industry experts from the  >>venture>> Advisory Board, who will crown one winner in each of the six verticals. Each vertical winner will take home CHF 50,000 (US$64,000) plus a McKinsey and Company consulting package. The other finalists will earn CHF 10,000 each. The six winners will then go head-to-head for the ultimate prize of an extra CHF 100,000, and be crowned the 2026 >>venture>> Grand Prize winner. The audience present at the ceremony will also vote for their favorite startup. This winner will take home the CHF 10,000 Audience Award prize. 2026 Spotlight Award competition The Board will select the CHF 50,000 Spotlight Award winner. The Spotlight Award is a special recognition that shines a light on innovation, creativity, and impact beyond the traditional competition categories. Each year, this award highlights a new theme, celebrating ventures that dare to push boundaries. This year’s theme is Apertus, Switzerland’s new open source large language model (LLM) launched by ETH Zurich, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), and the Swiss National Supercomputing Centre (CSCS). The award will recognize the most creative, high-impact application of Apertus within a Swiss startup. >>venture>> program background Founded in 1997, >>venture>> is a leading competition for up-and-coming entrepreneurs in Switzerland. A joint initiative of ETH Zurich, McKinsey and Company, Knecht Holding, Innosuisse and EPFL, the competition is open to individuals and teams at all stages of development. Every startup team needs to have a minimum of one person 18 years of age or older and one person who is a resident of Switzerland. Applicants must submit a ten to 20-page document detailing their business idea. Selected teams benefit from workshops, feedback from a panel of around 90 experts, and connections across Switzerland’s startup ecosystem. The competition also offers substantial cash prizes, expert mentorship, business consulting, networking with investors and industry leaders, and extensive media exposure. Since its inception, >>venture>> alumni have successfully founded over 1,500 companies and create more than 15,000 jobs in Switzerland. Notable winners include Kaspar&, an investment app acquired in February 2026 by Liberty Vorsorge; Stableton Financial, an institutional investment platform focused on private blue-chip technology companies; and Frigg, an operating system for renewable energy finance.   Featured image: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by muhammad.abdullah via Freepik The post Startup Competition >>venture>> Unveils 2026 Finance Semi-Finalists appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Qivalis, a consortium of twelve European banks, has selected Fireblocks as its infrastructure partner for a euro-backed stablecoin planned for launch in the second half of 2026. Fireblocks will provide tokenisation and treasury management infrastructure to support issuance, distribution, and lifecycle management of the stablecoin. The platform will also provide compliance features, including AML/KYC checks, sanctions screening, fraud monitoring, and audit-ready reporting, integrated into transaction workflows. It will use its ERC-20F standard, designed for permissioned access and regulatory controls. Qivalis, based in Amsterdam, will issue the stablecoin subject to approval by De Nederlandsche Bank. The structure aims to comply with the EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCAR). The consortium banks include Banca Sella, BBVA, BNP Paribas, CaixaBank, Danske Bank, DekaBank, DZ BANK, ING, KBC, Raiffeisen Bank International, SEB, and UniCredit. Despite the stablecoin market reaching US$305 billion in January 2026, around 99% is dollar-denominated. Euro-pegged stablecoins account for approximately US$650 million. The consortium aims to provide a regulated euro alternative for institutional use and cross-border settlement. Fireblocks’ infrastructure will also support custody, wallet services, and payment orchestration for participating banks, depending on their implementation. Its architecture allows multiple institutions to operate within a shared framework, with role-based permissions and governance controls. Michael Shaulov “European banks now have both the regulatory framework and the institutional-grade infrastructure needed to scale stablecoins across the market,” said Michael Shaulov, Co-Founder and CEO of Fireblocks. “Qivalis demonstrates how major financial institutions can work together to plan a compliant euro-backed stablecoin at scale.” Jan Sell, CEO of Qivalis, said: Jan Sell “Europe needs a regulated euro-backed stablecoin option backed by trusted financial institutions. Fireblocks’ platform gives us the security, compliance controls, and operational infrastructure to deliver exactly that.” Stablecoin transaction volumes reached US$11 trillion in Q4 2025, bringing full-year volumes to US$33 trillion, a 75% year-on-year increase.     Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by HobieArt via Freepik The post Qivalis Taps Fireblocks to Power Euro Stablecoin Push Under MiCAR Rules appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Eight firms, including Barclays, Experian, Lloyds Banking Group (Scottish Widows), and UBS, have been selected by UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) to test AI applications in a live environment. The FCA is working with Advai to run its AI Live Testing programme, which allows firms to examine risk management and monitoring approaches during deployment. Applications reflect a range of AI models, including agentic AI, small language models, and neurosymbolic systems. Use cases in the second cohort cover both customer-facing and business-to-business services, such as investment support, credit insights, payments, anti-money laundering detection, and Know Your Customer processes. Jessica Rusu “We’re continuing to collaborate with firms to support the safe and responsible development of AI in UK financial markets,” said Jessica Rusu, Chief Data, Information and Intelligence Officer at the FCA. “With tailored support from the FCA and Advai, the initiative reflects our commitment to supporting the pace of change in AI, whilst demonstrating how regulators and industry can work together to harness innovation responsibly.” The FCA said it will publish a report on good and poor practice in AI for financial services later in 2026. The announcement coincides with the release of the FCA’s Innovation Insights report, which outlines developments in UK fintech and findings from its innovation services. Applications to the FCA’s Regulatory Sandbox and Innovation Pathways rose 49% year-on-year. The report also shows that fintech firms are driving demand for these services, particularly in areas such as AI. Applications for the second cohort of AI Live Testing opened in January 2026, with testing starting in April. The programme will run until the end of the year, with an evaluation report expected in the first quarter of 2027.     Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by smilephotoap via Freepik The post FCA Expands Live AI Testing with Barclays, UBS and 6 Other Firms appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

