Visa and the GenerationS start-up accelerator are now partners
Visa, a global payment system, has become an industrial partner for the largest start-up accelerator in Russia and Eastern Europe GenerationS, which has been held by RVC since 2013. Company Visa has supported the Finance & BankingTechnologies track, within which the search for promising projects in the field of financial technology, services and e-commerce is being carried out.
Applications from start-ups to participate in the Finance & BankingTechnologies track will be accepted until October 15, 2016, after which the best projects will get to the corporate program of acceleration. The participants will be able to modify their product in constant interaction with a potential customer and to test the business model and prepare the project for its successful entering the market. In case of successful completion of the acceleration program, start-ups will receive certain investments and subsidies to enlarge their businesses.
Visa will focus on finding in the field of mobile and e-commerce projects the improvement of the quality of payment services, as well as the security of payments. Within the framework of acceleration of the program, the Visa experts will conduct a series of trainings and workshops for start-ups, and will present the possibilities of universal programming interface (API), with which mobile application developers can get access to the most popular payment technologies and services from Visa and integrate them into their applications.
"Technology plays a crucial role in the development of modern electronic payments. The rapid penetration of mobile and connected devices contributes to the emergence of new payment methods, changing the consumer experience. In these circumstances, Visa, as a payment system, aims at offering the industry participants the necessary tools and services to support innovation and help to implement promising projects. We are pleased to participate in the GenerationS start-up accelerator and hope that it will help to open up new ideas that will contribute to the development of non-cash forms of payment," noted Michael Batuev, head of the department for the development of new products and innovations of Visa in Russia.
"Finteh became one of the most popular industry trends within the GenerationS accelerator. We get comprehensive feedback from a number of corporations and government agencies that are interested in finding new technologies in this field, comments Gulnara Bikkulova, RVC Deputy Director General and the GenerationS ideologist, "it is especially important for us to connect to the project of global-level players, the world leaders in its segment, such as Visa. For start-ups, participating in GenerationS, a partnership with Visa will become a real possibility of the development and piloting its development, not only nationally, but also in the global market".
GenerationS was officially launched in July 2016 on eight corporate tracks: Mining&Metals, AgroBioTech&Food, SmartCity, Сreative Industries, LifeScience, TechNet, Power&Еnergy, Finance&Banking Technologies. Acceptance of applications from technology entrepreneurs is open on the GenerationS official website. To become a member of an accelerator, it is necessary to complete the registration process, following the link: http://en.generation-startup.ru/register/. GenerationS Super final will be held in March 2017. The winners will share the prize money of 15 million rubles and the prizes from partners and also will have the opportunity to continue their work with industry partners and to attract investments for the development and refinement of the product.
About GenerationS
GenerationS is the largest accelerator of technology projects in Russia and Eastern Europe and the first federal platform for creating and developing corporate acceleration toolwork. It has been held by RVC since 2013. GenerationS-2015 has received a record number of applications: 2,566 projects from 14 countries. 141 projects were selected to participate in the corporate accelerators in 7 directions. The customers and industrial partners of GenerationS became more than 20 Russian companies, in whose interests the selection and acceleration of projects were carried out. Then more than 60 joint projects are to be analysed. The total amount of prizes from the GenerationS-2015 partners reached 160 million rubles.
About RVC
RVC is a governmental fund of funds, the Institute of Development of the Russian Federation. The main objectives of RVC: stimulating the creation of Russia's venture capital industry and execution of functions of the Project Office of the National Technology Initiative (NTI). The authorized capital of RVC is more than 30 billion rubles. One hundred per cent of the RVC capital belongs to the Russian Federation represented by the Federal Property Management Agency. The total amount of funds generated by RVC has reached 21 billion rubles; meanwhile, the total size is equal to 32.4 billion rubles. The share of RVC is 19.9 billion rubles. The number of innovative companies invested by RVC funds has reached 196. The total volume of invested monetary funds is 18.4 billion rubles.
About Visa Inc.
Visa Inc. is a global payments technology company that connects consumers, businesses, service companies, financial institutions and governments in more than 200 countries with a fast, secure and reliable e-payment network. Electronic payments are made through the global innovation processing system VisaNet, which is capable of handling more than 65,000 transactions a second, with fraud protection for consumers and guaranteed payments for merchants. Visa is not a bank, does not issue payment cards, does not establish commissions or interest rates for consumers and does not lend any credits to cardholders. In turn, Visa's innovations enable financial institutions to offer their customers a wide range of financial instruments, including debit, prepaid and credit card products.
