Driving the Female Economy

This hackathon is open to fintechs in early to mid-stage development, including seed stage, raising/raised funds, or in the process of scaling.

Women represent a huge business opportunity worth trillions of dollars--that has been largely underserved or unserved by the traditional financial sector. Through this e-hackathon, you can chart a path to becoming a chosen brand for female customers. Additionally, you'll have the opportunity to pitch to high-level executives at established brands including Mastercard and other major finserv institutions, network with industry leaders.
Winning team will get US$ 25,000 cash prize, 6-months Free subscription in APIX platform and up to USD 25,000 credits on AWS.
Three winners will automatically enter the finals for Mastercard’s award winning Start Path program, plus the opportunity to connect with Mastercard experts for a dedicated mentoring session. Mastercard helps fintechs rise to the next level by connecting them to future technology partners, end-to-end solutions and countless ways to innovate anywhere. Part of Mastercard Accelerate, Start Path invites later stage startups to participate in a 6-month program, providing unprecedented opportunities to scale. More than 230 companies have participated in the program; these companies have gone on to raise $2.7B in capital after the program.
Top three winning teams will become a member of the Financial Alliance for Women for a full year, enabling access to a network of global financial services providers, mentoring and peer learning opportunities, and to the Alliance's proprietary tools and knowledge products to develop their women's market proposition.

A Wealth of Opportunities. Women represent a huge market opportunity and growing purchasing power, led by trends toward gender parity in education, entrepreneurship, and wealth. 40% of global health is held by women. By 2030, American women are expected to control much of the $30 trillion in financial assets that baby boomers will possess—a potential wealth transfer of such magnitude that it approaches the annual GDP of the United States. In the US, women make 80% of household buying decision about where to bank; and yet they are greatly underserved by and highly dissatisfied with the financial services sector. They need propositions that they can trust to solve their needs at all stages of life. Brands that can meet this unmet need this will have a strong competitive advantage moving forward.

A Lingering Gap. While overall financial inclusion has increased markedly over the past decades, the global gender gap in account ownership has stayed at roughly 7% since the early 2000s. Digitizing payments, lowering eKYC, increasing digital adoption, make products more compelling with gamification, connecting women to their communities, expanding their networks, and building in financial education are all potential solutions with the promise to finally close this stubborn gap. Driving that change is both a financial and ethical imperative.

Yes, your team can submit one proposal per subcategory of the problem statement and can submit up to 3 proposals per company. The Alliance will allocate the selected team one subcategory of a problem statement from the team’s [three] preferred choices. Incomplete Entries may be disqualified.

Teams Selection:
An independent selection committee will assess fintech proposals based on the following criteria: registration status, growth potential, minimum viable product (MVP) or product on the market, and the ability to impact women's access to financial services. Selected fintechs will be invited to take part in the Hackathon from september 26 till september 30.

Fintechs will develop tech solutions through their integration, testing and coding at the APIX sand box. Solutions can be targeted to women-only, or they can be women-friendly--displaying an understanding of women/s unique needs while still catering to a wider market.

Selected teams will take part in dedicated workshops to better understand the women's market proposition and the opportunity behind the female economy. In addition, to business and technical workshops. Participating teams will receive as well guidance, expert advice, and full sandbox access on the APIX platform.

Teams have full ownership of everything they build at the hackathon and are free to do with it what they wish.

As part of the pitch, Shortlisted teams will demo your hack in front of the jury panel. Then you will deliver a brief (3 minutes) presentation followed by Q&A. Your presentation must state the problem and research behind it, the proposed solution, the go to market strategy and the relevance to the female economy covering the judging criteria.