As leaders in Mexico’s financial sector, we navigate a complex reality: the demand for digital innovation is accelerating, while we operate on an infrastructure with inherent friction. Closed systems, a true lack of interoperability, and high costs for cross-border transactions are not just technical problems; they are business barriers that limit growth, inclusion, and the customer experience.
But what if there was an opportunity to experiment with a new layer of infrastructure, an open standard designed for money to flow as easily as data on the internet?
That opportunity was the focus of a fundamental conversation we had this past September 2nd in the webinar “Interledger Hackathon: Introduction to Open Payments.” That session, which you can now watch in its full recording, was just the beginning. Now, that vision becomes a tangible challenge: the Interledger Hackathon, in partnership with Finnosummit, which will be held in Mexico City on the upcoming November 8th and 9th.
This event is much more than a programming competition; it is an invitation for your organization to actively explore and build the next generation of financial services.
The Diagnosis: What is Really Slowing Down Payment Innovation
In a recent preparatory webinar, experts from the Interledger Foundation (ILF) and Finnosummit not only talked about technology but also pinpointed the problems holding the ecosystem back:
- The Real Cost of Friction: Alex Lakatos, CTO of ILF, shared a powerful anecdote about a community in Oaxaca where sending a remittance from the U.S. can cost up to 18% and take 3 days. This is not an isolated case; it is the face of a systemic inefficiency that drains value from the economy and limits the well-being of millions.
- The Interoperability Wall: Despite advancements, our financial ecosystems continue to operate in silos. Banks, SOFOMEs, wallets, and neobanks struggle to communicate fluently, creating fragmented user experiences and limiting the creation of truly integrated products.
- The Operational Barrier for New Business Models: As discussed in the webinar, a marketplace that facilitates a transaction is forced to obtain a Payment Service Provider (PSP) license because it “touches the money” in the process. This adds a layer of regulatory and cost complexity that stifles innovation before it can scale.
The Proposed Solution: An Open Standard for Payments (Open Payments)
Interledger’s proposal is not another closed product, but an open protocol (ILP) that functions as a fundamental layer for communication between different payment networks. As Alex described it, it’s about making money behave like the internet. This translates into direct strategic benefits for your business:
- New Business Models, Less Bureaucracy: With Open Payments, the marketplace from the example above can instruct a payment to be split at the source (90% to the seller, 10% to the platform) without touching the funds. This unlocks business potential without the operational and regulatory burden of becoming a payment institution.
- Radical Reduction in Costs and Times: Interledger’s technology allows for transactions in milliseconds and with costs that can be as low as 0%, compared to days and double-digit commissions in traditional remittance corridors.
- Enabling Micro-transactions: Unlike traditional networks, whose old infrastructure does not support low-value payments, Interledger was designed for it. This opens the door to models like streaming payments or pay-per-use that are unfeasible today but are demanded by the creator economy and the IoT.
The Laboratory: Why Sending Your Team to the Hackathon is a Strategic Investment
For an innovation leader, a CEO, or a department director, the value of the hackathon transcends the prizes of up to $5,000 USD. The real gain is strategic:
- Accelerated, Low-Risk Innovation: In 24 hours, your team can develop and validate a functional prototype for a real problem within your organization. It’s a controlled experimentation environment to test business hypotheses that, in a normal corporate cycle, would take months and a significantly larger investment.
- Elite Training and Intrapreneurship: This event is the most relevant intensive training program you can offer your technology, product, and business development teams. They will work with a cutting-edge API, receive direct mentorship from Interledger experts, and develop a problem-solving mindset to bring back to your organization.
- Competitive Intelligence and a High-Level Ecosystem: The partnership with Finnosummit guarantees that the event will bring together the brightest and most ambitious profiles in the region. It is an unparalleled opportunity to evaluate external talent, understand the solutions others are building, and position your brand at the epicenter of innovation.
To the CEOs, Innovation Directors, and leaders of banking and Fintech in Mexico: the future of payments will not wait. The question is not if new open standards will emerge, but who will be the first to master and capitalize on them.
Don’t just send your team to compete; send them to explore, to learn, and to bring back the prototype of your next great product.
Registrations are free, but spots are limited and subject to a rigorous selection process to ensure the highest quality of participation.