Glossary
Plain-language definitions of the fintech and AI terms you will meet in our programmes and articles.
- AML (anti-money laundering)
- The controls financial institutions use to detect, prevent and report suspicious transactions linked to crime.
- API (application programming interface)
- A defined way for software systems to request data or actions from each other. Banks use APIs to connect apps, partners and internal systems.
- Applied AI
- Using artificial intelligence to solve a specific, real problem, such as spotting fraud or answering customer questions.
- BaaS (Banking as a Service)
- A model in which a licensed bank makes its banking capabilities available to other businesses through APIs, so they can offer financial products under their own brand.
- Capstone
- The final project of a TECHIVE cohort. Teams solve a real industry challenge, then each participant presents and defends their work.
- Cloud computing
- Using computing power, storage and services over the internet instead of running your own servers.
- Cohort
- A group of participants who go through a TECHIVE programme together.
- Core banking system
- The central software that records a bank’s accounts, balances and transactions.
- Digital wallet
- An app that stores payment details or money so people can pay from a phone or computer.
- Embedded finance
- Financial services, such as payments, lending or accounts, built directly into a non-financial product or platform.
- The Hive Frame
- TECHIVE’s connected ecosystem: the financial institutions, technology providers, universities, youth communities and development partners around every cohort.
- KYC (know your customer)
- The checks financial institutions carry out to verify who their customers are.
- Large language model (LLM)
- An AI model trained on large amounts of text that can understand and generate language.
- Localisation
- Adapting a product for a specific market, including language, regulation, currency and customer expectations.
- Machine learning
- A branch of AI in which systems learn patterns from data rather than following fixed rules.
- Neobank
- A bank that serves customers entirely through digital channels, without physical branches.
- Open banking
- Securely sharing a customer’s financial data with authorised third parties, with the customer’s consent, usually through APIs.
- RegTech
- Technology that helps organisations meet regulatory requirements, such as automated reporting or compliance monitoring.
- Regulatory sandbox
- A controlled environment in which a regulator lets firms test new financial products under supervision before a full launch.
- Synthetic data
- Artificially generated data that behaves like real data but contains no real customer information. TECHIVE cohorts use it to work on realistic problems safely.
- The TECHIVE Pathway
- The three stages every participant moves through: Youth (engage potential), Talent (build capability) and Intelligence (apply learning).
- Tokenisation (payments)
- Replacing sensitive data, such as a card number, with a unique substitute value that is useless if stolen.
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