time.lex will be Eggsplore’s partner for new financial technologies
21/11/2016
Brussels, November 21, 2016 – time.lex will be Eggsplore’s partner for new financial technologies. time.lex and Eggsplore (or since 2017 known as B-HIVE) join forces to complement Eggsplore’s fintech know-how with time.lex’s legal expertise in digital technologies, IP, and privacy. Their joint competences will provide answers to the digital challenges currently faced by the financial industry.
NOTE: This article was written before the company name change in 2017: Eggsplore has changed to B-HIVE.
Challenges for financial service providers
The traditional financial actors have no choice but to meet the demands of their digitalized customers who use smartphones and tablets as full financial tools.
Established financial companies will need to adapt their business models and establish alliances with innovative technological start-ups to be able to utilise the new opportunities and challenges presented by technology. After all, flexible fintech companies are focusing precisely on those areas where established and traditional players sometimes fail, forcing them to undergo a transformation.
Belgium’s fintech sector
Belgium’s fintech sector is growing fast but is still small compared to countries such as the Netherlands, Great Britain, and the United States. However, there are plenty of ideas in Belgium.
Eggsplore’s initiative of establishing a “fintech hub” or ecosystem in Diegem (Brussels), sharing know-how, experience, innovation, and technology, radiates unprecedented dynamism. The fact that established banks, international payment specialists, credit providers, and fintech companies are making concerted efforts for this initiative is evidence of its necessity.
Eggsplore will help the Belgian financial sector to stand up to the competition from Google, Facebook, and Amazon, which have already obtained banking licenses in countries such as the United Kingdom and the United States.
"To ensure that banks remain relevant, they will have to start reasoning like Facebook et al. In other words, their thinking must start from the client’s wishes and they should offer user-friendly and new technological solutions", says Wim De Waele, CEO and, together with Jurgen Ingels, Eggsplore’s initiator. He adds that they also intend to turn Belgium into the main financial artery and the base for the rest of the Eurozone. "The world of finance in Belgium must have noticed this as the four major banks, and organizations like SWIFT and Euroclear, have joined our initiative as founding partners."
Legal tangle
However, Eggsplore noticed that current legislation does not provide clear fintech regulations. “For this reason, the partnership with time.lex is an essential link in our services”, concludes Wim De Waele.
“Indeed, time.lex provides exceptional added value for this" says Edwin Jacobs, a partner in the niche law firm time.lex. "We can give advice on the relevant legislation to all actors wishing to take up the digital challenge, from established banks to start-ups, from large to small companies. The introduction of new technologies raises various questions about privacy, IP (intellectual property rights), data protection, electronic archiving, and so on. time.lex’s expertise, both at fintech level and in the areas of virtual coins, privacy and big data, online payment services, smart contracts, cloud computing, electronic invoicing and archiving, and, of course, dispute resolution (also via mediation), is useful for all of Eggsplore’s partners.
"Under Eggsplore’s umbrella, we will contribute to the financial industry by holding workshops, actively supporting business cases, and providing open office hours, in short, by sharing our know-how,” concludes Edwin Jacobs.
Europe’s fintech sector is still relatively small, but it is growing rapidly.
About time.lex
time.lex is an all-round law firm for the information society specialized in technology, intellectual property, media and e-business/e-government/entertainment. Not only does time.lex follow up on these legal topics, they also contribute to their development. Together, its founders represent more than 50 years of shared experience in information and technology law, from an academic, business, and policy perspective across all aspects of this discipline.
About Eggsplore (B-HIVE)
Eggsplore, since 2017 known as B-HIVE, is an independent and open organization, founded by seasoned entrepreneurs, that acts as a catalyst for the European FinTech ecosystem by providing a number of services in collaboration with its partners. It organizes a number of educational and networking events, including a yearly FinTech Conference, and manages a Brussels-based Fintech studio.
Eggsplore (B-HIVE) connects the dots in fintech and in doing so it relies on its structural partners: AXA, Belfius, BNP Paribas Fortis, Cresco, Euroclear, ING, KBC, McKinsey & Company, Proximus, and SWIFT.
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