US workers most exposed to artificial intelligence (AI) are better positioned to navigate job transitions following displacement than the broader workforce, according to new research from fellows at the nonprofit Centre for Governance of AI (GovAI). The study examined 356 occupations covering 95.9% of the US workforce and introduced an occupation-level adaptive capacity index, capturing a set of worker characteristics relevant for navigating job transitions if displaced, including net liquid wealth, skill transferability, geographic density, and age of workers. It found that AI exposure and adaptive capacity are positively correlated. Of the 37.1 million workers in the top quartile of AI exposure, 26.5 million (40%) occupy positions that have above-median adaptive capacity, making them comparatively well-equipped to handle job transitions if displacement occurs. These occupations, which include managerial, professional, and technical positions like computer programmers, web developers, and financial analysts, typically possess characteristics that enable successful navigation of job transitions, such as substantial financial resources and transferable skill sets. Occupations with highest adaptive capacity among high AI exposure, Source: How Adaptable Are American Workers to AI-Induced Job Displacement?, Sam Manning and Tomás Aguirre, Jan 2026 Despite the overall positive correlation between exposure and adaptive capacity, the research identified 6.1 million workers, or 4.2% of the workforce in the sample, who face high AI exposure but who fall in the bottom quartile of adaptive capacity. These workers are concentrated in clerical and administrative roles, and include secretaries and administrative assistants, information clerks, and tax preparers. They represent a segment of the labor market that may struggle most to transition to comparable new job opportunities if displaced. Occupations with lowest adaptive capacity among high AI exposure, Source: How Adaptable Are American Workers to AI-Induced Job Displacement?, Sam Manning and Tomás Aguirre, Jan 2026 Early-career workers among the most impacted But beyond job roles, AI affects employees differently based on their seniority. 2025 research by Stanford University scholars found AI has a disproportionate impact on early-career workers, with employment growth for young workers stagnating since late 2022 while overall employment continued to grow robustly. In particular, the research identified substantial employment declines for workers aged 22 to 25 in occupations most exposed to AI, such as software developers and customer service representatives. In these roles, workers in this age bracket experienced a 6% drop in employment from late 2022 to September 2025, compared to a 6-9% increase for older workers. AI adoption in the workplace Over the past years, adoption of AI in the workplace has intensified. According to Boston Consulting Group’s 2025 AI at Work global survey, more than three-quarters of leaders and managers used generative AI (genAI) several times a week in 2025, up 22 points from 2023. For frontline employees, that figure stood at 51% in 2025, marking a 31 point increase from 2023. Regular use of genAI across worker levels, Source: AI at Work 2025 global study, Boston Consulting Group, Jun 2025 Respondents reported tangible productivity gains, with 47% of respondents stating that AI saves them more than an hour a day with AI. Workers reinvested this time in several ways, with most completing additional tasks (54%), finishing work earlier with higher quality (52%), or shifting their focus to strategic initiatives (44%). Share of respondents who report doing these activities with the same saved by genAI, Source: AI at Work 2025 global study, Boston Consulting Group, Jun 2025 However, AI is also introducing a new set of challenges. Preliminary research conducted by scholars at the University of California, Berkeley examined over an eight-month period in 2025 how genAI affected work habits at a US-based tech company with about 200 employees. It found that while AI does reduce burden of some work and frees up time for high-value task, the technology also drives employees to work at a faster pace, take on a broader scope of tasks, and extend work into more hours of the day, often without being asked to do so. While these shifts may initially appear ideal for leadership, this “workload creep” can lead to cognitive fatigue, burnout, and weakened decision-making. Ultimately, the initial productivity surge may give way to lower quality work, turnover, and other problems.   Featured image: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by thanyakij-12 via Freepik The post Workers Most Exposed to AI Are Better Positioned for Job Transitions, New Research Finds appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

A jury of 19 experts from the Swiss fintech space have reviewed around 70 applications (out of a total of 100 submissions) of fintech start-ups and have picked the five most promising companies in the categories “Early Stage Start-up of the Year” and “Growth Stage Start-up of the Year”. The top start-ups of the Swiss FinTech Awards in 2026 are: Swiss Early Stage Top 5 Fintech Startups (Alphabetical Order) Credura Credura is a digital insurance assistant bundling everything in one app with independent advise and automatic optimisations. ForenSwiss ForenSwiss uses generative artificial intelligence to combat online crime and money laundering. Porters Porters is a AI-native, agentic outsourcing partner for various banking operations. Qubera Qubera offers an AI infrastructure that allows to extract insights of alternative investments in minutes so clients can make investment decisions with full auditability. Wealthcom Wealthcom is an AI-native wealth management platform including portfolio management, oder management and more designed for independent financial advisors, external asset managers and family offices. Swiss Growth Stage Top 5 Fintech Startups (Alphabetical Order) AIDONIC AIDONIC is a blockchain-based execution infrastructure to deliver humanitarian, climate and public sector capital faster, transparently and at scale. BLP Digital BLP Digital offers intelligent, end-to-end ERP automation for finance, procurement, sales and more. Calvin Risk Calvin Risk provide solutions for AI model validation, model testing and governance. LEND LEND is a marketplace lending platform for loans that connect borrowers directly with investors. What normally is retained by the bank benefits the clients. Relai Relai offers its users a simple, user-friendly and secure access to Bitcoin.   Swiss AI Start-ups Drive Innovation in the Finance Industry This year’s Top 10 of the Swiss FinTech Awards reflects both the strong pace of innovation in Switzerland’s fintech landscape and the major advances in artificial intelligence. Half of the nominees explicitly use or address AI to optimize part of the financial sector’s value chain or process chain, ranging from fighting online crime and AI agent-based outsourcing or automation to wealth management and governance topics. These AI-focused start-ups are complemented by notable companies in the fields of blockchain, insurtech, and lending. The Top 10 of the Swiss FinTech Awards send a clear signal that the wave of AI innovation has now firmly reached the financial industry. Since their inception in 2016 the Swiss FinTech Awards have established themselves as the most important award in the fintech industry honoring outstanding innovators, start-ups and shapers of the Swiss fintech ecosystem on an annual basis. Previous winners of the awards include companies like Yokoy, Taurus or Crypto Finance as well as important shapers of the Swiss fintech landscape such as Tenity, SICTIC or former Federal Councillor Ueli Maurer. The Swiss FinTech Awards is a broadly supported initiative what is made possible through the collaboration and support of the fintech and finance ecosystem including banks, insurances, investors, accelerators, media, academia, associations and more. The winners of the awards 2026 will be announced at the Swiss FinTech Awards Night taking place on June 23 in Zurich – a part of the first ever, international Swiss Fintech Week.   Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on background image by  Swiss Fintech Awards The post Swiss Fintech Awards 2026 Announce 10 Finalists appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

