The establishment of our flagship degree at the University of Cape Town
Our flagship programme, the Master of Philosophy specialising in Financial Technology, continues to be the leading dedicated fintech master's programme in Africa. This degree was launched in 2018 by Professor Co-Pierre Georg due to the industry feedback that new entrants to Financial Services were ill-equipped for the quickly-evolving, increasing technical and interdisciplinary requirements in the industry.
Ultimately, this is a multidisciplinary programme aiming to equip graduates with essential skills in computer science, data science, economics and finance to empower them for entrepreneurship or impactful roles within the financial services sector. It is currently convened by Dr. Allan Davids and this programme continues to be highly selective, historically admitting 5-10% of applicants.
We offer generous bursaries to support students with their tuition and living expenses. As a rule, our bursaries have no work-back clause so that graduates can enjoy the flexibility to explore diverse career opportunities without any employment obligations post-graduation.
The Financial Innovation Hub's
In 2021, the Financial Innovation Hub was officially established as a research unit within the School of Economics at the University of Cape Town after receiving funding from Ripple’s University Blockchain Research Initiative (UBRI) and the Algorand Foundation. We were the only lead African recipient for both initiatives. In addition to administrating the MPhil in FinTech Degree, the Hub serves to drive impact in the four pillars - teaching, research, innovation and community building.
CBDCs
In 2022, we hosted our first conference which brought together representatives from various African central banks, leading academics, and representatives from industry to discuss the impact of CBDC’s and ongoing payment innovations.
National Research Foundation Grant
The South African Research Chairs Initiative (SARChI) was established in 2006 by the Department of Science and Technology (DST) and the National Research Foundation (NRF). It is designed to attract and retain excellence in research and innovation at South African public universities through the establishment of Research Chairs at public universities in South Africa with a long-term investment trajectory of up to fifteen years.
Launched our Pre-Incubator program.
Established by the Hub in 2023, the GenesisBloc Launchpad Batch I program featured four startups. These startups, stemming from the top-performing student-led ventures of FinHub Hack Series I 2023, benefit from robust support by esteemed allies like the Swiss-South Africa Blockchain bilateral collaboration and the Swiss Embassy in South Africa (SERI).
Interledger NextGen Higher Education Grant
In 2024, we were selected by the Interledger Foundation's NextGen Higher Education Grant program as their first African recipient. Our partnership with the Interledger Foundation involves developing course work with Interledger's Open Payments infrastructure and collaborating to provide opportunities for students to get hands-on experience with Interledger's open technology. We kicked off with the FinHub x Interledger bootcamp and hackathon.
The Financial Innovation Hub brings together the greatest minds on the African continent to lead in the research and innovation of financial technologies.
Meet The Team