Egypt's central bank celebrates winners of “FinYology – FinTech for Youth” Initiative

CAIRO - 29 March 2021: FinTech Egypt –an affiliate of the Central Bank of Egypt- organized a virtual closing ceremony to celebrate the awarded university students participating in the “FinYology - FinTech for Youth” initiative.

The initiative was launched in February 2020, with the objective of fostering young talents and inspire university students of different related majors to conduct FinTech Projects and innovative solutions, as part of their curricula’s graded courses, with the participation of representatives of CBE, participated banks and universities in the initiative to award winning groups from each university.

The participation of the distinguished talents was presented through the projects that meet the current demands & needs of the Egyptian banking & financial market that require digital financial solutions to Egypt’s National FinTech Problem Statements, previously gathered and published on FinTech Egypt platform along with achieving financial literacy & the promotion of financial inclusion to the underserved segments of the population.

"The initiative comes within the framework of implementing the directives of the President of the Egyptian Republic to support the youth and encourage innovation as one of the pillars to achieve the sustainable development goals of Egypt’s Vision 2030,"  Rami AbulNaga - Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Egypt stated.

AbulNaga added that the Central Bank of Egypt is aiming to endorse young talents through “FinYology-FinTech for Youth” initiative, as part of the deployed efforts of the financial technology and innovation strategy, wherein fostering the young talents is a fundamental pillar for its success and for the advancement of financial technology and financial inclusion in Egypt.

“Launching the “FinYology-FinTech for Youth” initiative stems from the ambitious aspiration of the Central Bank of Egypt that targets the future expansion of courses and academic specialization of financial technology in various universities, with the aim of keeping pace with the significant and successive evolutions witnessed within this vital industry, through fostering FinTech and innovation in the Egyptian market, and increasing the talent pipeline across the young generations to the Egyptian market, while nurturing their ideas and projects," Eng. Ayman Hussein, Sub Governor of Business Technology Sector, said.

Students from the American University in Cairo, the German University in Cairo, New Giza University, Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport in Cairo, and Nile University participated in the initiative in the majors of entrepreneurship and innovation, finance, computer science, and computer engineering during the second semester of the academic year 2019/2020 and the first semester of 2020/2021.

The initiative included a number of information sessions related to financial technology, which were held by the Central Bank in collaboration with the Egyptian Banking Institute to educate more than 600 students from the universities, who participated in the initiative, either in-class or remotely to combat the repercussions of the pandemic, 

Participating banks; the National Bank of Egypt, Banque Misr, ALEXBANK, Qatar National Bank, Export Development Bank of Egypt, Emirates NBD, and Al Ahli Bank of Kuwait-Egypt, have provided mentorship and assistance to participating students during the development of their FinTech ideas and projects while providing guidance in the possibility for their implementation, development and future expansion. The banks also provided physical and virtual summer training programs for the winning groups to develop and cultivate their expertise and skills.