Deal-flow sessions with top innovators lead to experimentation and commercialisation with SA corporates

19 September 2018, Johannesburg, South Africa – The Disruption Agenda, a first-of-its-kind event for the country, saw over 200 top business leaders and innovation thinkers attend the inaugural launch this week. This new platform initiated by Nedbank in partnership with Silicon Valley’s Plug and Play team, sought to connect leading global and local innovation talent to leaders ready to implement disruptive technologies.

The two-day event was structured into deal-flow sessions on Day 1 where thirty of Nedbank CIB’s top clients engaged with 10 of the most innovative startups sourced with the help of Plug and Play, known as the world’s largest innovation platform. Day two saw pitches from the 10 startups and a Disruption Panel Discussion with Nedbank’s lead thinkers on disruption and digital transformation to over 200 clients of Nedbank CIB’s, Retail Business Banking and Nedbank Private Wealth clients with a goal to stimulate and accelerate innovation action.

“The focus on disruption is something that we’ve been driving not only in our business, but as new value propositions for our clients. Additionally, our objective is to advance the local tech community,” shares Stuart van der Veen, Head of Innovation and Disruption at Nedbank CIB. Nedbank identify the top 100 disruptors every six months, both locally and globally. From this, 12 collaborations are identified across Nedbank with six progressing to experimentation and one through to commercialisation on a rolling basis.

“Aerobotics is a great example. They were one of the disruptors we identified, and we’ve taken them through to commercialisation with several of our clients,” concludes van der Veen.

Reflecting on the event, Alex Fenn, Technology and Innovation Lead for Sibanye-Stillwater, commented, “Mining companies are experiencing increasing cost pressures and volatile commodity prices. We’ve pulled all of the efficiency levers that we have at hand. I believe the next paradigm shift in operational performance will come from the adoption of some type of disruptive technology at a very broad level. We’ve identified enormous opportunity amongst the startups that we have engaged with, which could be critical to our digital transformation and sustainability going forward.”

The startups selected to showcase include Aerobotics, Dispel, GotBot, IoT.nxt, Koniku, LifeQ, Sentiance, Trueface AI, Wasteless and What3Words.

Michael Clampett, Head of Asset and Property Management: Retail at Attacq Group, states: “We’re quite small to allocate resources to sourcing top innovation at this scale but in partnership with Nedbank, this has now been possible, and we have access to innovate more quickly.”

In the venture capital space there a number of new entrants investing in disruptive tech startups, with the industry sitting around 4.4 billion and around 530 deals existing within the venture capital sector. Of these figures, 1.1 billion was new capital invested and 159 of deals took place in 2017 reflecting steady growth in the sector.

When talking about The Disruption Agenda, Herman Singh, Chief Digital Officer for MTN Group, shared, “This model of like-minded corporates working together to assist and facilitate innovation results in the startup model having the highest probability to succeed.”

The Disruption Agenda sought to activate experimentation and proof of concept initiatives between startups and corporates as a pragmatic, action-orientated approach to ensure impactful outcomes of the engagements.

“It’s been an extraordinary two days. The deal-flow sessions were transformative for us. As a small part of a wider business scaling globally, it’s been phenomenal to have the support of executives in those meetings with potential clients of Nedbank’s and to have them facilitate those conversations, so we can start to discuss proof-of-concepts and commercialisation. It’s a very exciting thing for us, to have so much hands-on support. It’s changed the way we think about how corporates are dealing with the innovation space in South Africa,” adds Lyndsey Duff, Country Manager for What3Words in South Africa. 

ENDS 

For more information on The Disruption Agenda or this press release please contact:

Mika Stanvliet | This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. | 081 534 6237 

About Nedbank Group

Nedbank Group is a bank holding company listed on JSE Limited (JSE) with a market capitalisation of R125 billion as at 30 June 2018. Nedbank Group is one of Africa’s largest banking groups.Its principal banking subsidiary is Nedbank Limited, and the group is 54% majority owned by Old Mutual Limited (OML), which has a primary listing on the JSE with secondary listings in London, Zimbabwe, Malawi, and Namibia. Nedbank Group owns subsidiaries and banks in Namibia, Swaziland, Malawi, Mozambique, Lesotho and Zimbabwe, and offshore in the Isle of Man, Guernsey and Jersey. It also has representative offices in other Southern Africa countries, including Angola and Kenya, and has key global financial centres to provide international banking services for SA-based multinational and high-net-worth clients in London, Toronto and Dubai (UAE).We are a diversified financial services provider, offering a wide range of wholesale and retail banking services, as well as insurance, asset management and wealth management solutions.

