Finance, Fin-Tech, AI, Enterprise Tech and Digital Transformation

The Islamic finance industry is emerging as a crucial component of the future global financial architecture. Cambridge Judge Business School Executive Education is launching a new programme focused on the sector.

Dr Kamal Munir says Islamic banks weathered the financial crisis better and outperformed all conventional banks. Their unique services are attracting investors and clients in many parts of the world outside their traditional areas.

Islamic finance – conservative, safe and growing dramatically

Private Equity Insider: A candid chat with Tony James
Department of Finance public lecture 
Date: Wednesday 23 February 2011
Time: 6.30-8pm
Venue:  Old Theatre, Old Building
Speaker: Hamilton ("Tony") E. James
Chair: Professor Felda Hardymon 

Although the private equity industry has existed for more than three decades and has grown to be an important actor in the world economy, it is still an industry surrounded by controversy. Proponents of private equity claim that the governance and financial structure employed in leveraged buyouts is a superior way to manage companies, while detractors claim that private equity practitioners simply engage in levered bets that endanger the future of companies and employees. In this ‘fireside chat’ Tony James and Felda Hardymon discuss candidly the truths and myths surrounding this controversial industry. 

Hamilton ("Tony") E. James is president and chief operating officer of Blackstone, one of the world's leading investment and advisory firms. Blackstone’s Private Equity business is one of the world’s largest and most highly respected, with assets under management in excess of $24 billion. Prior to joining Blackstone Mr. James was chairman of Global Investment Banking and Private Equity at Credit Suisse First Boston. He graduated magna cum laude with a BA from Harvard College in 1973 and an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1975. 

2:20 funny reference to Gaddafi family
36:00 (approx.) Professor Felda Hardymon turns the tables and asks the hard questions



Tony James Page - Blackstone - discussion on Private Equity at LSE - 23-02-11

The Islamic finance industry is facing a great future, not only because it offers a stable banking system, but also because its benefits are being realised by a greater number of people.

Launching his new Cambridge Judge Business School Executive Education programme on Islamic finance, Dr Kamal Munir, Reader in Strategy & Policy at Cambridge Judge Business School, says the British government's move to issue an Islamic bond is good news for the industry.

Islamic finance: the future is great

In this podcast series we go behind the scenes to give you a feel for what it's really like to work in some of the most coveted careers and companies. In this podcast Cambridge MBA Ajay Arora (ex-BBC) is joined by classmates that have joined the programme from various finance backgrounds.

Getting into finance

So you want to work in…finance

Ravi Kanbur says statistics are fundamentally political in nature and in import. Kanbur is Professor of Economics at Cornell University and gave the keynote speech at the  Fourth IMF Statistical forum on Statistics for Inclusive Growth, held in November 2016. In this podcast, Kanbur says data doesn’t always reflect reality when it comes to poverty and inequality. Contributors: Ravi Kanbur: T. H. Lee Professor of World Affairs and Professor of Economics at Cornell University.

Ravi Kanbur: Political Dimensions of Data and Statistics

Speaker(s): Dr Jana Uher | People often feel they are being judged differently for doing the same things. But experiences based on gender identity or ethnicity are frequently dismissed. This lecture will present key findings of a timely Marie Curie Project conducted at LSE. Identical leadership films featuring different protagonists and cutting-edge interview methodologies involving first-person videos provided deep insights into how people perceive others and how they judge others on personality scales. These new findings illuminate the pathways to the emergence of implicit biases and their manifestation in standardised surveys, which are widely used in organisations and research. Jana Uher is Senior Research Fellow, MarieCurie Fellow and member of the Athena SWAN Self-Assessment Team at LSE. Julia Black is Interim Director of LSE and Professor of Law at LSE. The Department of Psychological and Behavioural Science (@PsychologyLSE) study and teach societal psychology: the psychology of humans in complex socio-technical systems (organisations, communities, societies). Our research deals with real-world issues, we train the future global leaders.

How We Judge Others' Personality: gender, ethnicity and questionnaires [Audio]

Dr Simon Taylor, Professor Colin Lizieri, John Kelting

Dr Simon Taylor, Lecturer in Finance at Cambridge Judge Business School, Professor Colin Lizieri, Professor of Real Estate Finance at the University of Cambridge, and John Kelting, Head of Product at Barclays Corporate, are optimistic about the future of finance. Smart regulation, they say, not simply constraining activities, but encouraging globalisation, competition and innovation, will be the key.

