Data registries and analytics business Illion, formerly Dun & Bradstreet, has acquired Adelaide fintech startup Proviso as it gears up for the arrival of Australia’s open banking regime.
Founded by brothers Luke and Dallin Howes in 2013, Proviso provides automated bank statement retrieval, analysis, and categorisation solutions, boasting other fintech startups through to ASX- and NYSE-listed lenders and banks and credit unions as clients.
Luke Howes said the acquisition came as the team felt Illion would enable Proviso to accelerate its growth.
“Proviso’s mission has been to reduce friction in financial services, and this fits perfectly with Illion’s commitment to developing products and services that make life easier for businesses and consumers,” he said.
Simon Bligh, CEO of Illion, said the acquisition puts the company in a strong position as open banking makes headway in Australia and New Zealand.
“Since 2015, Illion has concentrated on developing innovative financial data products and services by investing heavily in our own…solutions and by selectively acquiring complementary businesses. The acquisition of Proviso builds on this strategy,” he said.
“Proviso’s bank statement retrieval, analysis, and categorisation services complement Illion’s existing fintech products.”
Howes added, “At present we enable more data to be processed at faster speeds than any of our competitors. Once open banking APIs are fully introduced in the Australian and New Zealand financial sectors, we’ll process even more data sources and be able to present a more complete picture of an individual’s financial position.”
At its core, open banking is about giving consumers easier access to, and more control over, the data around their finances and transactions that is held by their banks, in turn giving them more information and choice when selecting financial products and services.
Australia’s Federal Government announced in the 2017-18 Budget last May that it will introduce an open banking regime, later commissioning an independent review to recommend the best framework to implement such a regime.
“Open banking will require banks to share product and customer data with customers and third parties with the consent of the customer. Data sharing will increase price transparency and enable comparison services to accurately assess how much a product would cost a consumer based on their behaviour and recommend the most appropriate products for them,” the Treasury stated in its terms of reference for the review.
“Open banking will drive competition in financial services by changing the way Australians use, and benefit from, their data. This will deliver increased consumer choice and empower bank customers to seek out banking products that better suit their circumstances.”
Having called for submissions from industry in response to an issues paper, the review was due to report at the end of 2017.
New Zealand too is pushing forward on open banking, with a report to be handed to Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Kris Faafoi within the next few months.
Image: the Proviso team. Source: Proviso.
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