How we built the RFI Global Virtual Innovation Hub (GVI Hub)

We began working on the GVI Hub with support of HSBC Middle East Ltd. before the COVID-19 pandemic to further our belief that technology had an important role to play in the development of responsible finance. 

The RFI Foundation had run over three years (2017 - 2019) a Support Disruption for Good Challenge that identified applications of FinTech in service of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).  The learning experience from the SDG Challenge was that the focus of the FinTech field was often times completely different than the financial institutions we generally had engaged with. 

FinTechs often pursued specific impactful outcomes from their products, but did not usually have the capacity to analyze the ESG risks of their own business models.  Financial institutions, facing advocacy from investors and other stakeholders, were trying to embed ESG into their operations but struggling with the realities of implementing the changes. 

The GVI Hub’s objective was to tackle that more directly with involvement of financial sector stakeholders, both from the FinTech ecosystem as well as more broadly.  But even the best laid plans couldn’t avoid the rethink forced by the onset of the global pandemic in 2020, and we had to do a full rethink of what would be possible within the constraints brought on by the spread of COVID-19 around the world. 

The power of resilience and collaboration

Facing a novel challenge, RFI looked inside and out for the best ideas including from our Emissary Network which had formed organically during the few years prior to the pandemic.  The members of the Emissary Network provided input including proposing the formation of the Emissary Leadership Group who started meeting together with RFI staff and board members to come up with a solution that could be achieved with virtual delivery along two tracks which became the Responsible Finance FinTech Program and the Open Innovation Calls.  

The GVI Hub’s program has evolved based on feedback from participants starting with the pilot cohort in 2021 and continuing across 6 cohorts through the end of 2023. In parallel to the RFTP which aims to prepare FinTechs to adopt responsible finance and understand their own ESG risks and the impact they create as financial enablers, during 2022, we held the Net Zero Challenge, which was the first Open Innovation Call.  The Net Zero Challenge provided visibility and connections that continue to benefit the participating FinTechs looking to build or expand their engagement with financial sector stakeholders across the MENAT region.