For more information, visit https://www.nedbank.co.za/    

About Plug and Play:

Plug and Play is a global innovation platform. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, we have built accelerator programs, corporate innovation services, and an in-house VC to make technological advancement progress faster than ever before. Since inception in 2006, our programs have expanded worldwide to include a presence in over 20 locations globally giving startups the necessary resources to succeed in Silicon Valley and beyond. With over 6,000 startups and 220 official corporate partners, we have created the ultimate startup ecosystem in many industries.We provide active investments with 200 leading Silicon Valley VCs, and host more than 700 networking events per year. Companies in our community have raised over $7 billion in funding, with successful portfolio exits including Danger, Dropbox, Lending Club, PayPal, SoundHound, and Zoosk.

For more information, visit www.plugandplaytechcenter.com

Nedbank launches The Disruption Agenda to connect the best technology startups to major corporations and business leaders

South Africa, 13 August 2018 – Nedbank announced today the expansion of their US partnership with Plug and Play, the world’s largest innovation platform, to include South Africa for the first time.Together, the entities will connect 10 visionary entrepreneurs from around the world to business leaders at The Disruption Agenda to be held in Johannesburg, South Africa in September.These startups are at the leading edge of digital transformation. They have been accelerated via the Plug and Play platform and identified as relevant disruptors to solving cross-sector business challenges at a corporate level within the local market.

“Nedbank recognises that building an innovation strategy at a corporate level can present a number of significant challenges. To help corporate leaders, we have structured The Disruption Agenda, a first of its kind event on the continent, to simplify how corporates connect to world-class startups,” shares Stuart van der Veen, Head of Disruption and Innovation at Nedbank Corporate and Investment Banking (CIB). “The problem is that innovative thinking is too often limited to finding new ways of doing old things, when what businesses really need to set themselves apart is to find completely new things to do. And that’s where the successful integration of disruptive technology can be an unparalleled source of comprehensive transformation for any business.”

Nedbank’s participation in Plug and Play's FinTech accelerator program abroad supports its commitment to source innovative digital enhancements to meet the changing needs of its clients. Nedbank has sponsored Play and Play’s Fintech initiative for close on two years and for each of the four batches that Nedbank has been involved in, the bank’s teams actively engaged with the startups to source new ideas and partnerships with the aim of delivering delightful client experiences and disruptive client value propositions.

“Our partnership with Nedbank has given our startups a successful route to expand their business to South Africa,” said Max Koenig, Director of Plug and Play FinTech, Silicon Valley. “The CIB group, responsible for innovation within Nedbank, has been instrumental in sourcing startups to digitally transform their company.” 

The Disruption Agenda is a closed event structured for Nedbank’s clients, while a public event for broader access to Plug and Play is envisioned to take place later in the year. The success of these engagements will form the basis of Plug and Play’s decision to accelerate plans to establish a permanent presence in Africa.

“The opportunity in Africa as a whole is endless and we view this event in September as an integral first step for opening and developing an Innovation Hub in South Africa in 2019” noted Saeed Amidi, Founder & CEO of Plug and Play.

“We believe that successful disruptors are those organisations that are able to see through their traditional functions and create new realities for their clients and businesses. In the process of transforming innovation thinkers to disruption leaders, these organisations have real potential to transform the economic reality of entire communities,” shares Van der Veen. 

-- ENDS --

For more information about this press release please contact:

Mika Stanvliet - The This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. | 081 534 6237 

About Nedbank Group

Nedbank Group is a bank holding company listed on JSE Limited (JSE) with a market capitalisation of R125 billion as at 30 June 2018. Nedbank Group is one of Africa’s largest banking groups.Its principal banking subsidiary is Nedbank Limited, and the group is 54% majority owned by Old Mutual Limited (OML), which has a primary listing on the JSE with secondary listings in London, Zimbabwe, Malawi, and Namibia. Nedbank Group owns subsidiaries and banks in Namibia, Swaziland, Malawi, Mozambique, Lesotho and Zimbabwe, and offshore in the Isle of Man, Guernsey and Jersey. It also has representative offices in other Southern Africa countries, including Angola and Kenya, and has key global financial centres to provide international banking services for SA-based multinational and high-net-worth clients in London, Toronto and Dubai (UAE).We are a diversified financial services provider, offering a wide range of wholesale and retail banking services, as well as insurance, asset management and wealth management solutions.

For more information, visit https://www.nedbank.co.za/ 

About Plug and Play:

Plug and Play is a global innovation platform. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, we have built accelerator programs, corporate innovation services, and an in-house VC to make technological advancement progress faster than ever before. Since inception in 2006, our programs have expanded worldwide to include a presence in over 20 locations globally giving startups the necessary resources to succeed in Silicon Valley and beyond. With over 6,000 startups and 220 official corporate partners, we have created the ultimate startup ecosystem in many industries.We provide active investments with 200 leading Silicon Valley VCs, and host more than 700 networking events per year. Companies in our community have raised over $7 billion in funding, with successful portfolio exits including Danger, Dropbox, Lending Club, PayPal, SoundHound, and Zoosk.

For more information, visit www.plugandplaytechcenter.com