FinTech Innovation Hub

The FinTech Innovation Hub on the University of Delaware’s Science, Technology and Advanced Research (STAR) Campus is a nexus for high-quality education, groundbreaking research and workforce development in the exciting field of financial technology. It serves as a national center of excellence that leverages the region’s expertise and assets to address broad challenges in financial health.

Created through a partnership with Delaware Technology Park and Discover Bank, and with state and federal funding, the FinTech Innovation Hub brings together unique strengths and resources to create the tools to help individuals and families build wealth and fair access to credit, to support entrepreneurs and to continue growing the robust financial-services sector and small business community. UD students benefit through experiential learning, research and engagement opportunities, preparing them to lead and succeed in this high-demand industry.

The FinTech Innovation Hub also plays a key role in economic development in Delaware. Since the 1980s, Delaware has been a global leader in banking and financial services, which account for 9% of the state’s jobs. The Hub’s assets and its prime location in the mid-Atlantic technology corridor help Delaware secure and expand its central role in these sectors, while also attracting greater investment from out-of-state firms.

FinTech at the University of Delaware

“The FinTech Innovation Hub adds another gem to UD’s STAR Campus, where collaborative hubs in health and life sciences already are thriving and strengthening the economy of the whole region. The research and innovation at this new hub will expand Delaware’s legacy of national leadership in financial services, drawing on UD’s top-shelf expertise in finance and technology. It also opens new space for education, giving our students access to a highly collaborative ecosystem and preparing them for great jobs and future success. And it puts UD and the state at the forefront of promoting equity in financial services and health — two serious problems facing our world.” — UD President Dennis Assanis

Read about UD’s vision for fintech innovation >

Nektarios Tsoutsos (left) of the University of Delaware’s College of Engineering and Gang Wang of the Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics have been named new co-directors of UD’s endeavors in financial technology.

Meet the Co-Directors

The University of Delaware’s burgeoning endeavors in financial technology — fintech, for short — will have new leadership, effective September 1.

Nektarios Tsoutsos, an expert in cybersecurity in the College of Engineering, and Gang Wang, an expert in adoption of digital technologies and their societal impact in the Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics, will direct UD’s fintech ecosystem, taking over for colleagues who set the table last year — Prof. Carlos Asarta of Lerner and Prof. Rudolf Eigenmann of the College of Engineering.

FinTech and Financial Institutions Research Conference

The insightful findings and analyses shared by industry experts at the inaugural conference in April 2024 are accessible below. This event was jointly planned and sponsored by the University of Delaware and the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia. Information about future conferences will be shared here when it is available.

2024 CONFERENCE materials

Papers Presented

FINTECH AND FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS RESEARCH CONFERENCE

Session 1: Chair - Jack Bao

Algorithmic Underwriting in High Risk Mortgage Markets by Janet Gao, Hanyi Livia Yi and David Zhang *Best Paper Award Recipients*

Discussant: Matthew C. Plosser

Mobile Internet, Digital Collateral, and Banking by Angelo D’Andrea, Patrick Hitayezu, Roland K Kpodar, Nicola Limodio, and Andrea Presbitero Discussant: Apoorv Gupta

Session 2: Chair - Daniel Sanches

A Theory of Speculation in Community Assets by Kevin Mei and Michael Sockin

Discussant: Ariel Zetlin-Jones

Reaching for Yield in Decentralized Financial Markets by Patrick Augustin, Roy Chen-Zhang, and Donghwa Shin

Discussant: Shimon Kogan

Keynote: Manju Puri

Session 3: Chair - Phil Strahan

Old Program, New Banks: Online Banks in Small Business Lending by Elizabeth Bickmore, Andrew MacKinlay, and Yessenia Tellez

Discussant: John Hackney

Bank Branch Density and Bank Runs by Efraim Benmelech, Jun Yang, and Michal Zator

Discussant: Jinyuan Zhang

Session 4: Chair - David Yermack

Digital Veblen Goods by Sebeom Oh, Samuel Rosen, and Anthony Zhang

Discussant: Joseph Abadi

Artificial Intelligence and Customer Acquisition in Retail Financial Services: Experimental Evidence from Insurance Distribution by Xing Liu Discussant: Lindsey Raymond

Keynote Speaker

2024 KEYNOTE SPEAKER - MANJU PURI

We are pleased to announce that our keynote speaker will be Manju Puri, J. B. Fuqua Professor of Finance at the Fuqua School of Business, Duke University.

