Winners of Mastercard’s Lighthouse Spring 2023 programs announced

The winners of the Mastercard Lighthouse FINITIV and MASSIV spring 2023 programs have today been announced during Mastercard Lighthouse’s Showcase event and the award ceremony at Latitude59 conference in Tallinn.

Payment app startup, Cino was announced as winner of Mastercard Lighthouse FINITIV, and Swedish product traceability company, TrusTrace, was awarded as winner of Mastercard Lighthouse MASSIV.

As winners, Cino and TrusTrace will receive ongoing support from Mastercard and are invited to pitch for Start Path, Mastercard’s global start-up engagement program.

Mastercard Lighthouse FINITIV

Cino, a solution that makes splitting bills more convenient, was recognised on its home turf as the regional Baltic class winner, and the overall winner of the Mastercard Lighthouse FINITIV spring program.

Cino’s user-friendly interface allows users to streamline the bill-splitting process and to settle in an effortless and intuitive way. With its tap-and-split function, users can instantly split the transaction according to user-controlled settings.

Cino was selected as the overall FINITIV program winner on account of its strong traction with Mastercard banking partners, its eagerness to adapt, international ambitions and traction, clear and proven customer value and willingness and readiness to scale through partnerships.

The Mastercard Lighthouse FINITIV program runs over a three-month period, twice a year, and offers Nordic and Baltic fintech and fintech-enabler startups and early scaleups the opportunity to work with Mastercard, select Nordic banks, tech partners, program advisors and investors.

The purpose of the program is to create conditions favourable for identifying and pursuing partnership between the program participants and stakeholders, and between the participants themselves.

Three other start-ups also stood out in this spring’s FINITIV 2023 class:

• Swapin won the popular vote and received the People’s Choice award.
• Fygi Technologies was declared the winner of the Norwegian class of Mastercard Lighthouse FINITIV, Spring 2023. Their secure scan-pay-go solution turns users’ mobile phones into a payment system that enables shoppers to scan a store-specific QR code that initiates payment, and by doing so, offering a unique shopping experience.
• Uniify was declared winner of the Danish class. The solution offers a no-code customizable onboarding software for obtaining and structuring financial data on B2B and B2C end users.
  

Mats Taraldsson, Head of Innovation, Fintech and Impact Tech Engagement at Mastercard Nordics and Baltics says; “The fintech and impact-tech ecosystem across the Nordics & Baltics remains vibrant. We are very fortunate to have had the opportunity this spring to work with fifteen innovative and promising fintech and fintech-enabler companies, together with our partners and advisors in the Mastercard Lighthouse FINITIV program. We are very happy to see that Cino was appointed as the overall winner of the spring program with its innovative solution for splitting bills. Thanks to its business model tailored for international scaling and the traction they secured, Cino is ready to shift gears and meet international demand.”

“This award is very important for us, as the partners in the Mastercard Lighthouse program recognise the need to make payments social, especially for GenZ, and are offering their support to accelerate and achieve our vision. We've gained so much during the three month program; insights, partnerships, mentorship and amazing new friends," says Elena Churilova , CEO & Co-founder at Cino.

Mastercard Lighthouse MASSIV

TrusTrace, the leading supply chain software for product traceability, was awarded program winner for their innovative approach.

TrusTrace provides a digital platform for product traceability & supply chain compliance. This provides brands with visibility into supply chain data across all tiers, including raw material content, factory details, and supplier conduct reports, to meet regulatory compliance and operate responsible supply chains.

The company operates at scale in the fashion industry with 50+ apparel and footwear brands, and traces USD 2.5 billion worth of goods per month.

“We are thankful and proud to be a winner in the Mastercard Lighthouse MASSIV program among so many inspiring and impressive companies. Through Lighthouse MASSIV we have gained a lot of inspiration from fellow participants and experts, which has helped shape our ideas to accelerate our growth and impact. We now have an excellent platform to consolidate our presence in Europe and further accelerate our expansion into the US,” Shameek Ghosh, CEO and Co-Founder at TrusTrace.

4Life Solutions, which brings safe and affordable drinking water to people in low-income communities, was awarded the Impact Potential Award, for creating a real, positive, and tangible impact on the world.

“4Life Solutions' commitment to providing clean and safe drinking water to one billion people in low-income communities by 2030 exemplifies an enterprise dedicated to transforming lives on a monumental scale with a beautifully simple, technical solution. 4Life Solutions' mission, their approach and long-term perspective demonstrate a profound understanding of the challenges we face in building a sustainable future. As we are approaching the mid-point of the implementation of the 2030 Agenda, innovative solutions such as 4Life Solutions’ are needed to accelerate progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals. We hope their vision and determination will pave the way for a brighter and more equitable world where every individual can access the fundamental necessity of safe and clean water,” says Stine Kirstein Junge, Private Sector Advisor at UNDP Nordic Office.  

“Both TrusTrace and 4Life Solutions are highly impactful companies touching upon both social impact and sustainability. We are proud to have worked on the scaling journey of six impact tech start-ups this spring program. With Mastercard Lighthouse MASSIV we have the vision of helping one billion people live more prosperous and secure lives by 2025. It is important to support start-ups impacting both people and planet and contribute to achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals,” says Mats Taraldsson, Head of Innovation, Fintech and Impact Tech Engagement at Mastercard Nordics and Baltics.

The company that showed most traction with Mastercard Lighthouse’s Investor Circle and received The Investor Award, was eAgronom.

Over three months, six companies have participated in the MASSIV program, where they have attended workshops and received support from experts and advisors from Mastercard amongst others including; Swedbank, Danske Bank, UNDP, VNTRS and Synch.

Read about Mastercard Lighthouse partnership news and growth of the alumni companies in the recently published Mastercard Lighthouse research report.