Requests For Startups: FinTech

Joining Erik on this episode are Maia Bittner (@maiab), co-founder of Pinch, and Sheel Mohnot (@pitdesi), FinTech partner at 500 Startups. They go over the variety of sectors being disrupted by FinTech companies these days, including insurance, credit reporting, personal financial management, capital markets, financial planning, international finance and even banking in the developing world.Erik asks what kinds of opportunities Sheel and Maia see for founders and entrepreneurs as well as the pitfalls faced by different types of companies in the space. Sheel explains how he subdivides his fund and explains the difference between an “enabler” and a “disruptor.”They talk about why FinTech startups often have an advantage in distribution as opposed to product, contrasting with the competitive advantage a startup typically has. Of course, they also cover crypto and the opportunities in FinTech that blockchain and tokenization provide — as well as where the crypto hype might be overblown.