This agreement reinforces a 5-year partnership and confirms Société Générale and Mastercard determination to support the rapid growth of Treezor as a European BaaS company. Being already a Principal Member of Mastercard, Treezor has onboarded some of the most disruptive fintech and both Mastercard and Treezor have supported the development of successful new players including Swile, Lydia, Qonto, Shine, and Pixpay.

As part of the agreement, Mastercard has made a minority investment in Treezor, which will help provide additional support through improved services, communication means, multi-rail payment infrastructure, and sales support from Mastercard’s local teams to improve Treezor’s success with fintech and corporates across Europe.

Mastercard’s technology, expertise, local teams, and support programs for fintech will accelerate Treezor’s European development across Benelux, Germany, Italy and Spain. Treezor will have priority access to new Mastercard products such as credit services, Open Banking, and the carbon calculator as well as the fully digital experience card programme ‘Mastercard Digital First’.

According to the Country Manager of Mastercard France, Mastercard has supported the BaaS player in the development of its product range and in its international expansion since Treezor inception. Mastercard has also accelerated Treezor’s neobanks onboarding via the Fintech Express programme, which Treezor has joined since July 2020. Mastercard has been a factor in accelerating the European expansion of Treezor, which is authorised to operate in 25 countries as an Electronic Money Institution and is regulated by the ACPR (French Prudential Supervisory Authority).

Société Générale group acquired Treezor in 2019 and has provided it with the expertise of a major international banking group in order to also satisfy the company’s financial needs and the shareholder stability that it needs to develop. Treezor also leverages Société Générale group to implement new payment services via API (e.g. Instant Payments, insurance, credit services) for regulated institutions and large corporates.

Congratulations to Treezor on this great news, which confirms the growth of our corporate network and proves once again that collaboration between different players can ensure growth for the whole ecosystem internationally.

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Finlombarda Spa is the in-house public financial institution 100% owned by Lombardy Region and a financial intermediary supervised and authorised by the Bank of Italy. We interview Michele Vietti, Chairman of Finlombarda Spa, to know more about its fintech goals in the next months

This is the first time that a regional financial institution has joined Fintech District: what are the reasons that led you to become a corporate member?

Finlombarda Spa is the in-house public financial institution of Lombardy Region. Its mandate is to help promote the economic development of the regional territory through financing initiatives also in partnership with the banking system. We believe that this partnership should also extend to fintech operators and it is with this in mind that we have joined Fintech District. To start and maintain a constant dialogue with market operators active in fintech credit in order to develop new internal skills and new products that can also use the most innovative financial services: these are priority objectives for us. The use of new technologies today represents an important opportunity both for the management of the liquidity emergency of businesses in the post-Covid19 and to restart by looking to the future. The recent initiatives promoted by Cassa Depositi e Prestiti with the opening of the territorial office in Milan and the new accelerator for fintech and insurtech startups, and that of Bank of Italy with the fintech hub, confirm that partnership with the sector is a way forward to develop products that facilitate access to credit for firms, even those of smaller size and in the start-up phase.

Finlombarda and fintech: have you already launched projects of this kind?

In June of last year we opened a public call addressed to all economic operators looking for innovative and technologically advanced solutions in the areas of supply chain and inventory financing. The call was answered by 16 operators who proposed as many intervention hypotheses with the direct involvement of the regional finance company. A financial product is now being studied that will make use of the application of advanced technologies and the collaboration of market operators. The choice of offering alternative financing options for SMEs and Mid Caps is not new to us. Examples of this are minibond and basket bond for the growth programs in Italy and abroad and the establishment of an alternative investment fund called Credito F.A.C.I.L.E. to facilitate easier and faster access to credit for micro, small and medium enterprises and professionals in Lombardy.

Is Finlombarda active in open innovation? If yes, with which projects?

Finlombarda promotes open innovation processes on the regional platform Open Innovation, a collaborative environment that counts more than 20 thousand participants among companies, research centers, public administrations and citizens. We are convinced that for SMEs collaborating and confronting each other increases the competitiveness and helps to restart. In particular, we support SMEs and start-ups in the launch of local, national and international ‘open challenges’, which aim to involve the best skills of the territory and seek innovative solutions to business projects in different areas, from manufacturing 4.0 to cybersecurity and greentech, and in the presentation of initiatives that respond to social, environmental and economic challenges for the achievement of the UN 2030 goals for sustainable development. In addition, as coordinator of Simpler (Enterprise Europe Network), Finlombarda offers free guidance and specialized support services for innovation management, participation in European research and innovation programs, protection of intellectual property, identification of business and technology partners for research projects and technology transfer around the world, contact with investors interested in financing the projects of assisted companies. For 2021, specific services are planned to support the ‘green transition’ of companies and the access to the new European research and innovation investment programme Horizon Europe. Finally, in the framework of Smart Specialisation strategy for Lombardy (RIS3) 2021 – 2027, open innovation and collaboration with Fintech contribute to the strengthening of Lombardy’s research and innovation system.

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