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Reading Cooperative Bank is teaming up with 12 U.S. community and regional banks to form a partnership that will explore opportunities with emerging fintech companies.
Alloy Labs Alliance is a consortium approach to innovation and technology adoption and a platform for banks to identify shared areas of opportunity, and establish smaller work groups to share best practices through implementation.
Fintech Forge will manage the alliance, and Crowe LLP, a public accounting, consulting and technology firm, will provide advice and services regarding regulatory and compliance matters.
“Community banks play a special role in the lives of our customers,” Julie Thurlow, CEO of Reading Cooperative Bank, said in a statement. “But we don’t have the same IT and innovation budgets as the big banks to capitalize on that relationship.”
“No bank wants to be the next Sears,” added Chris Nichols, chief strategy officer of CenterState Bank in Florida. “To survive, every bank needs to innovate in order to drive down operating costs while ramping up the value we can deliver to the customer.”
Along with Reading and CenterState, founders include Pennsylvania-based Citizens & Northern Bank, Oklahoma-based Citizens Bank of Edmond, Washington-based Columbia Bank, Nebraska-based First National Bank of Omaha, Louisiana-based Gulf Coast Bank & Trust Company, Illinois-based Inland Bank, Iowa-based Lincoln Savings Bank, Mercantile Bank of Michigan, Missouri-based nbkc Bank and Illinois-based QCR Holdings.
Founding members span the U.S., representing institutions ranging from $251 million to nearly $20 billion in assets.
Working collaboratively, the banks aim to work with fintech start-ups to shape their solutions. Alloy Labs says it is currently working on both customer facing applications and back office efficiencies. No specifics were released.
Alloy Labs says banks that aren’t ready to begin adopting new technology can still join the alliance to learn from others in the group, share in ongoing research and shape the direction of the consortium.