The future of finance

In this episode of the Data Show, I spoke with Kristian Hammond, chief scientist of Narrative Science and professor of EECS at Northwestern University. He has been at the forefront of helping companies understand the power, limitations, and disruptive potential of AI technologies and tools. In a previous post on machine learning, I listed types of uses cases (a taxonomy) for machine learning that could just as well apply to enterprise applications of AI. But how do you identify good use cases to begin with?

Bringing AI Into the Enterprise

Speaker(s): Dr Ulf Axelson | Dr Axelson draws from leading academic research to shed light on the controversial role of private equity in the economy. Mon, 27 Sep 2010 18:30:00 GMT

Private Equity: leveraged expertise or leveraged bets? [Audio]

If you have been hearing more and more about RPA (Robot Process Automation) in the enterprise then this conversation with Gene Chao is a must listen. As Global Vice President &amp; GM of IBM Automation his perspective, drawn from a deep well of knowledge and experience, is helpful to understanding the challenges and upsides of AI infused RPA.

AI Infused RPA: Where Business Processes and IT Meet in the Enterprise

Auto lenders are increasingly relying on nontraditional data as they hone underwriting to gain a competitive edge. Alternative data can open the door to unbanked and under-banked consumers, enabling lenders to extend beyond their typical customer base without assuming too much risk. In this episode of The Roadmap, Auto Finance Excellence chats with Chuck Berend, senior vice president and chief risk officer at First Investors Financial Services Group, about how lenders can navigate the pain points of alternative data and leverage nontraditional credit markers to sharpen decision-making.

Speaker:  Chuck Berend, Senior Vice President, Chief Risk Officer at First Investors Financial Services Group

Episode 19: Sharpening Decisions With Alternative Data

This week, we interview Arnab Kumar, Founding Manager, Frontier Technologies for the NITI Aayog, the wing of the Indian government focused on rolling out AI into areas like healthcare and agriculture. In this episode, we talk about critical factors for applying AI at the national level, such as where to begin applying AI and what the low-hanging fruit is for gaining traction, leverage, and data assets that are going to transfer elsewhere. We also talk about how governments, much like enterprises, need a future vision for critical capabilities they're going to enable with AI. Finally, Kumar discusses what he thinks are the most transferable lessons for the enterprise from his experience building out a national AI strategy.

AI Enterprise Adoption Lessons From Building a National AI Strategy

2019 has been the year of the Initial Public Offering, or IPO. Some demonstrate healthy valuations for many of these companies, but financial analysts use a variety formulas to reach these numbers and base their math on the company’s previous record. But what about the future success and what about how customer behavior can impact that value? This is the approach being taken by Theta Equity Partners - called Customer Based Corporate Valuation. The co-founders of Theta Equity are Wharton Marketing Professor Peter Fader and Emory University Assistant Professor of Marketing Daniel McCarthy. And they join us to discuss how customer behavior should play a role in valuations.

Customer-based Corporate Valuation

RMA is committed to helping prepare institutions and the industry for the upcoming transition from LIBOR. In this podcast Stephen Krasowski, Contributing Editor of The RMA Journal, interviews Paul Guinan, Associate Director of Global Markets Risk and Securities Lending at RMA, on SOFR, the preferred interest rate benchmark that could ultimately replace LIBOR.

LIBOR Transitioning to SOFR

Speaker(s): Naomi Eisenstadt, Carey Oppenheim, Ryan Shorthouse, Matthew Taylor | What do children need from parents, how is poverty a barrier to meeting needs, and what has Government done – and should do – about it? Naomi Eisenstadt and Carey Oppenheim explore the radical changes in public attitudes and public policy concerning parents and parenting. Drawing on research and their extensive experience of working at senior levels of government, the authors of this new book, Parents, Poverty and the State: 20 Years of Evolving Family Policy, challenge expectations about what parenting policy on its own can deliver. Matthew Taylor (@RSAMatthew) has been Chief Executive of the RSA since November 2006. In July 2017 Matthew published the report ‘Good Work’; an independent review into modern employment, commissioned by the UK Prime Minister. Matthew’s previous roles include Chief Adviser on Political Strategy to the Prime Minister, and Chief Executive of the Institute for Public PolicyResearch (IPPR), the UK’s leading left of centre think tank. Matthew is aregular media performer, having presented several Radio Four documentaries, andis a panellist on the programme Moral Maze. He is Senior Editor of the Thames & Hudson Big Ideas series. Ryan Shorthouse (@RyanShorthouse) is the Founder and Chief Executive of Bright Blue. He founded the organisation in 2010 and finally became the full-time Chief Executive at the start of 2014. Ryan’s research focuses on education and social policy. Many of his policy ideas have been adopted by the UK Government over the past decade. He appears regularly in the national press and broadcast media. John Hills is Chair of CASE John Hills is the 'co-founder and former co-Director of the International Inequalities Institute at LSE. This event is hosted with the support of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and held as part of the launch of the new III research theme Economies of Global Care, led by Professor Beverley Skeggs. The International Inequalities Institute (@LSEInequalities) at LSE brings together experts from many LSE departments and centres to lead cutting-edge research focused on understanding why inequalities are escalating in numerous arenas across the world, and to develop critical tools to address these challenges.

