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Octopus Investments aims to bring FinTech into the mainstream with new accelerator

London-based investment firm Octopus Investments is launching a new FinTech-focused accelerator that is to capitalise on the growing clamour for technological innovations in financial services.

The new Octopus Labs accelerator, which will be based out of Central London, will support and mentor product-ready FinTech startups, with the potential for further investment or a ‘spin-in’ from Octopus for successful cohort businesses.

Applications are now open for its inaugural 12-week accelerator programme which is to begin in October, which will provide what is described as ‘top level mentoring’ as well as access to the investment firm’s long list of distribution channels, investors and advisers.

While the investment firm is keen to stress that the Labs are a separate venture to the investment group, the ability for startups to take advantage of Octopus Investment’s extensive industry connections, borne from over 16 years of investing in the likes of Graze and LoveFilm, will be a major drawn for financial tech startups.

Richard Wazacz, who will head up Octopus Labs, commented: “Octopus Labs takes the existing strengths of our business – our established customer base, distribution channels, skills and expertise – and adds a start-up dimension. The result is a powerful new force that will quickly develop new products and services to form part of the Octopus stable.”

Octopus Labs will also be a testing and development bed for its own FinTech developments, with the firm expanding its remit to include in-house developments that it will look to take to market.

The firm said it already has a number of self-build projects in development and earlier this year launched the first fruits of its efforts in the form the Octopus Choice P2P lending platform.

Expanding further on the group’s vision for the new programme, Richard added: “Our accelerator is a great example of the ambitions we have as a business unit. We want to take existing innovations and ready them for our mainstream audience of advisers and retail investors.

We’re excited to start receiving applications – and even more excited to start supporting our selected teams on their growth journey.“

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