A jury of 19 experts from the Swiss fintech space have reviewed around 70 applications (out of a total of 100 submissions) of fintech start-ups and have picked the five most promising companies in the categories “Early Stage Start-up of the Year” and “Growth Stage Start-up of the Year”. The top start-ups of the Swiss FinTech Awards in 2026 are: Swiss Early Stage Top 5 Fintech Startups (Alphabetical Order) Credura Credura is a digital insurance assistant bundling everything in one app with independent advise and automatic optimisations. ForenSwiss ForenSwiss uses generative artificial intelligence to combat online crime and money laundering. Porters Porters is a AI-native, agentic outsourcing partner for various banking operations. Qubera Qubera offers an AI infrastructure that allows to extract insights of alternative investments in minutes so clients can make investment decisions with full auditability. Wealthcom Wealthcom is an AI-native wealth management platform including portfolio management, oder management and more designed for independent financial advisors, external asset managers and family offices. Swiss Growth Stage Top 5 Fintech Startups (Alphabetical Order) AIDONIC AIDONIC is a blockchain-based execution infrastructure to deliver humanitarian, climate and public sector capital faster, transparently and at scale. BLP Digital BLP Digital offers intelligent, end-to-end ERP automation for finance, procurement, sales and more. Calvin Risk Calvin Risk provide solutions for AI model validation, model testing and governance. LEND LEND is a marketplace lending platform for loans that connect borrowers directly with investors. What normally is retained by the bank benefits the clients. Relai Relai offers its users a simple, user-friendly and secure access to Bitcoin.   Swiss AI Start-ups Drive Innovation in the Finance Industry This year’s Top 10 of the Swiss FinTech Awards reflects both the strong pace of innovation in Switzerland’s fintech landscape and the major advances in artificial intelligence. Half of the nominees explicitly use or address AI to optimize part of the financial sector’s value chain or process chain, ranging from fighting online crime and AI agent-based outsourcing or automation to wealth management and governance topics. These AI-focused start-ups are complemented by notable companies in the fields of blockchain, insurtech, and lending. The Top 10 of the Swiss FinTech Awards send a clear signal that the wave of AI innovation has now firmly reached the financial industry. Since their inception in 2016 the Swiss FinTech Awards have established themselves as the most important award in the fintech industry honoring outstanding innovators, start-ups and shapers of the Swiss fintech ecosystem on an annual basis. Previous winners of the awards include companies like Yokoy, Taurus or Crypto Finance as well as important shapers of the Swiss fintech landscape such as Tenity, SICTIC or former Federal Councillor Ueli Maurer. The Swiss FinTech Awards is a broadly supported initiative what is made possible through the collaboration and support of the fintech and finance ecosystem including banks, insurances, investors, accelerators, media, academia, associations and more. The winners of the awards 2026 will be announced at the Swiss FinTech Awards Night taking place on June 23 in Zurich – a part of the first ever, international Swiss Fintech Week.   Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on background image by  Swiss Fintech Awards The post Swiss Fintech Awards 20266 Announce 10 Finalists appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

In Switzerland, neobanking has moved past early adopters and into broader mainstream usage. As of March 2026, the market attracted nearly 2.3 million customers, representing a penetration rate of approximately 25% of the country’s population of 9 million, according to new research by the Institute of Financial Services Zug (IFZ) of the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts. This means that one in four people in Switzerland now holds a neobanking account, marking a notable increase from a reported 10% in 2020, according to the Swiss Payment Monitor (SPM) study by the University of St. Gallen and the Zurich University of Applied Sciences. Neobanking leaders in Switzerland The IFZ report, based on data and forecasts from the institute, as well as estimates from SPM survey results, show that Revolut maintains its lead with an estimated 1.2 million customers in March 2026, giving it 53% market share and making it the undisputed market leader in Switzerland’s neobanking landscape. Founded in 2015, Revolut is one of the world’s biggest digital bank, boasting more than 70 million customers and 500,000 business customers across over 160 countries and regions. The company offers a mobile banking app with services including currency exchange, international money transfers, budgeting tools, and cryptocurrency trading. It aims to serve 100 million customers by mid-2027, and enter more than 30 new markets by 2030. Yuh follows Revolut, continuing its upward trajectory in 2026, with an estimated 424,000 customers, up from 399,000 at the end of 2025. It captures nearly 19% of the market. Launched in 2021 as a joint venture between PostFinance and Swissquote, Yuh is a digital banking platform that provides banking, payments, saving, and investing services. Swissquote acquired full ownership of Yuh in mid-2025, and is now working on tightening integration between its traditional trading platform and the newer Yuh app, which targets retail customers with simplified financial services. Yuh turned profitable in 2024. Neon, another Swiss neobank, follows with 251,000 users (11%). Founded in 2017, Neon provides banking services through a mobile app, operating in partnership with Hypothekarbank Lenzburg. Its main appeal is low-cost, simple banking, offering features like a debit card, payments, and account management directly from a smartphone. Other notable players include UK-based Wise with an estimated 183,000 users in Switzerland (8% market share); N26, a licensed digital bank from Germany, with 84,000 customers (4%); Zak, a mobile app operated by Bank Cler, with 83,000 customers (4%), and Alpian, a Swiss digital private bank that combines everyday banking with wealth management, with 31,500 customers (1%). Development of user numbers of neobanks active in Switzerland 2019-2026, Source: Institute of Financial Services Zug IFZ, Apr 2026 Neobanking matures Despite strong growth, neobanking in Switzerland has yet to reach true critical mass. Scaling in banking is notoriously known for being expensive, slow and regulatory demanding. Consequently, several neobanking players have struggled to expand, leading some to pivot towards alternative focus areas. Kaspar&, founded in 2020, initially launched as an investment app in collaboration with Hypothekarbank Lenzburg, offering account, card, investment, and Pillar 3a solutions. In 2024, the company pivoted to the business-to-business (B2B) market, providing its technology to banks as a white-label solution. In February 2026, Liberty Vorsorge AG in Schwyz acquired Kaspar& to strengthen its technology and digitalization expertise. Similarly, Yapeal, a Swiss-based neobanking company founded in 2018, has shifted its focus towards its embedded finance offering. In March 2026, the company’s Board of Directors appointed Dr. Dominik Bollier as CEO, a role he now holds alongside his existing position as Chairman of the Board of Directors of Yapeal. Dr. Eidel will support Yapeal’s next phase of growth, driving strategic expansion and value-creating partnerships, and scaling its embedded finance business. The global neobanking landscape The neobanking industry has reached mainstream adoption worldwide. The sector now serves 1.4 billion accounts globally, representing 19% of total banking accounts, according to strategy consulting firm Simon-Kucher. Leaders include Revolut, and Nubank, the latter claiming 131 million customers across Brazil, Mexico, and Colombia. Nubank claims that 62% of Brazilian adults are customers, showcasing widespread reach. Furthermore, over 29 million people obtained access to their first credit card thanks to Nubank, underscoring how the digital bank has improved access to finance. In addition to these leaders, more than 20 institutions now exceed 10 million customers and roughly 100 have passed the one-million-user mark, according to a global analysis conducted by Simon-Kucher. Beyond an expanding customer base, neobanks around the world are also seeing deepened customer relationships. Revenues per customer jumped to approximately US$100 per account per year in 2025, up from US$75 in 2023, according to the firm.   