It’s no secret that most student unions and societies could do with more funding to finance their “educational activities”. But is solving this issue a viable path to building a unicorn?

The Republic of Ireland has created a brand new trade association for fintech and payment companies, as the nation looks to establish itself as a leading hub for the financial services sector.

Emergent Payments, a secure transactions firm that helps international merchants, has partnered with Optimal Payments, an online solutions provider, in order to expand its global reach and help merchants accept a greater amount of payments.

The majority of British people expect traditional bank branches to survive the onslaught of digital innovation and remain in use in 2025. However, the caveat to that is that a certain standard of service is expected from the bank branches of the future.

“The increasing preference for digital shopping over the traditional in-store experience means we are spending £9.7 billion a year through mobile payments. By 2024, this number will grow to more than £50 billion,” says Niklas Adalberth, co-founder of Klarna. He stresses these sort of figures mean retailers can’t afford to ignore the rise of mobile payments.

Over 180 million journeys have been made using contactless payments on London’s transport network in the first year since its launch, Transport for London has announced.