Professor Puri has expertise in the field of empirical corporate finance and, in particular, financial intermediation. Her published work spans the areas of commercial banks, investment banks, venture capital, entrepreneurship, behavioral finance, and FinTech. Her research has appeared in publications such as American Economic Review, Journal of Finance, Journal of Financial Economics, and Review of Financial Studies. She has been the recipient of the Sloan Research Fellowship as well as multiple awards from the National Science Foundation. Her publication record includes over 30 refereed papers in the top finance and economic journals. Her research has won many awards including four best paper awards at the FMA Annual Meetings, two Western Finance Association best paper awards, an All-Star award from Journal of Financial Economics, the Brennan best paper award at the Review of Financial Studies, and three Fama-DFA /Jenson best paper awards in the Journal of Financial Economics.

More About Professor Puri

Organizers and Program Committee

Organizers

Michael Gelman, University of Delaware
Paul Laux, University of Delaware
Vitaly Meursault, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia

Program Committee

Joseph Abadi, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
Jack Bao, University of Delaware
Isil Erel, The Ohio State University
Xiao Fang, University of Delaware
Laura Field, University of Delaware
Paul Goldsmith-Pinkham, Yale University
Itay Goldstein, University of Pennsylvania
Deeksha Gupta, Johns Hopkins University
Wenli Li, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
Marina Niessner, Indiana University
Raluca Roman, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
Alberto Rossi, Georgetown University
Philip Strahan, Boston College
James Vickery, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia
Gloria Yang Yu, Singapore Management University

Events

Lunch & Learn Series

The Lunch & Learn events bring together FinTech corporations and the University of Delaware's faculty and staff to discuss collaborative opportunities. The typical format includes two short presentations, about a FinTech activity and a UD academic activity (e.g., research or educational efforts), respectively, followed by an open discussion.

The FinTech Innovation Hub on UD’s Science, Technology and Advanced Research (STAR) Campus is a nexus for high-quality education, groundbreaking research and workforce development in the exciting field of financial technology.

For questions, please contact Nektarios Tsoutsos (tsousos@udel.edu) and Gang Wang (gangw@udel.edu).

Upcoming:

Time: Wednesday, October 23, 11:30 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.

Venue: 301 Innovation Gallery, FinTech Innovation Hub

591 Collaboration Way, Newark, DE 19713

Agenda:

11:30 Lunch will be provided

11:50 Introductions (all participants)

12:00 Pedro Moore, Director of GrowthStage Incubator, Delaware Technology Park

12:25 Leting Zhang, Assistant Professor of MIS, University of Delaware

12:50 Open Discussion

Please register here by October 14 (registration is free)

Previously:

May 24, 2024: DelawareBio (Michael Fleming), Health Risk Analytics (Prof. Jiaheng Xie) and FinTech's Exponential Impact Potential with Special Student Groups (Prof. Amanda Bullough)

May 8, 2024: DelTechpark/Growthstage (Pedro Moore), Creating Fintech Startups (Andrew Novocin)

April 10, 2024: CollegeAve (Joe DePaulo) and UD Center for Economic Education and Entrepreneurship, CEEE (Carlos Asarta)

Mar. 13, 2024: Tech Impact and Impact of Technologies (Prof. Gang Wang)

Feb. 28, 2024: The Kendal Corporation and UD Center for Cybersecurity, Assurance and Privacy

Feb. 14, 2024: Using the FinTech Innovation Hub to advance financial technology and wellness in Delaware.

To receive updates on the FinTech Lunch & Learn events, please join the fintech-ud@udel.edu mailing list by contacting nglittle@udel.edu.

2024 Fintech Technology Workshop

Held in May 2024, the workshop brought together researchers, practitioners and industry experts to discuss the latest advancements, challenges and opportunities in the fintech space. Presenters included representatives of the International Monetary Fund, the U.S. Treasury and multiple higher education institutions. The event, which drew 60 participants, was sponsored by Discover Bank and Aramark.

News

Ribbon-cutting ceremony marks UD’s entry to new FinTech Innovation Hub

Open for business, research, innovation and training

Nektarios Georgios Tsoutsos, an assistant professor in UD’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, is collaborating with IDEMA to create secure mobile ID applications and improve access to digital financial services.

Encouraging equity in FinTech

The Data Science Symposium provided attendees the opportunity to network and engage with peers.

The power of data

ABOUT THE FINTECH INNOVATION HUB FACILITY

Located on the University of Delaware’s Science, Technology and Advanced Research (STAR) Campus, the FinTech Innovation Hub enables ground-breaking research and cross-disciplinary collaborations. It provides space, resources and technical assistance to early-stage financial and business software entrepreneurs and startup companies.