Featured image: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on images by Who is Danny and kavalenkava via Freepik The post Neobanking Reaches Mainstream Adoption in Switzerland appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

In 2026, agentic artificial intelligence (AI) systems will transform how individuals and organizations operate, converting employees into human supervisors of AI agents, helping security teams handle alert triage and threat investigation more efficiently, and enhancing customer experiences with personalized concierge-style services, according to a new whitepaper by Google Cloud. At the same time, the rise of AI agents will also require organizations to invest in workforce upskilling, including internal innovation programs, and comprehensive training on AI risks and data governance. The whitepaper draws on qualitative and quantitative data, including internal Google Cloud and Google DeepMind interviews with AI leaders, customer case studies and insights from studies. It highlights five critical shifts in business driven by AI agents in 2026. Boosting productivity In 2026, agentic models will expand the potential of individuals, turning them into the primary engine for innovation and growth. AI agents will manage complex, multi-step workflows across systems, while employees will be responsible for setting the strategy and overseeing the system responsible for tasks, such as invoicing and contracts. In this new paradigm, every employee will become a human supervisor of agents. Their new responsibilities will be to delegate mundane or repetitive tasks, set goals and desired outcome for the agent, and outline strategy. For example, in marketing, managers could orchestrate systems of specialized AI agents to achieve their goals, rather than performing every task personally. A typical setup will involve five specialized agents working in concert. The data agent will sift structured and unstructured data points to find patterns in market trends. The analyst agent will monitor market trends, competitors’ announcements, and social media sentiment. The content agent will draft copies for social media posts and blog articles. The creative agent will generate images and videos to accompany those social posts. Finally, the reporting agent will connect to the company’s analytics platforms to pull and analyze weekly campaign data and deliver summaries. Running businesses Digital assembly line: Orchestrating agentic systems. Source: AI Agent Trends 2026, Google Cloud Agentic systems will orchestrate multiple agents to make the entire businesses run more intelligently, efficiently, 24/7, and at scale. Agentic workflows will bridge previously siloed functions, such as network operations, field services, and customer contact centers in telecommunications. In this integrated environment, agents will autonomously remediate network anomalies, proactively open a ticket with the field service systems, and alert contact centers to inform customers of a technician dispatch, all within a single sequence. For example, an AI agent from a media company could connect to a retailer’s agent to showcase the details and pricing on a specific product displayed in streamed or broadcast content. Similarly, AI agents at a hospital could work directly with labs or insurance agents, provided the patient grants permission. In e-commerce, AI agents could monitor prices and availability and, with human pre-approval, execute a secure purchase. Leading the change in this space, PayPal is creating agentic shopping and commerce experiences by adopting the Agent Payments Protocol (AP2), an open standard protocol that enables AI agents to carry out payments on behalf of users, and enabling checkout within Microsoft’s Copilot. Salesforce is working with Google Cloud to create AI agents that work across both platforms using the Agent2Agent (A2A) open protocol. Elanco, a leader in animal health, uses Gemini models within the Elanco.ai platform to automate workflows, retrieve and analyze company data, and execute knowledge tasks across the business. Concierge-life experiences for customers Over the past decade, customer service automation involved pre-programmed chatbots answering simple questions and deflecting support tickets. With advances in large language models (LLMs) and A2A, 2026 will deliver more helpful concierge-style agents that connect enterprises and customers by remembering preferences and past conversations to offer truly one-on-one experiences. A notable example of this trend is Home Depot’s Magic Apron, a suite of generative AI (genAI) tools that helps store associates quickly access product knowledge, answer customer questions, and get guidance on home improvement projects. It combines company data with AI to improve employee productivity and customer service on the sales floor. In 2026, agentic concierges will monitor systems for triggers and resolve problems using real-time data to provide insights and take actions with human guidance and oversight. For example, in healthcare, agents could integrate data such as imaging, electronic health record (EHR) systems, and claims, to deliver proactive insights directly into the clinician’s workflow. This would enable preemptive risk management across patient populations and democratize high-quality healthcare. Advancing security With their ability to reason, act, observe, and adjust actions based on new information, AI agents will help security teams identify and respond to threats more effectively. In 2026, AI agents will increasingly assist with tasks like vulnerability discovery, alert triage, and investigation. Google Cloud’s 2025 ROI of AI study further highlights this trend. Among the 3,400+ executives polled, 46% of the organizations with production-ready AI agents use them for security operations and cybersecurity. Source: Google Cloud’s 2025 ROI of AI study With the addition of agentic systems acting as force multipliers and assume the draining and reactive work of “alert-watching”, human analyst roles will change, and shift to a more strategic level, engaging in activities including threat hunting, supervising and fine-tuning agents, and focusing on long-term security posture like architecting better defenses and anticipating the next wave of attacks. This comes as IT and cybersecurity leaders face increasing alert and data overload. A 2025 Forrester survey of more than 1,500 senior leaders at enterprise organizations found that 82% of respondents are concerned their organizations are missing real threats due to these volumes, underscoring the challenge of prioritizing and responding to potential threats effectively. Upskilling talent As AI evolves, the