Municipal lender Bank of Beijing has announced the establishment of a new Fintech Innovation Center (科技金融创新中心) while flagging greater financial support for leading tech enterprises.
Bank of Beijing director Zhang Dongning (张东宁) said that the bank would use the fintech innovation centre to to develop a a set of four key platforms for for “business innovation, resource sharing, technological integration and brand promotion.”
The platforms will see the ongoing development of fintech products, services and channels as well as specialised fintech credit assessment systems.
Bank of Beijing is also intent upon expanding its financial support for the tech sector, executing a “Cooperative Memorandum for Supporting the Development of Cutting-edge Tech Enterprises” (支持前沿技术企业发展合作备忘录) with leading companies, investment institutions and industry associations, as well as “cutting-edge tech loan” credit agreements with a slew of different companies.
An executive from the Bank of Beijing said that it planned to provide more than 10 billion yuan in loans to over 300 innovative tech enterprises across the next three years, in order to foster the emergence of China’s next “unicorns.”
According to the executive Bank of Beijing will provide “differentiated services” to tech enterprises that apply for financing, including connections with specialist organisations, preferential loan quotas, online withdrawals and more convenient procedures for account opening.
Bank of Beijing has long sought to establish itself a leading lender to the tech sector, with a tech loan balance of 127.7 billion yuan as of the end of the first quarter of 2018, for an increase of approximately 30% within three year period.
The bank has provided a total of 400 billion yuan in loans to 230,000 small and micro-enterprises in the sector.
