
In a beautiful flat on the edge of San Francisco’s sun-kissed Inner Sunset neighbourhood, the inimitable Sam Maule invited a plethora of fintech experts over for dinner. Across two evenings in the run up to our After Dark San Francisco show, Sam serves up chilli, tacos, and foodie fintech insights. You can listen to them here and here. Disclaimer: The food was actually cooked by Ollie Judge, Head of Media at 11:FS.

At 11:FS, we spend a lot of time looking at next-generation mobile trends and technology. Every now and again we come across a product or feature that just blows us away. It can be as simple as a smart integration with another product or as complicated as a whole app that’s powered by bleeding edge technology.

“Thank you to the Academy…” Sure. Classic Oscar speech energy.But do you know what hits harder than a polite golf clap from a panel of judges? Winning when your actual customers vote. And that’s what happened at the 2025 British Bank Awards, where 11:FS was named Consultancy of the Year. Again! 2019. 2020. 2021. 2023. And now 2025.

In her latest column for Forbes, 11:FS Head of Research Sarah Kocianski examines the new set of authentication procedures and how they are being implemented by UK banks.

11:FS are pleased to announce that Lisa Gansky joined us as a Non-Executive Director, on 3rd July 2017.

As a designer, it’s an all too familiar scenario: you’re about to undertake work on an exciting new digital product or service. It has the potential to have it all, only for you to be handed what all product designers dread - the existing constraints of a rigid and outdated brand playbook. It can certainly feel like a crushing blow. But approached in the correct manner, these constraints can be transformed into an opportunity to take both the product and the brand to the next level.

Digital Banking is only 1% Finished. That’s our motto at 11:FS. You can see it plastered across everything we do, we talk about it at events, and it’s in all of our client work. Taking a paper statement to the telephone, to a website and then a mobile app isn’t where digital banking ends; it’s where it begins. Digital Banking having 99% to go is a statement of optimism, of opportunity and its how you differentiate, as consumer expectations will only grow in the coming years.

On 1st August at approximately 12:20 UTC, the cryptocurrency known as Bitcoin formally began a process to fork – or split into two- creating Bitcoin Cash, a new currency. It is unclear exactly what the implications of this will be in the long term but here’s a summary of what we know so far:

It’s about trust. Why do banks insist on having everything? Because they think if they only insist on some, they’ll never get the rest.

Fintech is technology used in the financial services industry, insurtech is technology used in a subset of that industry, insurance. And yet while one is typically considered fascinating, worthy of pages of mainstream media coverage, mention of the other is often greeted with eye-rolling outside of specialist circles.

Sam Maule joins 11:FS as Managing Partner, Americas

This week I had the super-smart Mariano Belinky tell me that the current crop of challenger banks are really just ‘better mousetraps’.

A few weeks ago, I outlined the problems with the financial products that supposedly address small and medium sized businesses’ (SMBs) needs, and how they are chronically underserved by incumbent financial institutions (FIs) across all sectors. Since then, we’ve explored how things are changing in the SMB insurance space and delved into the developments in the areas of bank account opening, payments and loans in our podcasts. I’ve also been busy trying to discover, articulate and demonstrate what “best in class” in this industry looks like in my latest research report.

At 11:FS we like to say that digital banking is 1% finished, well the same is true of Open Banking. The unknown potential of the regulation far outstrips what is being done right now. And that potential has caught the imagination of foreign regulators.

Dave Bruno, Co-Founder at YNOME and Head of WM Innovation at UBS, explains how digital can scale wealth management for everyone.

Ross Gallagher and Sarah Kocianski are joined by some great guests to talk about some of the most interesting stories of the last 7 days, including: RBS preps for coronavirus impacts, Standard Chartered detail virtual bank, and Starling joins Team GB!

Sarah Kocianski hosts today and is joined by some wonderful women in fintech to talk about gender, diversity and inclusivity in financial services. Guests on today's show are: Charlotte Crosswell - CEO at Innovate Finance, Wincie Wong - Head of Rose Review Implementation at Natwest, and Evelina Vrabie - CTO at Toucan.

