UK FinTech startup The Oak has announced it has closed its first round at $300k. The Oak will release a public beta soon to improve people’s relationship with their finances.
The Oak is a financial wellness coach, it studies your banking data and through machine learning and artificial intelligence technology can answer a vast array of questions to help the customers. From the simple everyday ones (ex: have I paid the council tax?) to the most complex ones (ex: what expenses can I reduce to achieve my saving target in 5 months time?). The key to The Oak’s solution is a conversational user interfaces that uses Natural Language Processing and Artificial Intelligence techniques to interpret the text or voice of a customer to understand what he or she is asking and answering this correctly by virtue of the users data.
The initial spark came from the heart of finance, as Niall Bellabarba – a tech entrepreneur with a finance background with BlackRock – Aladdin Product Group – explained: “Working with powerful technology within BlackRock Aladdin Team made apparent there would be a huge new opportunity in the rise of artificial intelligence and bots applied to the masses in helping them with their day to day issues. Now is the time for Private Banking to become artificially intelligent and available to all.”
Peter Best, a City Senior MD with decades of financial expertise, says: “FinTech Bots are an exciting and busy space with big boy players like Facebook & Apple deploying resources. What impressed me about The Oak is the team’s determination, cohesion and expertise. I think these guys can outperform the financial incumbents and have an edge on the technology giants because The Oak is focusing on a narrower problem. What The Oak is building will be interesting in 3-5 years time to both incumbents or technology giants.”
The Oak is about to release an alpha version to its closest partners with a public beta being
expected a couple months after that. For early bird access, click here.
