Bahrain Fintech Bay (BFB) and the Fintech Association of Israel –Fintech Aviv (FTA) have agreed to collaborate on the development of Fintech in the region. Earlier this year, diplomatic relations between the two countries were normalized ushering a new era of cross-border innovation and partnership. The Abraham Accords Peace agreement was signed between Bahrain and Israel in September 2020.
According to a release, both parties will collaborate on joint projects, community events and facilitate communication and introduction between Fintechs and venture capital interested in expanding in both countries.
BFB claims to be one of the leading Fintech Hubs in the region. Its mission is to develop and accelerate the Fintech ecosystem in the Middle East. During the past three years, BFB has incubated over 50 Fintechs that have looked to establish their MENA headquarters in Bahrain. BFB has also partnered with over 20 global scale-ups looking to expand regionally via its unique venture acceleration platform.
BFB reports over 50 partners across governmental bodies, financial institutions, corporates, consultancy firms, universities, associations, venture capital, and fintech start-ups to bring the full spectrum of market participants together.
Fintech-Aviv was established in 2014 and serves the needs of the Israeli Fintech ecosystem, estimated at over 6,000 start-ups and 300 research and development centers. Fintech-Aviv reports a community of 30,000 members including growth stage Fintech companies, early-stage startups, global banks, insurance firms, VCs and multinational companies.
Khalid Dannish, CEO of BFB, states:
“Bahrain has taken tremendous strides towards embracing, adopting and promoting innovative technology and we are pleased to launch this partnership to further enable Bahrain’s Fintech ecosystem and open up opportunities for our respective fintechs and partners through our collaboration with Fintech Aviv. This exciting step towards cross border cooperation with the Israeli FinTech community will pave the way for future partnerships and collectively strengthen our ecosystems.”
Nir Netzer, the Chairman of Fintech-Aviv says that in this unprecedented time of new economic and political order in the Middle East, the are honoured to extend their relationship and partners network to Bahrain and to initiate this unique collaboration in order to facilitate the export of Israeli technologies to new markets.
“The Fintech-Aviv community and its 30,000+ Israeli and worldwide members, proudly hold the torch of this exciting initiative and are humbled to be leading Israeli Fintech companies towards the exploration of new horizons with our new business partners.”