skills gap is widening, especially as the scope of employee work shifts to include agent management and orchestration. To thrive, organizations will need to build an AI-ready workforce and establish a holistic strategy built on five pillars: Setting up clear and measurable goals that align with the bigger picture of what their organization needs; Gathering a team of primary stakeholders for their AI initiative, tasked with providing the necessary funding and messaging on AI’s importance; managing grassroots campaigns, generating excitement, and collecting employee ideas; and transforming those prioritized ideas into functional solutions; Maintaining momentum through regular multichannel communication and a quarterly awards program to recognize and reward AI use cases, new ideas, and innovators; Hosting internal hackathons where small teams compete to develop and pitch innovative AI solutions, and encouraging staff to practice using new custom AI tools and other innovations; and Preparing their organizations for increasing risks by training their staff on what data can and cannot be used in AI tools, and teaching them how to recognize sophisticated threats like social engineering that uses AI.   Featured image by Frolopiaton Palm on Freepik The post 5 Defining AI Agent Trends for 2026 appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

American technology giants Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google, and Microsoft dominate the cloud database management systems (DBMS) market, leading the space with their extensive market presence and reputation, broad selection of cloud DBMS services, and advanced artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities, according to an analysis by Gartner, an American research and advisory firm. Cloud DBMS are software products designed to store and manipulate data, and which are primarily delivered as platform-as-a-service (PaaS) in the cloud. These systems address diverse use cases, including online transaction processing, high-volume simple transactions, and the management of session states at scale. They also provide rich user profiles, offer variable consistency mechanisms, and manage data from multiple sources within highly structured schemas to meet analytical demands. Common features include support for multiple data models and types, PaaS delivery with options for on-premises deployment, and integrated AI, machine learning (ML) and generative AI (genAI) capabilities. With the DBMS industry experiencing significant growth and undergoing a profound transformation driven by AI adoption, real-time processing requirements, and new interaction methods between systems, Gartner has shared a new analysis of vendors. This analysis is based on the Magic Quadrant, a framework that evaluates providers’ capabilities based on their execution and vision in 2024 and early 2025, as well as their future plans. It categorizes DBMS providers into four groups: the Leaders, the Visionaries, the Challengers, and the Niche Players. DBMS leaders The Leaders, which comprise nine players, support a broad range of DBMS use cases, lead in advanced features and architecture, and demonstrate strong strategic vision. AWS stands out as one of these Leaders, recognized for its extensive global infrastructure spanning over 30 regions, its comprehensive suite of purpose-built databases, and its ability to unify data and AI governance through SageMaker, which provides central access to create, govern and share data, analytics and AI assets. However, AWS also faces limitations. First, the sheer volume of overlapping and sometimes conflicting features can create confusion for customers trying to determine the optimal solution mix. Second, the lack of a unified pricing model can make cost tracking and management challenging. AWS has also limited its focus on multicloud strategies, preferring native connectors and support for open-source engines. This is forcing many customers to rely on third-party solutions for hybrid and multicloud orchestration. Google is another DBMS leader, recognized for its comprehensive suite of managed database services, including Spanner, BigQuery, AlloyDB, and Cloud SQL. A primary strength of Google’s offerings is its deep integration of its proprietary AI models, like Gemini, directly into its database offerings to facilitate agentic AI and complex automated workflows. However, Google also has limitations, including an ecosystem that can be complex to navigate and which is still maturing, and intricate cost management within its cloud database services. Another key DBMS leader is Microsoft, offering an extensive portfolio that comprises Azure SQL Database, Azure Cosmos DB, and its converged data, analytics and AI platform, Microsoft Fabric. Other strengths of Microsoft include the company’s deep engagement with the PostgreSQL community, driving improvements in I/O and performance, as well as its strong capabilities to support genAI and AI agents. Limitations include a potential overlap between its unified “all-in-one” platform and established enterprise strategies, unproven functions in Microsoft Fabric and ongoing customer concerns regarding its data warehouse and data governance functions, and the aggressive integration of operational databases like Azure SQL and Cosmos DB into Fabric which can introduce compatibility challenges such as performance and resource management in the short term. Besides the Leaders, the Visionaries category includes DBMS vendors with a strong market understanding and a robust roadmap for the cloud DBMS market, but which lack the market presence of Leaders. These players include Cloudera, SAP, and Teradata. The third category, the Challengers, are vendors with strong, established offerings, but which lack a clear vision for the cloud DBMS market. They include InterSystems, and Huawei Systems. Finally, the Niche Players are those delivering a highly specialized but restricted range of products with particular, limited market appeal. They include Couchbase, EDB, and SingleStore. Magic Quadrant for Cloud Database Management Systems, Source: Gartner, Nov 2025 DBMS market growth and trends The global DBMS market reached US$119.5 billion in 2024, growing 13.4% year-on-year. Gartner expects the industry to expand by 18.4% in 2026 to US$161 billion, driven by rising data volumes and growth of analytic workloads, AI adoption and cloud-native expansion. Organization across all industries are generating unprecedented amounts of data amid digital transformation initiatives, expanded online operations, and automation of business processes. This changing landscape requires scalable, cost-effective storage and processing solutions that traditional on-premise systems struggle to offer. At the same time, AI applications demand databases optimized for ML, real-time analytics, and predictive technologies, requiring architecture capable of efficiently handling massive scale, low-latency requirements, and vector operations. AI penetration in the enterprise is accelerating. An analysis by Andreessen Horowitz, based on internal data and conversations with corporate executives, found that 29% of the Fortune 500 and about 19% of the Forbes Global 2000 are now live, paying customers of a leading AI startup. This rapid adoption is notable because large corporations historically resist being early tech adopters and typically wait years before becoming customers. According to the research, enterprise adoption is currently dominated by specific use cases and industries. Coding, support, and search represent the lion’s share of use cases, while the tech, legal, and healthcare sectors are the industries most eager to adopt AI. Application of AI in the enterprise, Source: Andreessen Horowitz, Apr 2026 In finance, AI usage is expanding rapidly, with 71% of the companies polled by KPMG in 2024 reporting the use of AI, and 41% utilizing it to a moderate or large degree. Companies are turning to AI in every area of finance. Accounting and financial planning are currently the furthest ahead, with nearly two-thirds of the respondents piloting or using AI for these functions. In these areas, organizations are aiming for benefits including improved data processing, financial reporting, real-time insights, and predictive analysis. Treasury and risk management follow suit, with nearly half of respondents piloting or using AI to improve debt management, cash-flow forecasting, fraud detection, credit risk assessment, and scenario analysis. Progress made in the use of AI in finance areas, Source: KPMG Global AI in Finance Report, 2024   Featured image: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by arslantanoli via Freepik3 The post Who Leads the Cloud Database Management Systems Market? appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

In Q1 2026, venture capital (VC) investment in the global fintech industry fell in both volume and decline, marking a shift from the previous quarter. According to new data released by CB Insights, fintech funding dropped 37.3% quarter-over-quarter (QoQ), reaching US$12.1 billion. Deal count slumped 19% QoQ to 762 transactions. Quarterly equity funding and deals in fintech, Source: State of Venture Q1 2026, CB Insights, Apr 2026 This decline contrasts sharply with the broader VC landscape, which saw total funding double QoQ, surging from US$142.3 billion in Q4 2025 to its highest level ever of US$285.5 billion in Q1 2026. The downturn underscores a shift in investor focus, marking a decline in the dominance of fintech in the global VC landscape. In Q1 2026, the sector accounted for only 4% of global VC funding, compared to 11% in 2025 when it ranked second only to artificial intelligence (AI). A focus on established firms In Q1 2026, fintech investors continued to favor more established firms. Mid-stage and late-stage deals took a larger share of the deal count, accounting for 23% of fintech transactions in Q1 2025, up 2 points from 2025. This trend pushed deal sizes upward. In Q1 2026, the average deal size stood at US$22.5 million, representing a 10.8% increase from US$20.3 million in 2025. The median deal size also increased, rising from US$4.7 million in 2025 to US$6 million in Q1 2026. Annual percent of deals in fintech by deal stage, Source: State of Venture Q1 2026, CB Insights, Apr 2026 This year, the US continues to lead the market, securing about half of global fintech funding and deal count in Q1 2026 at US$6.7 billion and 361 transactions. The country also dominated in transaction sizes, securing five of the quarter’s six largest fintech deals. These deals involved: Kalshi, a prediction market which secured a US$1 billion Series F in March at a US$22 billion valuation; Tala, a global financial infrastructure company which raised US$500 million in a Series F in January; World Liberty Financial, a Trump-linked cryptocurrency venture which raised a US$500 million round in January; Devoted Health, a healthcare company which closed a US$317 million Series F-Prime financing round in January; and Rain, an enterprise-grade infrastructure for stablecoin-enabled payments which secured US$250 million in a Series C at the beginning of the year. Investors remain bullish Echoing these broader market data, Amias Gerety, partner and head of US at QED Investors, a fintech-focused VC firm, told Crunchbase News that his company has been investing at a slightly slower pace so far in 2026 than in the previous years, citing macroeconomics and geopolitical challenges, and emphasizing a strategic pivot towards “high-conviction companies.” Despite a more measured approach, Gerety said QED Investors remains bullish on specific growth sectors, particularly the application layer of AI in fintech and stablecoins, and has backed several startups that are harnessing large language models (LLMs). Looking ahead, Gerety expressed optimism for the fintech sector as a whole this year. Part of the excitement is around the fact that larger companies are enhancing their operations with agentic workflows. “More and more transformation is moving from the ‘co-pilot’ phase, and we’re moving into the ‘OpenClaw’ phase,” Gerety said. “Reasoning agents will start to actually do all the work that was too tedious and slow to be done manually.” AI drives VC funding surge In Q1 2026, VC investors shifted their focus further away from fintech and towards AI. The sector continued to be the dominant investment theme, totaling US$226.2 billion and representing 79% of all VC funding for the quarter. AI secured some of the period’s largest transactions, including US$122 billion for OpenAI, US$30 billion for Anthropic, US$16 billion for Waymo, and US$7.5 billion for xAI. Quarterly equity funding and deal count, Source: State of Venture Q1 2026, CB Insights, Apr 2026 While global VC funding surged, deal count declined 15% QoQ, reaching their lowest quarterly total since Q4 2016 with 6,598. Capital concentrated into fewer and larger bets, with early-stage deals trending lower, falling to 64% of total deals, compared to 67% in 2025. This trend is further evidenced by the dramatic increase in deal sizes. The average deal size surged to US$66.3 million in Q1 2026, marking a near threefold increase from 2025’s US$23.5 million. Meanwhile, the median deal size reached US$4 million in Q1 2026, rising increased 29% from 2025. Annual average and median deal size, Source: State of Venture Q1 2026, CB Insights, Apr 2026     Featured image: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by freepik via Freepik The post Fintech Funding Cools as Capital Floods into AI Instead appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Finastra has announced that MUFG (Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group) has selected its Global PAYplus platform to support ACH services in the US. The deployment expands the existing relationship between MUFG and Finastra and extends a unified payments architecture across Japan, Europe and now the US. It follows MUFG’s earlier modernisation of its payments infrastructure in Japan and Europe as part of a wider effort to build a more scalable system. MUFG Americas CIO, Alla Whitston, said: Alla Whitston “In 2021, we began our ISO 20022 journey with a bold decision to replace the core payment engine with a completely new one. After careful evaluation, we selected Finastra as our partner to first modernise our payment capabilities and following its successful completion decided to migrate our legacy ACH platform, benefiting from their global payments’ expertise and modern technology stack.” The US rollout is part of a multi-year programme to simplify MUFG’s payments infrastructure and improve processing performance. The bank said that standardising on a single platform has helped increase straight-through processing rates to more than 95% across its global operations. Barry Rodrigues, EVP, Payments at Finastra, said: Barry Rodrigues “We’re proud to partner with MUFG on this journey, helping deliver the resilience, speed and flexibility that banks need today, while building a foundation that can evolve with future demands.” MUFG is consolidating ACH and cross-border payment processing onto a single ISO 20022-native platform. The initiative aims to reduce operational complexity and improve the bank’s ability to respond to regulatory and customer requirements.     Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by Frolopiaton Palm via Freepik The post MUFG Selects Finastra’s Global PAYplus for US ACH Modernisation appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Euronet has agreed to acquire PaynoPain, a provider of digital-first payment solutions serving businesses ranging from SMEs to large enterprises across sectors including ecommerce, hospitality, microfinance and marketplaces. The acquisition will expand Euronet’s merchant acquiring footprint in Spain and Portugal and support the growth of its omnichannel online payments and alternative payment methods offering. Euronet expects to close the transaction in the third quarter of 2026, subject to regulatory approvals and customary conditions. It will integrate PaynoPain’s merchant portfolio and technology into its existing acquiring business, strengthening its position in the European merchant acquiring market. Euronet will also establish an additional Merchant Acquiring Centre of Excellence in Spain to support advanced in-store and digital payment capabilities across its global operations. The deal supports Euronet’s broader strategy to deliver a unified omnichannel customer experience across digital and physical payment channels. It also addresses rising demand for ecommerce and omnichannel solutions, particularly among very small businesses, SMEs, and high-growth sectors such as hospitality. Euronet’s Ren payments platform will be enhanced through the integration of PaynoPain’s online payment capabilities, aimed at improving the delivery of secure and flexible merchant solutions. The company will also utilise PaynoPain’s payment service provider license, authorised by the Bank of Spain, within its Merchant Services platform to strengthen its regulatory and operational presence in the region. Nikos Fountas, EVP and CEO of EFT for EMEA and the Americas at Euronet, said: Nikos Fountas “The acquisition of PaynoPain enhances our ability to deliver scalable, technology-driven omnichannel payment solutions and further expands our merchant acquiring capabilities in Europe.” Jordi Nebot Carda, CEO and Founder of PaynoPain, added: Jordi Nebot Carda “Joining Euronet marks a significant milestone in PaynoPain’s journey… giving us global scale, expanded capabilities, and the opportunity to deliver greater value to merchants.”       Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by freepik The post Euronet to Acquire PaynoPain in Bid to Expand European Payments Reach appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

OpenAI has acquired AI personal finance startup Hiro, with the acquisition signalling a deliberate push into specialised financial agents, as reported by TechCrunch. The deal functions primarily to recruit talent, bringing Hiro founder Ethan Bloch and his ten-person team to the ChatGPT developer. The standalone Hiro application will cease operations on April 20 2026. Hiro will permanently delete all user data from its servers by May 13 2026. The startup confirmed that customer financial information will not transfer to OpenAI. Founded in 2023, Hiro built an automated tool designed to act as a personal CFO. The application allowed consumers to input salary, debt, and monthly expenses to model various financial scenarios. Hiro built its tool with a strict focus on mathematical accuracy. Users could verify the specific calculations produced by the AI, addressing a known weakness of large language models in numerical reasoning. Ethan Bloch “As we got to know the team at OpenAI, it became clear that joining forces would give us the opportunity to pursue that vision at a much larger scale for a much broader audience,” said Ethan Bloch, Founder, Hiro. The OpenAI Hiro acquisition follows the developer acquiring another AI personal finance application, Roi, in 2025. These purchases indicate a strategy to develop autonomous financial agents capable of completing complex tasks rather than simply answering queries. Following the OpenAI Hiro acquisition, European wealthtech companies face a shifting market. The integration of high-precision financial modelling into mainstream tools like ChatGPT sets a new benchmark for automated advisory services in regions like Switzerland.     Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by Dikarte via Freepik The post OpenAI’s Hiro Acquisition Brings Specialised Financial Agents to ChatGPT appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Deutsche Börse Group has announced a strategic investment of US$200 million in Payward, the infrastructure layer behind the global cryptocurrency platform Kraken. Deutsche Börse Group is making the investment through a secondary share purchase, giving it a 1.5% fully diluted stake in the company. The transaction further strengthens the strategic partnership between Deutsche Börse Group and Kraken. As previously announced in December 2025, the two firms intend to combine their respective capabilities to connect traditional financial markets with the digital asset ecosystem. The collaboration spans trading, custody, settlement, collateral management, and tokenised assets, with the aim of enabling more integrated access across both environments for institutional clients. The investment also underscores Deutsche Börse Group’s focus on its digital asset strategy, which centres on building a hybrid market infrastructure capable of processing both traditional securities and blockchain-based tokens within a unified liquidity pool. Customary closing conditions, including regulatory approvals, still apply to the transaction, and Deutsche Börse Group expects it to close in the second quarter.     Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by MohammadNahid011 via Freepik The post Deutsche Börse Acquires Stake in Kraken in $200M Digital Asset Deal appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Australian fintech unicorn Zeller has launched in the UK, introducing its payments and financial platform to the country’s 5.7 million SMEs. The move comes as UK businesses face rising operating costs and continued expectations from customers for smooth checkout experiences. Research from Foresight Factory, commissioned by Zeller, found that poor checkout experiences lead to nearly half of customers abandoning purchases, putting around £272bn in payments at risk. Zeller Terminal, the company’s payment hardware, is being introduced in the UK alongside its integrated platform, which combines payments, point-of-sale, invoicing, accounts, cards, and expense management in a single system. The company said the aim is to reduce the need for merchants to use multiple disconnected providers. Zeller said UK merchants could reduce payment processing costs by up to 35% annually compared with fintech and legacy providers, equivalent to as much as £5.2bn across the market. It also noted that its digital onboarding process takes under six minutes, compared with an industry average of around five days, with many providers still requiring in-person verification or paper-based applications. Early uptake in the UK includes more than 100 businesses during the pre-launch phase. Ben Pfisterer “The UK is one of the world’s most advanced fintech markets and home to millions of small businesses that are vital to the economy. But despite progress being made, payments is dominated by legacy providers offering unreliable, outdated, and costly payments hardware, paired with lengthy and time-consuming onboarding processes. UK merchants have been underserved for too long,” said Ben Pfisterer, co-founder and CEO of Zeller. Zeller, which supports more than 100,000 businesses in Australia, counts merchants including Domino’s Pizza, Baskin Robbins, The Cheesecake Shop, and SSP among its users.     Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by Frolopiaton Palm via Freepik The post Australian Fintech Zeller Launches in the UK to Target SME Payments Market appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Banking Circle Group will appoint former UBS and ING Group CEO Ralph Hamers as Chairman of its Group Board of Directors from 20 April 2026. Hamers has also advised companies in the fintech ecosystem, including Arta and Grab. He will work with management to expand into new markets, deepen Banking Circle’s product ecosystem, and strengthen its operational and regulatory foundations. Ralph Hamers said, “For more than a decade, Banking Circle Group has innovated at the intersection of banking, technology and regulation. The team has built a one-of-a-kind platform and ecosystem, delivering real and compounding value to clients as they scale. I look forward to joining the board and partnering with the team and other stakeholders as we enter this exciting next chapter of growth – continuing to strengthen the platform, expanding globally and delivering even greater value to our clients.” Anders La Cour Anders La Cour, Co-Founder and CEO of Banking Circle Group, said, “I am immensely proud of the achievements of all my colleagues, and the trust that our clients have placed in us on the journey. Ralph’s experience will be critical as we continue to scale the business and prepare for the next phase of growth. We are very excited to welcome him into the business.” Banking Circle is a financial technology platform for global commerce that provides payments infrastructure to payment service providers, fintech firms, banks, global marketplaces, corporates and online merchants. The business has surpassed €500 million in revenue, with growth driven by client adoption, international expansion and continued investment in products, technology and its regulatory footprint.     Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by ismode via Freepik This article first appeared on Fintech News Singapore The post Ex-UBS CEO Ralph Hamers Named Chairman of Banking Circle appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Inventx is expanding its AI portfolio with “AI-Models as a Service”, enabling financial and insurance institutions to operate large language models, small language models, and traditional machine learning models within its ix.Cloud environment. The service allows customers to select, combine, or replace AI models as needed. Inventx deploys open-source models and makes them available for production use without requiring customers to build their own GPU infrastructure or rely on public cloud services. The company says the setup supports the use of sensitive data within a controlled environment for training and automation use cases. Inventx operates ix.Cloud and hosts it in its own data centres in Switzerland. It designs the platform to meet regulatory and data protection requirements for highly regulated industries, while customers retain control over data, infrastructure, and governance. Carla Caspar, Product Manager Data Platform & AI and Head of InventxLab, said: Carla Caspar “The Model Serving Service provides our customers with a stable and secure interface via hosted model endpoints, enabling seamless integration of open-source AI models into existing applications. The platform allows models to be flexibly exchanged, applied to sensitive corporate data, and used to build automated AI workflows.”       Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by thanyakij-12 via Freepik The post Inventx Launches AI Models as a Service on ix.Cloud for Financial and Insurance Clients appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Crypto Finance, AMINA, and Incore Bank have completed the second stage of the first phase of their payment infrastructure pilot on Google Cloud Universal Ledger (GCUL), moving from a November 2025 proof-of-concept to interbank production validation. The three regulated financial intermediaries said the exercise demonstrated the consolidation of multiple transfers into single bank-to-bank clearing operations, with settlement efficiency improving as more institutions join the network. They added that the setup shows a potential route to modernising payment operations without altering existing regulatory frameworks or introducing new forms of digital money. AML and sanctions screening are embedded within the transaction flow to support compliance and data privacy requirements. In this stage of the pilot, participating banks processed live client transactions in a production environment. The earlier phase had demonstrated near real-time settlement using GCUL. Stijn Vander Straeten “We’re moving toward a more connected financial system in which money and assets can settle in real time without compromising trust,” said Stijn Vander Straeten, CEO of Crypto Finance Group. Franz Bergmueller “This pilot with Google Cloud Universal Ledger validates our technology infrastructure’s readiness for production environments within existing regulatory frameworks,” said Franz Bergmueller, CEO of AMINA. Crypto Finance acted as Currency Operator during this stage, setting governance standards, onboarding criteria, and transaction rules, while AMINA and Incore Bank integrated the system into their regulated environments. The pilot, supported by Google Cloud’s private permissioned ledger infrastructure, demonstrated automated domestic transfers operating continuously, combining existing Swiss payment rails with a shared ledger layer. The partners said future work will explore cross-currency settlement, FX workflows, and digital asset transfers.       Featured image credit: Edited by Fintech News Switzerland, based on image by freepik The post AMINA, Incore Bank and Crypto Finance Complete GCUL Payment Pilot Phase appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.

Celsion Bank has started its operations under a license from the Liechtenstein Financial Market Authority (FMA) and with authorisation under MiCAR. This enables the bank to provide services to clients across the EU/EEA, Switzerland, and other jurisdictions where legally permitted. Designed for digital asset banking, Celsion integrates digital asset services with traditional banking infrastructure. Its services target clients active in digital assets, including companies, asset managers, foundations, and other corporates. At launch, the bank offers digital asset custody, trading, staking, and transfer services. These are provided alongside core banking functions, all within a regulated framework. These services operate on a single platform, allowing clients to manage digital and traditional assets together. Celsion’s executive team combines experience in regulated banking, capital markets, audit, technology, risk management, and digital assets. The leadership team comprises CEO Dr Markus Federspiel, CGO Mauro Casellini, COO Holger Schultes, CFO Harald Siegel, and CRO Kevin Pekar, supported by a team across all key functions. The bank also benefits from a long-term investor base with expertise in digital assets. Lee Weiss “Clients active in digital assets require a banking setup where trading, custody and payments operate seamlessly together. That is the infrastructure Celsion provides,” said Lee Weiss, Chairman of the Board of Directors. Dr Markus Federspiel, CEO, added: Dr Markus Federspiel “We are not simply building another bank, but shaping a model that enables the long-term integration of traditional banking and digital assets within a fully regulated environment.” Celsion operates from Liechtenstein, a financial centre noted for stability, high supervisory standards, and a clear legal framework for digital assets. The jurisdiction provides a foundation for a bank bridging traditional and digital financial markets.   Featured image credit: Celsion Bank press release The post Celsion Bank Begins Operations, Combining Digital Assets and Traditional Banking appeared first on Fintech Schweiz Digital Finance News - FintechNewsCH.