With a mission to inform, empower, celebrate and advocate for British Columbia's current and aspiring business leaders, BCBusiness go behind the headlines and bring readers face to face with the key issues and people driving business in B.C.
Issue link: http://digital.canadawide.com/i/938724
CAnADA DRives Cody Green 2010 400; expanding to the U.s. and U.k. in 2018 online lending a former car salesman with a talent for web design, green launched canada drives to turn around an inefficient auto financing industry. rather than approve customers for a loan after they find the right car, he thought it should be the other way around revolutionized access to auto financing in canada by connecting customers and lenders through an online platform. canada drives col- lects basic customer data and sells the information to local car dealers ally. partners include schedule 1 banks as well as credit unions and alternative lenders BenCh ACCOunTinG ian Crosby, Jordan menashy, pavel rodionov, adam saint 2012 250 Bookkeeping UBc grads crosby and menashy founded Bench to tackle the problem of inefficient and time- consuming manual bookkeeping. With rodionov and saint, the pair got their company off the ground by landing a slot with famed new york incubator techstars Bench offers subscription access to cloud-based software with in-house accountants taking care of all the bookkeeping. small-business owners are freed up to keep working on their businesses and not in them neutral. Bench has integrated with online e-commerce platforms including gusto, mindbody, shopify and stripe mOGO Dave Feller 2003 232 (113 in B.c.) online lending feller spent years struggling with debt after university, and his brother was an investment banker at lehman Brothers holdings when it collapsed in 2008. the result- ing global credit crisis influenced mogo's development as faith in big financial institutions was shaken the mogo app allows users to check their credit score for free, while also giving them access to a suite of financial products including mort- gages, personal loans and prepaid visa cards disruptor. With a strong online presence plus brick-and-mortar locations, mogo poses a challenge for financial incumbents venzee kate hiscox and marco sylvestre 2014 41 connectivity and data transformation chief executive hiscox started venzee after realizing there was a market for a cloud-based inventory management system for retailers, suppliers and manufacturers venzee's mesh platform connects everyday apps and enterprise solutions with blockchain networks (users that each have to agree on all transactions coming in and out). features include custom smart contracts, data transformation and failsafe conditions that remove or encrypt sensitive data before committing to a blockchain network ally and disruptor. Banks can use mesh, but the platform also makes alternative currencies more viable and accessible for the average consumer march 2018 BCBusiness 19 kris krÜg (goktUrk); adam BlasBerg (eBerhard+green); paUl Joseph (crosBy) around uS $13 TRILLIOn NINE THOUSAnD 1/3 Estimated value of the global fintech market Approximate number of tech companies in British Columbia Portion of B.C. fintech companies that are less than five years old soUrces: Bc tech association, digital finance institUte