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Maria Gotsch. She\u2019s the president and CEO at the Partnership Fund for New York City, which is the investment arm of the Partnership for New York City. In addition to leading the funds operations, Maria has spearheaded the creation and operation of a number of fund strategic initiatives including The Fintech Innovation Lab. Prior to joining the fund in 1999, Maria was a managing director at a company that is now part of Deutsche Bank, providing strategic and financial advice related to mergers, acquisitions, dispositions, joint ventures and the development of business strategies. Maria worked for LaSalle Partners in the New York area and Merrill Lynch Capital Markets, in both New York and London. She graduated with an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BA from Wellesley College.

Famous Five:

• Favorite Book? \u2013 \u201cA book on the Iranian negotiations with the US around the treaty\u201d
• What CEO do you follow? \u2013 Henry Kravis
• Favorite online tool? \u2014 MyCity Bike app
• How many hours of sleep do you get?\u2014 7 and a half
• If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? \u2013 \u201cBe bold, be bold, be bold!\u201d

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Time Stamped Show Notes:

• 01:11 \u2013 Nathan introduces Maria to the show
• 02:15 \u2013 Partnership Fund is the corporate sector at the table that is trying to grow the NYC economy
  • 02:21 \u2013 Henry Kravis of KKR has raised funds in the late 90s and raised from major corporations and individuals, in NYC
  • 02:32 \u2013 The investor list is the \u201cwho\u2019s who" of the private equity
  • 02:36 \u2013 Partnership Fund was structured as an evergreen fund
  • 02:48 \u2013 \u201cWe can do things that are a little bit riskier and take a little bit longer than a traditional private sector investor\u201d
  • 03:02 \u2013 \u201cWe often work with government, but we\u2019re privately funded\u201d
• 03:13 \u2013 Partnership Fund is like an interest-free loan for 45 years
• 03:33 \u2013 All of Partnership Fund\u2019s gains just go back to their funds and they reinvest it
  • 03:41 \u2013 \u201cWe have the investors\u2019 money for 45 years and if we make returns, it comes back to us to fund new projects\u201d
• 03:58 \u2013 The Fintech Lab is currently in their 7th year and has 75 graduates
  • 04:08 \u2013 It is an elite program and takes 68 companies a year
  • 04:18 \u2013 It is structured as a civic program
  • 04:32 \u2013 The goal of the program is to help reduce the pain and agony of a small emerging company trying to get into and get attention from large financial institutions
  • 05:06 \u2013 \u201cBecause it is competitive to get in, it\u2019s a shark tank to get in, but once you\u2019re in, it\u2019s a dolphin tank\u201d
  • 05:18 \u2013 They get 150-160 applications a year
  • 05:28 \u2013 Companies are selected by their financial institution partners
  • 05:34 \u2013 A company\u2019s technology has to rise to the level of addressing a major pain point for major financial institutions
  • 06:10 \u2013 In some cases, it\u2019s not about an acquisition, it\u2019s about using
  • 06:15 \u2013 The fact that they are a non-profit civic organization is important
  • 06:29 \u2013 CTOs and CIOs will come to the table as a civic program, partly to help grow the fintech community in NYC, to create jobs
  • 07:23 \u2013 They invest in some of the graduates\u2019 post programs
  • 07:30 \u2013 The lab is laser-focused in solving problems
  • 07:41 \u2013 They are not doing any direct-to-consumer programs
• 08:20 \u2013 The big 3: data, security and risk management have been on the top of the CIOs list from the beginning
  • 08:43 \u2013 However, new things are coming
  • 08:47 \u2013 Disruptive talent management has been added as a new category
  • 08:58 \u2013 Blockchain has gone through an interesting cycle
  • 09:14 \u2013 This year, there\u2019s much less interest in blockchain and distributed ledger
• 09:52 \u2013 Maria predicts that in 2 years, there will be an increase of interest in enabling technologies that fit around the distributed ledger
• 10:31 \u2013 In data, Digital Reasoning came into the program with an interesting technology that is able to read unstructured data, and they\u2019re working for the government
  • 11:03 \u2013 They were advised to focus on compliance
• 12:04 \u2013 In security, Centripetal Networks has a perimeter defense technology and they\u2019re gaining traction from people who have a lot of retail locations
• 12:34 \u2013 In risk management, Quarule automates some of the processing of regulatory tracking and flagging operations against the regulations
• 13:23 \u2013 In blockchain, Digital Asset Holdings has raised a significant amount of money and has been involved in some major projects
• 13:50 \u2013 Maria shares how they are telling companies to create more jobs in NYC
  • 14:02 \u2013 The companies will also realize that they need to have people on the ground in NYC
  • 14:20 \u2013 Some have moved to their headquarters in NYC
• 14:46 \u2013 \u201cWe\u2019ve not raised money since the late 90s\u201d
  • 14:50 \u2013 The initial fund size was $120M
• 15:46 \u2013 New York is starting to be seen as a center for fintech
• 16:34 \u2013 There are some smaller companies that are trying to go after pieces and as they scale, the acquisition cost is increasingly expensive
  • 17:05 \u2013 LearnVest is a good example
• 17:40 \u2013 The small business lenders come to a market that the banks aren\u2019t servicing
  • 18:00 \u2013 There are companies who are an exception to the rule
• 18:17 \u2013 Most of the companies end up partnering with large institutions
• 18:54 \u2013 What the large financial institutions have is expertise and compliance
• 20:10 \u2013 The Famous Five

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3 Key Points:

1. The trend in the fintech space is constantly changing.
2. Creating more jobs in New York City means more opportunities for companies and for the people of New York.
3. Be BOLD\u2014don\u2019t shrink, don\u2019t hesitate\u2014just go for it.

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Resources Mentioned:

• The Top Inbox \u2013 The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences
• Organifi \u2013 The juice was Nathan\u2019s life saver during his trip in Southeast Asia
• Klipfolio \u2013 Track your business performance across all departments for FREE
• Acuity Scheduling \u2013 Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments
• Host Gator\u2013 The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible
• Audible\u2013 Nathan uses Audible when he\u2019s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books
• Freshbooks \u2013 Nathan doesn\u2019t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW

Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives