Fireside Chat with Antony Jenkins CBE Founder, Chair & CEO of 10x Banking

As Founder, Chair & CEO, Antony leads the company in its mission to be the global bank operating system of choice. Before creating 10x Banking, Antony served as Group CEO of Barclays plc for three years. Antony will be the guest speaker for our first E2E Grand Reception for this year on the 8th of June, alongside Nicolas Cary, Co-Founder and Vice-Chairman of Blockchain.com.

Antony is committed to driving the digital economy beyond the boundaries of 10x; he serves as Group Chairman of Currencies Direct, the leading UK non-bank provider of foreign exchange and international payment services.

He is a board member of Blockchain, the world’s leading software platform for digital assets and a Board Director for US mortgage lending giant Fannie Mae. Antony is also an external member of the Prudential Regulation Committee.

Additionally, Antony is committed to advancing digital education and skills in the workforce; his dedication to the advancement of learning is recognised in his role at the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education, which he led as Chair through to the summer of 2021.

Antony was awarded a CBE for services to business in the Queen’s Birthday Honours in June 2021.

Q: Was it challenging to transit from an institutional career to a founder of a cloud-native banking platform?

It was precisely my time working for large multinational financial institutions that led me to the idea behind 10X Future Technologies. I realised that despite banking being an essential part of everyday life, for most people, dealing with finances is usually boring or worse intimidating. When I launched 10x in 2016, there were two questions that I wanted to answer.

One – why don’t banks work better for their customers? And two – why hasn’t technology created true transformation in the financial services industry?

As a business, we have applied our deep financial industry expertise and cloud-native technology understanding to provide a platform that is fully fit for our purpose. This in turn has enabled us to secure $187 million Series C funding, and our purpose-built operating system is now being used by leading global financial institutions, including JPMorgan Chase and Westpac.

Q: In such a competitive market, what do you think differentiates businesses from one another?

It’s ultimately about service.

I started this company to make banking ten times better – for banks, their customers, and society. In practice, that means every product we develop or partnership we pursue is geared towards improving people’s lives by making it easier, faster, cheaper, and simply better to engage with their finances.

We’ve seen how traditional banking has suffered over the past years – often dragged down by legacy technology that slows employees and frustrates customers.

Nowadays, customers are increasingly fluent in direct interactions – no intermediaries and no unnecessary steps. They want seamless financial options. And that’s what we at 10X have set out to provide.

Q: Do you think we are ready for a complete digital transformation in how we handle and transact money?

Absolutely!

Just recently, Deloitte published a report noting that 93% of financial organisations are either adopting or considering the cloud. Equally, capturing data and using machine learning opens a universe of opportunities.

Shifting to processes that involve people working symbiotically with data-fuelled, predictive algorithms, banks can develop hyper-personalised products for customers in real-time. Banks and Insurance companies, for example, can make far more detailed credit assessments, slashing their risk.

Secondly, the traditional banks that see the opportunity to pursue a radically different business model and that have the leadership and vision to go after it can create a real competitive advantage.

Q: How would you describe success for 10x Banking?

Our goal is simple: to make 10X the go-to platform for all financial institutions—driving banks from monolithic legacy to transformational next-generation. I want to embed a culture and way of working that consistently delivers the right outcomes, in the right way, for all our stakeholders.

Q: What’s one thing you’ve experienced in your career and would never do as a founder?

If you look inside a bank, it’s like a museum of technology: the mainframes, and servers of every type and size can be found inside. And for the large part, big banks are in denial about the threat posed by fintech upstarts—and that the only genuine solution is to start over with better technology.

Google wasn’t the first search engine. Facebook wasn’t the first social media company. But they found a better way to solve the problem than the first-generation companies.

I’ve seen how complacency obstructs innovation and at 10X we strive to launch and change innovative financial products in minutes, instantly responding to the needs of both the client and the market.

Q: What’s the future of money, and how do founders need to prepare to facilitate better transactions with their customers?

It’s an exciting time for the creation of new economic models. For example, the latest technologies enable customers to transact with merchants directly for the financing of purchase as well as the purchase itself.

Traditional banks no longer have a monopoly but clients are still benefiting from fully regulated and overseen products.

Also, new technologies like the cloud, for example, provide access to a modern, low-cost, and highly scalable architecture. And within the cloud itself, there is a suite of tools that mean you don’t need to buy or build and are instantly at your disposal.

As a result, it massively lowers the barrier to entry, which is why many startups have been able to achieve so much and develop highly sophisticated offerings with relatively few resources.

Ultimately for the banks and fintech that can leverage these changes, there is a real opportunity to serve their customers 10x better.

Join our Grand Reception in Partnership with IWG Plc on the 8th of June at 18:30 to delve into fintech and cloud banking. Antony Jenkins CBE will share a panel with the exceptional Nicolas Cary, Co-Founder and Vice-Chairman of Blockchain.com.

The reception will be hosted at Spaces – London, Liverpool Street Station, New Broad Street House, 35 New Broad St, EC2M 1NH.