Online lender Spotcap today opened the Fintech Fellowship to applicants. The programme offers an £8k award to a postgraduate student studying a fintech related course at a UK university. Applications will be open for four months and close on the 1 August 2018.
The fellowship launched last year to raise awareness of the fintech talent gap and to encourage industry stakeholders to get involved in addressing the skills shortage. Forty-two universities from across the UK supported the programme. Last year’s winner was Mohammed Hussan, who is using the award to support his MSc in Computer Science.
Hussain said “Seeing positive collaboration between groups of talented entrepreneurs and established financial institutions really inspired me to apply. I believe it is a game-changer.”
The fintech industry is the fastest growing sector in the UK with higher than average growth expected; however, finding the right talent can be challenging. 58 percent of respondents to the UK FinTech Census 2017—which was commissioned by HM Treasury—reported that they considered attracting suitable and qualified talent as one of their top three challenges, with access to coding and software skills being of particular concern.
Niels Turfboer, Spotcap’s managing director, comments: “The possibility that access to skilled workers from Europe will be reduced after the UK leaves the EU in March 2019, has put talent on everyone’s radar. The fintech sector, academia and the government are all trying to find ways to plug the growing skills gap, but we can achieve more if everyone collaborates with each other.”
