Accenture Invests in Emtech, a Fintech Startup Providing Software-as-a-Service to Central Banks and Fintech Companies

Information and financial technology services company Accenture has invested in fintech startup Emtech, which provides software-as-a-service to central banks and fintech companies.

Accenture has announced an investment in Emtech, a fintech startup that provides software-as-a-service to central banks and fintech companies, which Accenture will integrate into its core banking services.

Emtech was founded in 2019 by Carmelle Cadet, a former IBM Blockchain executive. The company provides a range of services for central banks, including infrastructure for central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), a regulatory sandbox feature, and a compliance feature for financial service providers.

Emtech counts seven central banks among its clients — those of Ghana, Nigeria, the Republic of Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, The Gambia and the Bahamas. It also created a CBDC proof-of-concept for the Bank of the Republic of Haiti.

According to Cadet, Emtech has over 200 fintech clients. The company will also join the Accenture Venture Project Spotlight accelerator.

In August 2023, Emtech received $4 million in seed investment, following a $6 million pre-seed investment in 2022.

Emtech uses a unified ledger model for its CBDC services. In 2021, it partnered with Hedera Hashgraph to offer its Hedera Token Service and the Hedera Consensus Services. In July 2023, it introduced its CBDC Innovation Kit simulator, featuring pre-built application programming interfaces.

Accenture has also worked with the Bank of Canada, the Monetary Authority of Singapore, the European Central Bank and the Swedish Riksbank on CBDCs.

Both Accenture and Emtech are collaborating on the Digital Dollar Project, a foundation led by former Commodity Futures Trading Commission head J. Christopher Giancarlo. Accenture is a founding member of the organization, and Emtech joined its Technical Sandbox Program in 2022.

The vast majority of the world’s central banks are researching or testing CBDCs.