We. Are. Here. Today we bring you: The US’ first regulated crypto bank, Shopify joins Libra and Sweden tests its e-krona. Simon Taylor hosts and is joined by Matthew Pollard, founder of Archax and Helen Disney, founder of Unblocked. All this and much more on today's Blockchain Insider!

Host Will White is stateside this week and he's joined by some great guests to talk about some of the most interesting stories of the last 7 days, including: Intuit to purchase Credit Karma in landmark deal, JPMorgan wants to build a digital bank in the UK, A hole in the wall is now a tourist hotspot!

Simon Taylor and Adam Davis are joined by some great guests to talk about big banks' earnings. Guests on today's show are Sharon Kimathi, Editor at Fintech Futures and Lianna Brinded, Head of Yahoo Finance UK.

David Brear and Sam Maule are joined by some great guests to talk about some of the most interesting stories of the last 7 days, including: JPMorgan sets data deadline for fintechs, Marcus proves popular in new poll, and celebs invest in immigrant credit company.

Jason Bates is joined by TransferWise CEO, Taavet Hinrikus and GoCardless CEO, Hiroki Takeuchi to talk about their new partnership and the future of cross-border payments.

We. Are. Here. Today we bring you: DeFi protocol hit by hackers, JP Morgan’s Quorum looks to merge with ConsenSys, and multiples M&A moves in the crypto world. Today's guests include: Ed Cooper - Revolut, Michael Coletta - London Stock Exchange Group, Rhain Lewis - London Womon in Bitcoin, and Aman Kohli - DXC. All this and much more on today's Blockchain Insider!

In a Valentine's Day and episode 400 special, hosts Leda Glyptis, David Brear and Jason Bates get together to talk about the things they love most about this industry and their favourite fintech partnerships. Later in the show, they're joined by some friends of the podcast who also share some of theirs!

Nigel Walsh is joined by a panel of guests to talk through how insurance is evolving and changing in our modern world. All this and much much more on today's Insurtech Insider!

Leda Glyptis and David Brear are joined by some great guests to talk about some of the most interesting stories of the last 7 days, including: Could Goldman Sachs and Amazon join forces on small business lending?, two more payments giants are consolidating, and banker busted for allegedly filching food.

Leda Glyptis and David Brear are joined by some great guests to talk about some of the most interesting stories of the last 7 days, including: Could Goldman Sachs and Amazon join forces on small business lending?, two more payments giants are consolidating, and banker busted for allegedly filching food.

We. Are. Here. Today we bring you: will banks bet big on central bank digital currencies?, more execs leave Swiss stock exchange SDX, and Ripple eyes IPO. Simon Taylor hosts and is joined by Eric Van der Kleij, CEO of Frontier Network and Andrew Smith, CTO at RTGS.All this and much more on today's Blockchain Insider!

Sarah Kocianski is joined by some great guests to discuss the first 2 years of Open Banking in the UK - what's worked, what hasn't and how many more opportunities and innovations are yet to come.

David Brear and Sarah Kocianski are joined by some great guests to talk about some of the most interesting stories of the last 7 days, including: Open Banking passes a million customers on its second anniversary, shakeups at RBS as Bo exec to step down, and BlackRock to shift away from fossil fuel investments.
Ever wanted to know what’s going on behind the scenes every time we make a payment?
Regulation is essential. It stops banks from going bust or behaving badly.
The invention of the computer revolutionised banking in the 1950s.
Lending has been around for thousands of years and is one of the cornerstones of banking.
They're down, but they're not certainly not out.
Mastercard and Visa are the two biggest credit card networks in the world.
We kick off our Decoding: Banks series with a look at the banking landscape today and how we got here.

David M. Brear, our 11:FS CEO, takes us through legacy technology within banks - but of course, with a really cool Lightboard.

Fintech Marketing Podcast Season 2: Coming soon

The UK banking battlefield has never been more competitive. Customers expectfinancial apps that are personalised, seamless, and that genuinely make a differenc...


The UK banking battlefield has never been more competitive. Customers expectfinancial apps that are personalised, seamless, and that genuinely make a differenc...

