Finovate Spring 2014 Recap

I spent much of last week in San Jose attending Finovate Spring. I'm a Finovate veteran at this point, having seen all kinds of companies take the stage at the conference. Even after all these years Finovate is still my favorite conference. I rarely attend sessions at industry conferences but I make it a point to attend most if not all of the Finovate demos. The demo format is awesome, new companies show up each year, and there is much to learn. Granted, some of the companies don't stand a chance, though all need to be applauded for innovating and attempting to take our industry to the next level. There were several key themes at Finovate Spring:

• Lending and alternative credit (e.g. LendingTree, LendingRobot, Roostify, CUneXus, Visible Equity, etc.)
• Security and authentication. (e.g. Rippleshot, EyeVerify, TrueLink, ID.me, etc.)
• Digital investing. (e.g. Motif Investing, Stockpile, TD Ameritrade / LikeFolio, etc.)
• Self service (e.g. Interactions, Intellisresponse, etc.)
• Mobile enhancements. (e.g. Ondot Systems, Loop, Jumio, etc.)

What stood out?Funniest demo and best pitch:PrivatBank with their Topless ATM. Stay tuned for when the Finovate crew posts the videos. This one is really fun to watch. Most innovative demo:Fiserv's demo of payments and notifications using Google Glass and a Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch. The demo is a great example of why it's important to dream, try things out and not be afraid to fail. Most useful and practical:Jumio's card activation using a smartphone camera; TrueLink's solutions to protect the elderly and impaired; Stockpile's stock on a gift card (shout out to former Celent senior analyst Dan Schatt!) Glad it was gone: PFM has dominated the stage for several years at Finovate and I was glad to see only a handful of PFM companies on the docket this time around. Banks have lots of work to do on the PFM front and it is going to involve rethinking how banks and consumers approach PFM. More on that another time. There were other standouts, though this should give you a good sense of what Finovate Spring had to offer. Finovate Best of Show winners (audience selected) can be viewed here. I'm looking forward to seeing you all at Finovate Fall in NYC!