Parents, Poverty and the State [Audio]

In our latest podcast, Shompa Choudhury (WG ’20) is joined by Luvleen Sidhu, Co-Founder and CEO (formerly Chief Strategy Officer) at BankMobile (https://www.bankmobile.com/index). In this extensive interview, Luvleen explains how BankMobile is leading the way in mobile-first banking by making banking more accessible and affordable.  Luvleen also lays out the landscape for digital banking in the U.S. and explains how BankMobile’s B2B2C white label model allows them to create high volume customer acquisition at a low cost through partnerships with large consumer aggregators.

Established in 2015, BankMobile is a division of Customers Bank and among the largest and fastest-growing mobile-first banking platforms in the U.S., offering checking and savings accounts, personal loans and credit cards. BankMobile employs a “Bank-as-a-Service” (BaaS) model, which enables BankMobile to acquire customers at higher volumes and substantially lower expense than traditional banks. Its low-cost operating model enables it to provide low-cost banking services to low/middle-income Americans who have been left behind by the high-fee model of “traditional” banks. Today, BankMobile provides its BaaS platform to universities and large consumer aggregators, such as T-Mobile, and currently serves over 60 million members as a top 15 bank in number of consumer checking accounts.

Luvleen Sidhu is the Co-Founder and CEO (formerly Chief Strategy Officer) at BankMobile.  She is also a member of the BankMobile Board of Directors and Director & Founder of the BankMobile Foundation, where she identifies and funds budding entrepreneurs and organizations that promote financial literacy. Prior to becoming a well-recognized name in the industry, she earned her MBA here as part of The Wharton School at The University of Pennsylvania as part of the Class of 2013.

Luvleen Sidhu - Co-Founder and CEO at BankMobile

In our latest podcast, Meghna Sreenivasan (WG ’20) is joined by Richie Serna, CEO and Co-Founder of Finix (https://finixpayments.com). Richie discusses the inspiration behind Finix: seeing the difficulties companies faced when creating payments infrastructure in-house, and the opportunity this presented. He also shares his thoughts on other innovative payments companies, the future of the industry, and lessons learned from his journey as an entrepreneur.

Richie co-founded Finix with Sean Donovan in 2015 to redefine the economics of payments. Finix allows growing businesses to own and make money from their payments systems (vs. paying “rent” fees to third-party processors). Finix’s software allows companies to bring payments in-house, a process that previously took 2-3 years and cost millions of dollars. With Finix, they can do the same in as little as one month, and at a fraction of the cost. Finix is trusted by companies that process $50 million or more in payments like Lightspeed POS Inc. and Clubessential to build and scale their payments infrastructure. Finix is headquartered in San Francisco, with an additional office in Cincinnati, Ohio. Finix has raised funds from Bain Capital Ventures, Homebrew, Insight Venture Partners, Visa and several others.

Richie Serna - CEO of Finix

With double-digit growth over recent years, Islamic finance has generated significant, and increasing interest around the world.  It is serving previously underbanked populations, while many governments, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa, are now looking at Islamic finance as a possible new source of funding.

The Rise of Islamic Finance and its Potential for Africa

M&A & private equity panel from the inaugural IFLR European Capital Markets Forum, held at The Waldorf in London on January 24, 2013.

Topics:
Different approaches to M&A transactions: strategics vs sponsors
Acquisition due diligence, as buyer or seller
Special considerations for carve-outs
Structuring sales through a dual-track process
Evolution of key terms: time for a Eurozone Mac clause? Liability caps, thresholds, etc.
M&A deals in growth markets
Changes to the Takeover Code and the implications for defending hostile takeovers

Panelists:
Raman Bet-Mansour, partner, Debevoise & Plimpton (chair)
Rushad Abadan, general counsel, corporate/M&A, Royal Bank of Scotland
Ian FitzSimons, general counsel, Pernod Ricard
David Innes, partner, Debevoise & Plimpton

For more information, please visit: www.iflr.com/IHsummit2013


Finance, Fin-Tech, AI, Enterprise Tech and Digital Transformation

Hashem