UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. –– Three senior international finance students claimed first place in the inaugural Penn State FinTech App Competition sponsored by the Penn State Smeal College of Business Department of Finance and The FinTech Group, a student organization.
Banjot Kohli, from New Delhi, India; Christoforos Papakostopoulos, from Athens, Greece; and Heneel Patel, from Ahmedabad, India, and Dallas, collaborated to form the Payleo team that claimed $5,000 in scholarship money.
Claiming second place and $2,000 in scholarship money was the RothReady team, which also featured three senior finance majors: Salvatore De Sena of Newtown; Will Gordinier of Ramsey, New Jersey; and Pavle Vojinovic of Belgrade, Serbia.
Two teams tied for third and split $1,000 in scholarship money. Team One Pay Network featured three senior international students: Fatimata Diallo from Dakar, Senegal; Harshvardhan Goel from Delhi, India; and Mary Kane from Dakar, Senegal. Team Micropay team members included: senior finance major Jaiden Asch from Cicero, New York; Gabe Gamboa, a senior finance major from Laurel, New York; and junior finance and mathematics dual major Abhilash Menon from Morris Plains, New Jersey.
The competition consisted of two rounds. In the first, students presented to Stefan Lewellen, assistant professor of finance, in sections 2 and 3 of his "FIN 497: Finance and Technology" course. Lewellen selected the best 10 groups to present in front of four guest judges:
- Jeff Gido, a 1994 Penn State grad who is a partner and global head of fintech investment banking at Goldman Sachs
- Jason Barg, a 2004 Penn State graduate who is a partner at Lovell Minnick Partners
- Charley DeBow, a 2001 Penn State grad who is managing director for North America at JustPark
- Glenn Fedor, chief financial officer at Bill360
The judges selected the eventual placewinners.
“Myself, and all of the judges were so impressed by the level of preparation and knowledge of the student teams/presenters,” Gido said. “Not only did they come across as professional in their presentation itself, but we could also tell that they had spent a material amount of time researching their idea, analyzing the rationale and maybe most importantly, being able to pitch / defend their app in front of the judge panel. They had answers to even some of the tough questions the judges threw at them.”
Students created their own novel fintech application ideas and put together pitches to secure venture capital funding for their ideas.
The competition was funded through a $500,000 donation made three years ago by Jeff and Wendy Gido to endow the Jeff and Wendy Gido – Goldman Sachs Distinction in Financial Technology Fund. The gift, made possible through the Goldman Sachs Gives program, was the first gift to Penn State Smeal to support programs and initiatives that prepare students for careers in the financial technology industry.
Gido said competitions like the FinTech App Competition help prepare students for the realities of the field.
“What I see in my daily life at Goldman is the merging of traditional financial skills with enhanced technology applications. Technology has had such an impact on how most financial jobs are performed these days,” he said. “So, when Stefan and I discussed building a FinTech curriculum at Penn State Smeal we wanted to make sure it incorporated both rigorous financial analysis as well as learnings about the FinTech sector and how technology has changed the financial services value chain. And then real-world influences through guest speakers and exercises like the app competition help bring the curriculum alive.”