RESOURCES

Aeriel photo of University of Delaware's STAR Campus

Spaces for startups to develop and grow, managed by Delaware Technology Park, with onsite access to business development resources and technical assistance

Labs and centers associated within UD’s College of Engineering and Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics focused on financial analytics and literacy, cybersecurity, human-machine learning and data analysis

Presenter explains research at a data sciences conference

The Data Innovation Lab, a division of Tech Impact, which will convene policymakers, entrepreneurs, corporate innovators and community advocates, including through a year-long, full-time fellowship program

Tenant Organizations

UD-Affiliated

Artificial Intelligence Center of Excellence

Facilitates teams of AI partners within and outside UD to collaboratively apply technological solutions and create impactful and beneficial AI projects.

Learn More

Career Center Advisor and Community Outreach

One-on-one hoteling space for career advisors and community outreach professionals to facilitate conversations among students, business leaders, entrepreneurs, research scientists and engineers, yielding a team-based mentoring approach that is a critical component of workforce development and community engagement.

Center for Data-intensive and Computational Science

Advances the research frontiers and the underlying infrastructure at the nexus of computational and data science, enabled by high-performance computing and big data.

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Center for Economic Education and Entrepreneurship

Provides more than 2,000 teachers annually with high quality, grade-appropriate professional development and peer-networking opportunities to empower them to deliver the practical skills students need to graduate as economically literate and flourishing citizens.

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Computational Research and Programming Lab

Explores programming models and their usage to parallelize and accelerate scientific applications on large scale supercomputers.

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Horn Entrepreneurship

Empowers aspiring innovators as they pursue new ideas for a better world. Committed to supporting student success and cultivating a lifelong community of collaboration, connections and impact through venture development, and academic programs, certificates and the Innovation Fellows program.

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Office of Economic Innovation and Partnership

Facilitates the economic impact of UD’s research commercialization for the benefit of the public and the state. The Office includes the Technology Transfer Office (TTO), the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) and the APEX Accelerator Delaware.

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Partners

CAFÉ (Center for Accelerating Financial Equity)

Advancing financial health and wellness for low- to moderate-income populations and other underserved communities by supporting and scaling real-world technology solutions.

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Delaware BioScience Association

Serves diverse life-science sectors with the goal of expanding the state’s vibrant science-based economy. Delaware Bio’s 130-plus member companies and organizations represent 8,000 innovation-based jobs vital to Delaware’s economic future.

Learn More

Discover Bank

The largest consumer-only bank in the U.S. and a leading fintech employer in Delaware, Discover Bank has established a $36 million venture fund and has deployed $40 million in Community Reinvestment Act funds to develop the FinTech Innovation Hub.

Learn More

Innovative Precision Health

The first healthcare analytics company to deliver multi-dimensional and patient performance data and comparative efficacy metrics to optimize the continuum of care.

Learn More

Kendal Corporation

A leading national not-for-profit organization of communities, programs and services that advocate for and empower older adults to achieve their full potential with a focus on financial literacy, equity and digital security. Kendal has located its national HQ to STAR Campus and has a university-collaboration model that drives innovation.

Learn More

CONTACT

To stay updated on activities and opportunities for participation:

Nektarios Tsoutsos, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, tsousos@udel.edu
Gang Wang, associate professor of management information systems, gangw@udel.edu

To discuss business opportunities or for other information:

Tracy Shickel, Associate Vice President of Corporate Engagement, tshickel@udel.edu, 302-513-1366

FinTech Innovation Hub

FinTech at the University of Delaware

Meet the Co-Directors

FinTech and Financial Institutions Research Conference

2024 CONFERENCE materials

Papers Presented

Keynote Speaker

2024 KEYNOTE SPEAKER - MANJU PURI

Organizers and Program Committee

Organizers

Program Committee

Events

Lunch & Learn Series

2024 Fintech Technology Workshop

News

ABOUT THE FINTECH INNOVATION HUB FACILITY

RESOURCES

Tenant Organizations

UD-Affiliated

Artificial Intelligence Center of Excellence

Career Center Advisor and Community Outreach

Center for Data-intensive and Computational Science

Center for Economic Education and Entrepreneurship

Computational Research and Programming Lab

Horn Entrepreneurship

Office of Economic Innovation and Partnership

Partners

CAFÉ (Center for Accelerating Financial Equity)

Delaware BioScience Association

Discover Bank

Innovative Precision Health

Kendal Corporation

RAAD360

Tech Impact

The Grain Exchange

CONTACT

To stay updated on activities and opportunities for participation:

To discuss business opportunities or for other information: