The Women in Fintech Summit is being held today

Women in financial technology (Fintech) must develop relevant and desirable innovations if they are to succeed in competing in a sector dominated by men.

Shamirah Kimbugwe, founder and CEO of Pivot Payments, speaking at the ongoing 2022 Women in Fintech Hackathon, which is expected to conclude today with a summit in Kampala, said women in Fintech need to improve their skills development to overcome the gender imbalance that continues to dominate the financial technology area.

“There are very few of us in this business. You can count us in. We may be less than 10. But times have changed, the issue is no longer about your gender, it’s about what you bring to the table and how competent you are. If you compare, technology is more open for women to exercise our expertise,” she said, noting that as Fintech continues to grow, female innovators need to equip themselves with a range of knowledge that will give them an edge over men.

Women, she said, must come up with innovative home-grown solutions to modern social and economic problems, which will allow rapid automation and delivery of financial services, which is a key factor in the growth of Uganda.

The Women in Fintech Hackathon, now in its third year, started on September 10 and will conclude with a summit on Friday, where outstanding innovators from 20 teams will be rewarded. The 20 were selected from 50 entries.

The Hackathon, which is an initiative of HiPipo, seeks to close the gender gap in access to technology, skills and use of digital financial services, as well as give female innovators and students an opportunity to use digital financial technology to explore business concepts.

“Our ultimate goal is to help achieve a level playing field by guiding the African continent to fully maximize its digital benefits and potential, with all populations equitably participating in the use, exploitation, diffusion, innovation and adoption of secure digital financial services to improve lives, said Innocent Kawooya, CEO of HiPipo.

Since September 10, participants from all over the country have received training and met mentors and trainers in Fintech to equip them with basic knowledge that can improve their products.

The winning team of female innovators, expected to be announced today, will be awarded a $10,000 cash prize to fund their innovations.

Karen Byanjira, 21, one of the participants from the Sueno team, said her team had developed a platform to help low-income earners access utilities such as water and electricity on credit.
“We’ve learned a lot about how to brand and present our products to customers and potential investors. We’ve focused on how to develop something that the market actually wants. For the time I’ve been here, I’ve also learned to connect our ideas along with larger companies,” she said.

Bridget Akankunda, 27, whose team is involved in innovating an e-commerce platform for beauty products, said the hackathon had helped her team of three understand how to take their product from being an innovation to the next level.

“It’s been fun, I didn’t know much about product development, branding and marketing and it’s changed my whole perspective. We have been able to rebrand the product and it is stronger than it was before we arrived, she said.